This pasta with sausage, porcini, and balsamic vinegar is all about bold flavors. The sausage and porcini mushrooms bring a hefty dose of meaty sapidity, Sicilian tomato concentrate turns the umami volume up while giving a glossy finish, and finally the balsamic vinegar balances the savory flavors with its sweet, complex acidity. This sauce tastes like it took hours to make but, once you’ve rehydrated the porcini mushrooms, it comes together in just 20 minutes. The satisfying texture of mezzi paccheri stands up marvelously to the richness of the sauce, rigatoni would also work great.
Ingredients
TIME: 20 minutes + 30 minutes porcini soaking time
SERVES: 4
- Dried porcini mushrooms, 1 sachet / 50g / 1.7oz
- Mezzi Paccheri, 350g / 12oz
- Coarse Sea Salt, to taste
- Extra virgin olive oil, 2 tbsp
- Sausage, 225g / 8 oz
- Red onion, 1 medium, finely chopped
- Tomato concentrate, 1 tbsp
- Peperoncini sott’olio, to taste
- Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- Balsamic Saba 3, ⅓ cup / 80ml
- Vacche Rosse cheese, finely grated, to serve
Preparation
- First, rehydrate the porcini mushrooms. Empty the sachet into a medium bowl and cover with 3 cups of water. Drain and squeeze mushrooms dry, reserving their soaking liquid. Chop the porcini into small pieces and set aside.
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add coarse sea salt to taste and cook the mezzi paccheri, stirring occasionally, until al dente. Drain, reserving a cup or so of the pasta cooking water.
- Meanwhile, heat the extra virgin olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat. Add the sausage and cook for two minutes or so, breaking it apart with a wooden spoon.
- Next, stir the chopped red onion into the sausage. Cook for 5-10 minutes until the onion has softened.
- Dilute the tomato concetrate with a few tablespoons of the porcini soaking liquid to form a smooth paste (reserve the remaining mushroom liquid for another use). Add the diluted concentrate to the pan with the sausage and onions along with the peperoncini, the freshly ground black pepper, and the chopped porcini mushrooms. Stir together and cook for 2-3 minutes until the flavors combine.
- Deglaze the pan with the balsamic, scraping up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Turn off the heat and add the drained mezzi paccheri. Gently combine the pasta with the sauce, adding pasta water as needed.
- Divide between bowls and serve sprinkled with Vacche Rosse cheese.
