Pennette alla boscaiola – English version

Recipes for refugees: the challenge.
For every € 5 collected, I will post photos, ingredients, preparation and if I can a video (which is really not my thing but I’ll try!) of an unpublished recipe from my book “La pasta per al catalans”, which is no longer on sale. Also in English of course!

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been living the last few weeks with anxiety, with a feeling of helplessness. My photos, the recipes, the little holiday I enjoyed, it seems all a little out of place. There is always this sense of guilt. But we can’t stop living. We do have a responsibility towards our families, our society. We have to do things.
Since cooking for me is a hobby, a passion and I like to share what I do, I decided to use it to raise funds. Let’s see what happens. And thank you for reading until the end. You can donate from Instagram. The entire amount will go directly to Unicef.

The main ingredient in pasta alla boscaiola (which in Italian means “from the forest”) is mushrooms, preferably porcini. The recipe has many variants: with tomato, with sour cream, with or without sausage. This one, along with black olives, is my favorite. And since fresh mushrooms aren’t easy to find (especially when it’s not in season), I used dried mushrooms.

Ingredients

  • 320 g of pasta
  • 1 small onion
  • 30 g of dried mushrooms
  • 100 g of pancetta
  • 600 g ripe tomatoes (can be canned)
  • 50 g of black olives
  • 50 ml of oil
  • salt and pepper

Preparation

• Soak the mushrooms in warm water and leave them for at least an hour.
• Remove the pits from the olives and set aside.
• Dice the bacon and chop the onion.
• Peel the tomatoes (yuo can  scald them first; this will make it easierto peel them), remove the seeds and cut them into pieces not too small.
• Heat the oil in a large frying pan and add the onion. Add the bacon and cook until tender. Fat has to become transparent.
• Add the tomatoes, salt and pepper and cook with a lid for 10 minutes.
• Add olives and mushrooms. Cook everything for another 10 minutes on low heat until tomatoes are cooked.
• Boil the pasta in salted water and when al dente pour it back into the cooking pot. Add half the sauce and stir. Serve and complete each dish with a tablespoon of sauce and a good chopped parsley.

Observations

You can make the same preparation with fresh mushrooms, if it is early and you find it. In this case, clean them with a damp cloth, cut them into slices and add them to the fried onion and bacon. When they are almost cooked, add the tomatoes.

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