Tag: inspiration

Paccheri with Mushrooms, Gorgonzola, and Mascarpone Cream

Paccheri are undoubtedly the most majestic kind of short pasta one can find! With a diameter of 1 ½ inch (4 cm), thick walls, and a rough surface, each guarantees an unbeatable bite, or two!

The Paccheri shape originates in the Campania region of Italy, which is also where you find Gragnano – a town near Naples recognized as the capital of dried pasta. As you can imagine, when I stumbled upon a box of Paccheri made in Gragnano, I couldn’t resist!

However, I was still waiting for inspiration for the right sauce that would bring out the fantastic character of this pasta. As a northern Italian, now that it’s colder outside, I naturally drifted towards creamy mushrooms. But that wasn’t enough. So I added Gorgonzola for a pleasant blue kick and Mascarpone for extra creaminess and depth. The resulting recipe is very straightforward, quick to make, and very forgiving in the amounts, even in the timing.

Ingredients for 2 servings

  • 5 oz Paccheri (150 g) (can also use Rigatoni or other short dried pasta of sufficient presence)
  • 1 Tbsp coarse salt
  • 5-6 chestnut mushrooms (about 100 g), sliced
  • 2 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 1 Tbsp butter
  • 1 Tbsp olive oil
  • 2 Tbsp white wine
  • 2 Tbsp Mascarpone (about 75 g)
  • 2 Tbsp Gorgonzola (about 75 g)
  • 1/4 cup double cream
  • 1/4 cup Parmigiano, grated
  • table salt

Preparation

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add a Tbsp of coarse salt per 2 liters of water.
2. In a large nonstick pan, heat up oil and butter, add the crushed garlic.

3. Add the sliced mushrooms to the pan and roast them at high heat.
4. Continue sautéing the mushrooms until they have softened.

5. Start boiling the pasta for the time written on the box (usually around 14 minutes), which corresponds to an al-dente cooking level.
6. Add a splash of white wine to the mushrooms and let evaporate completely.

7. When the pasta is 5 minutes from ready, go back to the mushrooms, remove the garlic, and season lightly with salt.
8. Add the Mascarpone, Gorgonzola, and cream.

9. Still keeping very low heat, add ½ of the grated Parmigiano and mix everything into a creamy sauce. Note: should the sauce become too thick, add some of the pasta water.
10. When the pasta is ready, drain it quickly and add it to the pan with the sauce. Note: save some of the pasta water by draining the pasta back into the pan where it was boiled.

11. Finish cooking the pasta in the sauce for a couple of minutes, adding some of the pasta water to ensure the sauce remains silky smooth. This won’t overcook the pasta.
12. Plate gently into preheated bowls, then sprinkle with the rest of the Parmigiano.

Paccheri with Mushrooms, Gorgonzola, and Mascarpone Cream

Yield: 2 servings

Total Time: 30 minutes

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Paccheri with Mushrooms, Gorgonzola, and Mascarpone Cream

Ingredients

  • 5 oz Paccheri (150 g) (can also use Rigatoni or other short dried pasta of sufficient presence)
  • 1 Tbsp coarse salt
  • 5-6 chestnut mushrooms (about 100 g), sliced
  • 2 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 1 Tbsp butter
  • 1 Tbsp olive oil
  • 2 Tbsp white wine
  • 2 Tbsp Mascarpone (about 75 g)
  • 2 Tbsp Gorgonzola (about 75 g)
  • 1/4 cup double cream
  • 1/4 cup Parmigiano, grated
  • table salt

Preparation

  1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add a Tbsp of coarse salt per 2 liters of water.
  2. In a large nonstick pan, heat up oil and butter, add the crushed garlic.
  3. Add the sliced mushrooms to the pan and roast them at high heat.
  4. Continue until the mushrooms have softened.
  5. Start boiling the pasta for the time written on the box (usually around 14 minutes).
  6. Add a splash of white wine to the pan and let it evaporate completely.
  7. When the pasta is 5 minutes from ready, go back to the mushrooms pan, remove the garlic, and season them lightly with salt.
  8. Then add the Mascarpone, the Gorgonzola, and the cream.
  9. Still keeping very low heat, add 1/2 of the grated Parmigiano and mix everything into a creamy sauce. Note: should the sauce become too thick, add some of the pasta water.
  10. When the pasta is ready, drain it quickly and add it to the pan with the sauce. Note: save some of the pasta water by draining the pasta back into the pan where it was boiled.
  11. Finish cooking the pasta in the sauce for a couple of minutes, adding some of the pasta water to ensure the sauce remains silky smooth. This won't overcook the pasta.
  12. Plate gently into preheated bowls, then sprinkle with the rest of the Parmigiano.
https://www.disgracesonthemenu.com/2021/12/paccheri-with-mushrooms-gorgonzola-and-mascarpone-cream.html

