This BLT pasta dish is easy to throw together. It can be made in roughly 30 minutes, and it tastes AMAZING! It's got a creamy sauce and the salty pancetta sets it off!
Pasta, my other love
I love a good pasta dish! Pasta, for me, is a comfort food. It's a reminder of all of those times as a child when my grandma would throw together some sort of pasta dish and we'd sit on the back porch and watch the sunsets.
Now that I have kids of my own, it's not always easy to spend the time making spaghetti sauce for hours. Both of the kids are in the school band, and they're active in a variety of other activities. So, there's usually a need for a dish that I can throw together in 30-40 minutes with things that I probably have around the house.
Bacon? Lettuce? Definitely Tomato
That's where this take on BLT Pasta comes in. Technically, it only has the "T" of the BLT, but I've added some other ingredients as a substitute for the "B" and the "L" to give it a more gourmet feel. The pancetta and spinach fill in the other main ingredients, while the addition of some shallots add depth of flavor. Pancetta is just like bacon, it's just not smoked. It comes from the pork belly, it's cured just like bacon, but they don't smoke it. (Another good spot for that pancetta could be here) It's a completely different flavor! The spinach wilts easily in the sauce and adds a little flavor and a little color to your dish. You could substitute the pancetta for regular bacon. Kale or arugula would be a good substitute for spinach, but it will change the flavor profile slightly. You could swap out the shallots for red onion as well.
And the pasta
Any type of pasta would work for this dish. I chose fusilli because I like the way the sauce clings to the ridges in the noodles, but a good rotini or even some fettuccine would work here as well. Remember to save some of that extra salty, extra starchy pasta water because that's what's going to fill out the creaminess of this dish. I served mine with some fresh garlic toast and a glass of moscato, but a really nice frisee salad with either a balsamic vinaigrette or even a Dijon mustard vinaigrette would play nice here in a separate bowl. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did! This really was a yummy, quick meal that fed the whole house with some leftovers!
BLT Pasta
Ingredients
- 16 Oz. Pasta I used fusili
- 1 tablespoon of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- 3 Cloves Garlic Finely Minced or Crushed
- 1 Shallot finely diced
- 12 Oz. Fresh Baby Spinach Roughly Chopped
- 10 Oz. Cherry Tomatoes Cut in half
- ½ Cup Freshly Grated Asiago Cheese Plus more for garnish
- ½ Cup Freshly Grated Parmesan Cheese
- ⅓ Cup Unsalted Butter
- ½ Cup Dry White Wine
- 8 Oz. Pancetta Diced
- Salt and Pepper to taste
Instructions
- In a large pot of salted boiling water, start the pasta
- While pasta is cooking, add pancetta to a hot pan with olive oil
- Cook pancetta until crispy then remove using slotted spoon
- Drain pan of most rendered fat in the skillet reserving about a tablespoon
- Add shallot to skillet and sweat until soft and translucent.
- Add in garlic and cook until fragrant.
- Deglaze the pan with the white wine and reduce.
- In the reduction, add the spinach and tomatoes and ½ cup reserved pasta water
- Once spinach has wilted, add in pasta and toss
- Remove from heat and add cold butter in chunks. Toss until butter is melted and emulsified with sauce.
- Stir in cheese until melted
- Salt and Pepper to taste.
- Serve immediately with additional Asiago cheese as a garnish.
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