Olive Garden Announces First-Ever Lifetime Pasta Pass

Free pasta for life sounds too good to be true, but it's not. Olive Garden's annual Never Ending Pasta Pass is back again, and in addition to the 24,000 people who will get their hands on the normal pass, 50 will have the chance to upgrade it to the first-ever lifetime option. Just like the name implies, this new lifetime pasta pass grants diners unlimited pasta, sauce and toppings, soup, salad and breadsticks for the rest of their days.

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OG's Pasta Pass goes on sale Thursday, August 15, at 2 p.m. EST. These are $100 each. The first 50 guests who purchase their Pasta Pass will have the option to opt in for the Lifetime Pasta Pass for an additional $400 ($500 total). The chain is recommending that hopefuls join the "waiting room" on its website at 1:55 p.m. EST so that they're queued up and ready to go once the clock strikes 2 p.m.

If you're lucky enough to score the Never Ending Pasta Pass, you'll get nine weeks of unlimited pasta from September 23 through November 24. If you were to take advantage of the perk once a day, it would amount to $1.59 per visit. Now if you used the Lifetime Pasta Pass once a day for the next 60 years, each visit would cost less than three cents and the $500 you shelled out for the card would be paid off by your 45th bowl. You can't beat that. 

If you don't win the race for one of these passes, you can still get lots of grub on the cheap at Olive Garden starting September 23, when the Never Ending Pasta Bowl promotion kicks off. All guests have the option of order unlimited servings of their favorite noodles, sauce and toppings, plus soup or salad and breadsticks, starting at $10.99 per person. Well folks, it looks like carbs are in the stars for fall 2019. And if you can't get your paws on the pass, get yourself a nice cheese grater and pile that Parmesan on pasta recipes like Grandma used to make.