Creamy Pasta with Pancetta, Peas and Mushrooms
On a recent trip to St. Louis, I visited the famous “Hill” area. In its early years it was a neighborhood predominantly made up of immigrants from Northern Italy and over time became predominantly Italian Americans. The famous baseball player, Yogi Berra grew up on the Hill. Today you’ll find charming streets filled with brownstone style walk up homes and Catholic churches. For foodies, it offers up Italian markets, bakeries and Italian American style restaurants. During my recent visit, I spent a lot of time (actually 2 trips) at the Di Gregorio Market on Daggett Avenue. I loaded up on many items that I cannot source in my small, mid-Missouri city. One of the items I brought home was fresh pancetta. So of course it was time to think about using this delicious pork belly in a pasta dish.
Pancetta is salted pork belly that has been coated in salt and other spices and rolled. This delicious rolled pork belly has nearly equal amounts of meat and fat. The perfect thing to slice or cut into cubes/lardons like I did for this recipe. Pancetta can be used as a substitute for the more difficult to source Guanciale (pork cheek) in the famous Roman dish, Spaghetti alla carbonara. It’s silky, salty and slightly sweet flavors are much different that our heavily salted and smoked American style bacon.
One of the most important things I’ve learned from my study of Italian cooking and cooking classes I’ve taken in Italy is to always ADD your cooked pasta to the sauce in the original skillet or pot. Italians would never cook pasta, pour it into a serving bowl and top it with the sauce. Placing the hot, al dente pasta into the sauce pot and the gently tossing it allows the pasta to continue to cook and absorb all of the delicious sauce. It is true, the al dente (to the tooth) still firm pasta acts like a sponge once it’s added to a hot sauce. Lastly, when you add the cooked pasta to the sauce and then toss, every strand of pasta will be coated with the beautiful sauce you worked so hard to make! Finally, most Italian cooks know the importance of using the hot, starchy pasta water to thin out their sauces right before serving. So helpful if you notice that once you add your pasta to the skillet and it seems to have absorbed most of the sauce, add in a ladle full or 2 or 3 to the skillet until you get a silky, creamy consistency. I hope you’ll consider trying the tossing and hot pasta water methods to your skills in cooking Italian.
This recipe is simple and only takes about a half an hour to put together. Feel free to sub in and out items that you may already have in your kitchen…but if you can source some sweet and salty pancetta, you will be rewarded with a truly authentic Italian staple. If you find your way to St. Louis some day you might want to carve out some time for a little visit to the charming Hill neighborhood to visit their Italian markets, bakeries and restaurants. Buon Appetito!
Creamy Pasta with Pancetta, Peas and Mushrooms
Ingredients
- 1/2 pound long pasta (bucatini is my favorite)
- 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1/2 pound pancetta, small cubes
- 1 large leek, sliced into 1/2 inch rounds
- 8 ounces white mushrooms, sliced
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 1 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
- 1 cup frozen sweet peas
- 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup half n half
- 1/2 lemon (grated rind and juice)
- 1/2 cup shredded Italian cheese (Pecorino or Parmesan)
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley
Instructions
- Heat large pot of water to boiling
- Once boiling add 2-3 tablespoons of kosher salt
- In a large, deep skillet heat olive oil and pancetta over medium heat
- Cook pancetta until fat is rendered and pork is crispy
- Remove cooked pancetta from pan and place on paper towel lined plate
- To same skillet, add leeks, mushrooms, salt and pepper. Saute for about 8 minutes until leeks and mushrooms are soft
- Meanwhile, add pasta to salted, boiling water and cook until al dente (still a bit firm)
- To the skillet with the leeks and mushrooms, now add the cooked pancetta, peas, garlic and half n half and saute for about 3-4 minutes.
- Turn heat off and add grated lemon rind, lemon juice and cooked pasta to the skillet.
- Gently toss pasta in sauce…be sure to add additional HOT pasta cooking water to the pan until you have a silky, smooth sauce.
- Place pasta into bowls and top with freshly chopped parsley.
