Vegetarian Pasta Recipes – Pasta With Mushrooms

This easy vegetarian pasta recipe is a popular dish that is loved by not only vegetarians but also non vegetarians as well. It’s a simple pasta recipe that should take no more than 15 minutes to prepare. The good thing about this vegetarian pasta recipe is that you can use a variety of pasta such as ruote, penne, fusilli or eliche. For the shapes of the pasta, there is a brief description after the ingredients in below.

Vegetarian Pasta With Mushrooms

This hearty vegetarian pasta can be served with warm ciabatta. Ciabatta is famous flat oblong bread having a moist interior and a crispy crust. This combination makes an excellent lunch or dinner. Fresh wild mushrooms can be used instead of chestnut mushroom but they are seasonal and often expensive.

The dish is not only delicious but also very nutritious with low calorie and fat. It has high calcium and fibre and contains absolutely zero cholesterol. This excellent vegetarian pasta recipe is perfect for someone who is on diet or in the process of losing weight. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

Serves 4

• 15g/ ½ oz dried porcini mushrooms
• 175ml/6fl oz/¾ cup warm water
• 45ml/3tbsp olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 handful fresh flat leaf parsley, roughly chopped
• 2 large pieces drained sun-dried tomato in olive oil, sliced into thin strips
• 120ml/4fl oz/ ½ cup dry white wine
• 225g/8oz/2 cups vegetable stock
• 450g/1lb/ 4 cups dried short pasta shapes, e.g. ruote, penne, fusilli or eliche
• Salt and ground black pepper
• Rocket (arugula) and fresh flat leaf parsley to garnish

*Ruote is a round, wide pasta, with spokes coming into a central round, hollow axle.

*Penne is a 2 inch long pasta, about the width of a fat fountain pen, with a hole right down it’s length to absorb some pasta sauce.

*Fusilli - Though many call it a spiral, Fusilli is actually a helix.

Steps by Steps Cooking Instructions:

1. The first thing that you need to do is to soften the dried porcini mushrooms. Use warm water and pour it in a large bowl. Leave the mushroom in the bowl with the warm water for 15 to 20 minutes.

2. After that, when the mushrooms are soft enough, transfer them to a fine sieve or strainer. At this stage, remember to put a bowl under the sieve or strainer to contain the water.

3. Squeeze the mushrooms with your hands as much as you can to release the water absorbed by the soaked mushrooms. Reserve the strained soaking liquid. After that, chop the porcini mushrooms finely into small pieces.

4. In a large pan, heat the oil and cook the garlic, sun-dried tomato strips and the mushrooms over low heat. Stir often so that they are cooked evenly. Stir for about 5 minutes.

5. Stir in the wine, simmer for a few minutes until reduced, then stir in the chestnut mushrooms. Pour in the stock and simmer, uncovered, for 15 to 20 minutes more until the liquid has reduced and the sauce is quite thick and rich.

6. Meanwhile, in a separate pot, cook the pasta in salted boiling water according to the instructions on the packet.

7. While waiting for the pasta to ready, taste the mushroom sauce for seasoning

8. When the pasta is ready, drain the pasta and reserve some of the pasta cooking water.

9. In a separate large bowl, mix the pasta with the mushroom sauce and toss well. Thinning the sauce if necessary with some of the reserved pasta cooking water.

10. Viola! This hearty pasta is ready to be served. Sprinkle liberally with some chopped rocket or parsley.

Nutritional information per portion: Energy 420kcal/1787kj; Protein 15.1g; Carbohydrate 84.9g of which 5.1g is sugars; Fat 2.6g of which 0.3g is saturated fat; Cholesterol 0mg; Calcium 61mg; Fiber 4.8g; Sodium 14mg.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010 at 5:22 pm and is filed under Mushroom Pasta Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.