Every now and then when you want to indulge a little, this bacon mushroom pasta will satisfy those cravings. The elbow macaroni is tossed in a creamy, cheesy sauce with mushrooms, bacon, oregano, parsley, garlic chives, and some seasoning. This dish is incredibly easy to prepare and if you have some hiccups along the way they are simple to fix.
Another pasta dish that is also worth trying with easy-to-follow instructions, is this light and creamy pasta salad or this very popular creamy tomato sauce for pasta.
Ingredients
The ingredients for this creamy pasta dish are fairly simple, the most crucial being bacon and mushrooms. The butter and flour are needed to make a roux all the other ingredients will add flavour to the sauce
Instructions
The mushrooms are chopped as well as the bacon. The bacon is then fried, set to the side, and then the roux is made in the same pan.
Once the sauce starts to thicken the garlic, mustard, bacon, herbs, mushrooms, and seasonings are added and the sauce is left to simmer.
The cooked pasta (do not overcook!) is then added to the sauce. The rest of the herbs are then added, stirred in, and then your bacon and mushroom pasta is ready!
Substitutions
- Parmesan - Instead of using mozzarella, you can substitute it with parmesan, which will give this sauce and even better tasts. Parmesan happens to be one of my favourite cheeses.
- Penne - Apart from susbtituting the elbow macaroni with penne, you can use any other type of pasta. the great thing about pasta with holes, is that, all the flavourful sauce gets trapped which is a great morsel to bit into.
- Button Mushrooms - This recipe is just as great using button mushrooms.
- Heavy Cream or Cooking Cream - If you are unable to make a roux or you just dont want to then you can replace the roux + milk combination with either heavy cream or cooking cream.
- Ham - If you do not have bacon or just do not like it, you can use ham(the breakfast type, not raw pork).
Variations
- Spicy - Add some hot peppers to give a kick to this dish.
- Tomato Base - You can add some tomato paste to the sauce and this will give it a red or orange tinge as well as a bit of tomato flavour to the sauce.
Tips
Be sure not to boil the pasta until all the way cooked. As it is being tossed in the sauce it will continue to cook. The same applies if you want to turn this into a bacon and mushroom pasta bake. As the dish will go into the oven, and the pasta will cook some more, make sure that the macaroni is not all the way cooked. All we really want to do with the pasta bake is to ensure that the cheese on top is all melted and the pasta cooked. This is therefore something to consider if you intend to put this dish in the oven or turn it into a pasta bake.
Bacon and Mushroom Pasta
Ingredients
- 2 rashers streaky bacon chopped
- 100 grams mushrooms chopped
- 20 grams flour
- 20 grams butter
- 400 millilitres milk
- 2 cloves garlic grated
- ½ tablespoon mustard
- 40 grams mozzarella hard
- salt to taste
- black pepper to taste
- white pepper to taste
- pinch nutmeg
- onion powder to taste
- 150 grams elbow macaroni
- parsley chopped
- oregano
- garlic chives chopped, optional
Instructions
- Fry bacon in a pan without adding any additional oil. Once crispy, take off the heat.
- In the same pan, add butter and let it melt and then add flour.
- Cook flour until golden brown and then add milk and stir continuously until properly mixed.
- Add grated garlic, mustard, and bacon to the sauce and let simmer.
- Add mozzarella to the sauce.
- In the meantime boil pasta until almost al dente (They will finish cooking in the sauce).
- Drain and keep about 2 ladles full of pasta water.
- Add mushrooms to the sauce and then taste for salt. Also add Add black pepper, white pepper, and oregano.
- Add some of the pasta water to thin it out a bit and then add the pasta.
- Add parsley and garlic chives and then take the bacon and mushrooms pasta off the heat.
- Serve immediately.
Video
Notes
- Bacon is salty so we want to add the bacon to the sauce and wait a while before adjusting for additional salt.
- If after adding milk to your roux, the sauce becomes lumpy, simply pass the mixture through a sieve and then place it back into the pan.
- Cook the pasta while the sauce is simmering and thickening up, that way you save time.
- You can use some of the pasta water in your sauce if you wish to thin it out slightly. In a regular sauce, you would use the pasta water to bring the sauce together- however as this sauce is thicker, it serves well for "thinning" out the sauce.
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