Mar 24, 2022

Pasta alla Boscaiola

Pasta alla Boscaiola (“woodsman-style pasta”) features a rich blend of mushrooms and bacon tossed with pasta in a silky garlic-herb tomato cream sauce. It’s earthy, smoky, creamy and unbelievably delicious.

Pasta alla Boscaiola

If I could gather all of my favorite things into a single pasta dish, pasta alla boscaiola would be it. ♡

Somehow I never crossed paths with this classic Tuscan “woodsman-style” pasta until a few years ago. But the moment I saw its ingredients listed on the menu of our favorite cozy neighborhood artisan pasta shop, I knew instantly that this pasta would be love at first, savory, al dente bite. I mean, a rich blend of mushrooms (including Italy’s beloved porcini), chewy diced pancetta (or bacon or sausage), loads of sautéed shallots and garlic, chopped fresh rosemary and thyme, all tossed together with al dente pasta in a rich white wine tomato cream sauce and finished with a sprinkling of freshly-grated Parmesan?

COUNT ME IN.

This dish is unapologetically rich and indulgent and packed with bold mushroom flavor. And while I’ve read that there are countless regional variations on ways to prepare pasta alla boscaiola around Italy, this particular recipe has become my personal favorite.

As I explain more below, boscaiola sauces are traditionally made with foraged mushrooms (hence the name, as bosca means “forest”). But since we live about as far away from the forest here as possible here in Barcelona’s city center, and fresh wild mushrooms can be difficult to come by, I’ve written this version instead using fresh baby bella and dried porcini mushrooms that are much more available to us here year-round. Dried porcinis also give us a double bonus in this recipe because, in addition to being chopped and added to the pasta, we get to add the leftover hot veggie broth used to soften them to the pasta sauce as well, which means SO much extra umami flavor for all of you mushroom lovers out there. Yum.

I also love the salty flavor and chewy bite that diced pancetta adds to this recipe, but smoky thick-cut bacon or Italian sausage would work well here too. Or if you prefer to make this dish vegetarian, you can omit the meat altogether and we can vouch that it will still be delicious. I’ve also included lots of options for variations in the notes below, including how to make your version gluten-free or incorporate other add-ins traditionally used in pasta boscaiola around various parts of Italy. But whatever variation you choose, I’m pretty sure you can’t go wrong here.

Pasta alla boscaiola is total comfort food that has become a total favorite here in our home. So go round up some mushrooms, and let’s cook a batch together!

(more…)



source https://www.gimmesomeoven.com/pasta-alla-boscaiola-recipe/

0 comments:

Post a Comment