For my third post, I decided to take on a dish that could be a little more challenging for me, concerning the preparation. So, I decided to take on a spaghetti dish with two different types of mushrooms!
This recipe required lots of multi-tasking. First, I had to soak dried mushrooms in warm water, then give them a rough chop. I also had to slice mushrooms but I purchased pre-sliced to save time. For washing the mushrooms, Smith mentions, "If you must wash them, just rinse them quickly, and then drain and dry them before cooking them" (Smith 231). I followed this method and let the mushrooms dry off while I prepared the spaghetti and sauce.
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| Re-hydrating the mushrooms |
When cooking spaghetti, it's important to salt your water because your pasta will be tasteless without it. Smith recommends fresh pasta for these dishes, but if that isn't available to you pasta made from semolina or durum wheat is preferred since it isn't prone to becoming soggy (Smith 140).
After the spaghetti was cooked and drained, I began to prepare the sauce. First, I heated up olive oil in a steep pan and added pureed garlic since I didn't have fresh garlic. I also added garlic powder for more flavor. Second, I added the two types of mushrooms and let them cook for about six minutes.
Finally, I added the remaining ingredients including heavy whipping cream, salt, and pepper. Following this, I let the mushrooms cook in the pot for a few more minutes. This step took the longest because I had to decide when the mushrooms seemed to have soaked up enough of the cream. I added the cooked spaghetti into the sauce pot and incorporated it into the sauce. It ended up being too dry, so I added in the rest of the cream instead of just the initial quarter cup.
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| Mushroom sauce with added cream |
If I were to make this dish again, I would have added the sauce to the pasta when serving rather than mixing it in. Jeff Smith actually recommends this, but I overlooked this step in the recipe. It ended up being a challenge to fully incorporate the sauce when the pasta was in the same pot. Additionally, I would have added less dehydrated mushrooms into the pasta. Fresh mushrooms have less flavor compared to the dry kind; the dehydrated mushrooms pack a punch!
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| Mixed spaghetti with sauce and cheese |
This dish was really creamy and you could definitely taste the mushrooms. If you aren't a fan of mushrooms, you will not enjoy this recipe. This is a perfect winter time dish because it really fills you up! If you'd like a little less mushroom flavor ringing through, I'd suggest adding in shredded mozzarella or Parmesan.
Do you have specific techniques for cooking mushrooms? Have you cooked with fresh pasta before and seen a difference in flavor?
Smith, Jeff. The Frugal Gourmet. Ballantine Books, 1984.
Your dish looks delicious, Fahimah! This is something I would want to make. I have never cooked mushrooms and fresh pasta before but would love to. The only pasta I have cooked came straight out of the box. After making this, what do you think you could do next time to improve the dish?
ReplyDeleteThank you, Brandon! If I were to improve the dish, I would have added half the amount of dried mushrooms for a more mild flavor. Also, I would have cooked the mushrooms for less time in the sauce since they ended up creating a lot of moisture that diluted the cream. Adding some mozzarella instead of parmesan would really make the sauce creamy :)
ReplyDeleteFahima, the pasta looks really good! I don't think I've tried spaghetti with mushrooms, but it seems like it would taste amazing! I've honestly never tried cooking with fresh pasta before, or mushrooms. Have you ever tried making pasta with different vegetables? If so, were they easier than this dish?
ReplyDeleteThanks so much, Ubah! I usually make pasta with different vegetables, primarily tomatoes and onions, or anything we have on hand at home. I would say that different vegetables are easier to cook in pasta compared to mushrooms, because they don't have as much moisture.
DeleteYum! The dish came out so very! It reminds me a little of my grandmothers asparagus and mushroom pasta. Have you ever thought about using Bigoli noodles instead of spaghetti?
ReplyDeleteThank you, Rodas! I actually didn't think about using anything other than spaghetti when cooking this recipe. However, looking at bigoli noodles, that would have also been a good choice for this recipe since it is thicker than spaghetti and could soak up the cream in the sauce.
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