Eleven years of blogging, eight of podcasting

Another year! The good news is that this blog is still active and luckily keeps being found by those searching for Italian specialties like pizzoccheri or canederli or Italian misconceptions like my 6 Italian myths. The bad news of course is that I haven’t posted any new articles or recipes this year. I know, it’s terrible – but it’s also okay, given that social media has taken the place of blogging in many ways.

But I did resume podcasting (yay!) and produced 16 new episodes with as many guests and collaborations this past year! This continues to be a lot of fun for me and I’ve already started to work on a new round of episodes to hopefully reach my dream milestone of 100 episodes very soon!

Here is a list of the episodes this year. Thanks again to all of my wonderful guests!

On a personal level, we keep well here in southern England, still working from home and enjoying plenty of homecooked food. We pretty much spend our time planning meals, cooking, cleaning the kitchen, and being grateful for having a dishwasher. As the government lifted all social distancing measures exactly two weeks ago, we are far from back to normal, unfortunately. Traveling is still not really possible, including to and from Italy which of course breaks our hearts. But we enjoy our area, which is wonderfully green after a very wet summer, and spending time with our cat Rascal, who just turned 19, overall doing great and still a great source of comfort and inspiration to us both.

I hope you’re all well, wherever you are, and please get in touch for collaborations, to be on the podcast, or just to say hi – I’d love that 🙂

[Thoughts on the Table – 56] Italians of the World – Introducing Linda from Signorina Spaghetti

Thoughts on the Table is back with a new guest: Linda from Signorina Spaghetti. I discovered Linda’s blog only quite recently, but I immediately offered her the Cannolo Award for contributing to preserving the true flavors of Italy in the world! In the episode, Linda talks about what brought her to Brussels, Belgium and about her motivations for starting a blog, which she describes through hilarious examples and colorful stories. She also talks about her inspiration as a cook, her most important recipes and what’s behind them, and her plans for future projects and collaborations. Whether you already know Linda or not, join me to hear more about her and about how much Italians in the world have in common!

You can follow Linda also on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Youtube, and Twitter @signaspaghetti.

Listen now!
   

[Thoughts on the Table – 23] Introducing Christina Conte from Christina’s Cucina

As part of the series: Italians of the World, I have the pleasure to interview the author of Christina’s Cucina: Christina Conte, a talented food blogger of Italian descent, born in Scotland and based in Los Angeles.

In this episode, Christina shares what motivates her as a food blogger, including the preservation of traditional Italian dishes. She also reveals one of her sources of inspiration in the development of original recipes.

You can follow Christina’s Cucina on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram.

Listen now!
   

Two Years of Blogging

Another year has gone by, marking Quatro Fromaggio’s second birthday, and the time for me to look back at 12 more months of blogging!

With about 30 articles published, I managed to keep my resolution of posting at least once every two weeks, having failed my real resolution to post every week. Out of the 19 new recipes, a few became quite popular, confirming that people go to food blogs when they are looking for genuine recipes.

I presented an appetizer (Cannellini and Radicchio Crostini), a summer salad (Insalata di Riso), two second courses (Asparagi alla Milanese, Frittatona di Cipolle), one side (Polenta Taragna), two desserts (Caldarroste and Tiramisu), one soup (Summer Minestra), one risotto (Saffron and Leek), several pasta dishes (Pesto, Potatoes and Green Beans Pasta, Bell Pepper Pasta, Pasta alla Norma, Egg Pasta with Green Beans and Mushrooms, Baked Shells Pasta with Ricotta and Spinach, Tagliolini with Mushrooms, Eggs and Smoked Scamorza Pasta), and, finally, the interesting Canederli, the Italian version of Knödel.

As you may have noticed, Quatro Fromaggio has the “unadvertised feature” of containing all vegetarian (lacto-ovo) recipes, most of which being first courses. This is because my wife and I have a vegetarian household and because these are the recipes that I enjoy cooking the most. In the coming year, I would like to present more sides dishes, appetizers, and a few second courses.

