Experiment 3: Pasta Toscana (Grazie, Rachel Ray)

What you need:
• About 2/3 pound of dry spaghetti
• A giant bottle of $5 Chianti
• Olive oil
• ¼ pound of pancetta, chopped (or you can skip the pancetta and make this a veg-safe recipe)
• 3 garlic cloves, chopped
• Red pepper flakes
• ½ pint portabella mushrooms, chopped
• 4 cups shredded or chopped kale
• Rosemary

What you do:
Pour ½ the cheap-ass bottle of Chianti into a large pot. Add some water, until you have enough liquid to cook about 2/3 of a box of spaghetti. When it starts boiling, cook the spaghetti until al dente. PROTIP: save about ½ cup of the cooking liquid before you drain it all. Or you will be sad later on when you have to eat dry, nasty pasta.

While the pasta gets all cook-y, slop a big dollop of olive oil into a big skillet and throw in the chopped pancetta. Cook it until it’s golden brown, and then transfer it from a pan to a big pile of paper towels, so that you can blot off some of the incredible, incredible amounts of grease. Leave as much of the olive oil in the pan as you can, so that you can throw the mushrooms into nice meat-flavored cooking oil, along with a few shakes of dried rosemary from your spice rack. Once those are done cooking, push them to the side and add in the garlic and a few shakes of red pepper flakes. Cook them for 1 or 2 minutes, and then mix them together with the mushrooms to cook for just a little longer. Next time I make this, I plan to add in some cherry tomatoes, which should probably be added around now so that they don’t overcook and asplode.

Add the shredded kale to the mushroom pan. Toss it a few times until it’s starting to wilt. Then you can add the ½ cup of cooking liquid you saved. You didn’t forget to save it, did you? Let everything cook down for a little while.

Have you drained your pasta yet? No?! Well, hurry up and drain it already. Once you’ve done that, you can add it to the pan with the veggies so that it soaks up some of the newly meaty, oily, delicious cooking liquid. Let it sit for a minute, and then serve it hot.

Pour yourself a glass of cheap-ass Chianti. Eat pasta - PINK pasta. Life is good.

Time needed: ****: A little less than ½ hour. Totally worth it.
Deliciousness: **** 1/2: Dude. You are eating wine-soaked noodles with bacon’s schmancy cousin slathered all over it.
Serving size: **** : Makes about 3 servings, but it could be stretched by using more pasta. I just prefer a lower noodle-to-topping ratio.
Ingredients: *** ½ : Easy to find. The only negative is that pancetta is a bit pricy – eliminate that and this becomes a cheap recipe as well as a simple one.




The bottom line: Mamma mia! É delizioso e facile.