By posting more new recipes, I had the opportunity to work on my food photography. I still have a long way to go, but I think I managed to make my recipes look at least appetizing, which is actually quite challenging. I invested a bit in the equipment, but I also followed a few important tips, such as the ones from Michael Ray and from Katherine Martinelli.

Still, recipes are not the main focus of this blog; the main focus is to talk about Italian culture and the difference between contemporary (continental) Italian food and its misrepresentations around the world. As I expected, having covered in year one all the basic Italian themes (and most of my pet peeves), I now have to dig deeper to find new topics and do much more research. This is the real reason why I have so many recipes this year, relatively to the number of articles – I keep posting recipes because the articles take longer to write! However, this also means that I’m learning a lot – instead of just comparing Italian products to their North American counterparts, I now need to understand the reasons of this difference. For the Italian Myths article, for instance, I discovered a lot about Italian-American cuisine, of which I admit I didn’t know much about. Other articles were about: Panini, Ravioli, Limoncello, Amaretti and Amaretto, Tomatoes, and Coffee.

This year I also ran one interesting experiment, the Pasta Calendar giveaway offered to all who participated in a Quiz on Italian cuisine. Many took the test, and I very much enjoyed looking at the results. Especially because they confirmed that there is still very much need for blogs like mine!

But the most interesting initiative of the entire year is, without doubt, the introduction of the Cannolo Award, which has gained far more popularity than I expected by reaching several acclaimed food blogs, and by being proudly displayed by most of them. The inspiration came from the many awards that food bloggers give to other food bloggers as recognition for good work and to cross-link. I’ve always dreamed of some kind of “certification” for food that is presented as “Italian”, as for any other regional or ethnic food. Wouldn’t it be awesome to dine at Paolo’s Italian Restaurant, licensed and certified? Well, I thought, at least let’s certify food blogs! I would like to thank my wife Candace for coming up with the name (which then gave birth to the logo) – I think it played a big part in the award’s success.

As usual, thanks all for reading! Please contact me if you have any request or suggestion, or please post a comment. Feedback is always welcome.

Seven Links

A few days ago I had the honor of being nominated by Nami (@ Just One Cookbook) for the Seven Links Challenge. It consists of selecting seven of my existing posts based on as many given criteria and explaining the reasons behind the choices. So, here I go!

1. The most beautiful post

 

As my most “beautiful” post, I have chosen Risotto with Porcini Mushrooms. This is mostly because I like the picture, a lucky single shot taken on a trip to Italy. After this became my first recipe on Quatro Fromaggio, I continued posting more recipes and realized how hard food photography really is!

2. The most popular post

formaggi

According to Google Analytics, the Formaggio Cheese post is the one that reached my highest number of views so far. Several people find this article while searching for a particular type of Italian cheese. Hopefully, it answers their questions!

3. The most controversial post

pasta

Pretty much every single article on Quatro Fromaggio has some level of controversy. The whole premise of this blog is to compare authentic Italian food to its many aberrations, and my role can’t be too accommodating towards the “offenders” 🙂 In the Pasta 101 article, however, the controversy is in the reference to the Atkins debate.

4. The most helpful post

pasta-names

home-made lightbox
My home-made lightbox

Pasta Names Explained has been called out as the most informative by commenters. This makes me really happy because of the effort that went into the preparation. The collection of the various pictures was the challenge. Since I didn’t want to buy all the different types of pasta at once, I came up with a system based on a home-made lightbox that I could carry with me and use to take pictures in almost identical conditions over time.

5. The post that was surprisingly successful

pizzoccheri

I didn’t think that Google would rank Pizzoccheri della Valtellina as high as it does. In fact, most people come across this page through the search engines. Pizzoccheri is a relatively unknown dish outside of Italy – most readers are probably Italians.

6. The post that did not get the attention it deserved

Possibly because I posted it when not many people knew about this blog, but Eating Vegetarian didn’t do as well as I hoped. My fiancée is a vegetarian (and the artist who painted the above picture), and I firmly believe in yummy vegetarian food where nobody would lament the lack of meat. Italian food often qualifies as such.

7. The post I am most proud of

The research work behind Rice Demystified was one of the most productive and satisfying for me. I quickly answered my own questions and I started producing the illustrations, starting from my own scans of real rice grains. I really enjoyed that 🙂

~~~~~

And now to the part where I nominate 5 bloggers and pass the Seven Links Challenge on to them. I have chosen some that I have been following for quite some time, and that have been a great source of motivation and inspiration for me: