Mushroom Pasta: Fettuccine with Fried Champignons

Mushroom Pasta

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If you don’t have much time for a tasty breakfast, you will surely like mushroom pasta. Champignons are the most available mushrooms at any time of year, grown on a large scale and sold in almost any shop. Making fettuccine with champignons is no trouble at all: it is quick and easy. While the pasta boils, you make the sauce of fried mushrooms.

Champignons cook very fast. They say you can eat them raw. I haven’t tried it, but I am happy to believe it. To my taste, champignons are best when they are not overboiled or overfried. I don’t know whether the term al dente suits mushrooms, but in the finished dish they should be slightly springy, with a barely perceptible firmness in the middle. Then champignons taste good and keep all their trace elements and nutrients.

When you set out to make a tasty breakfast of mushrooms and pasta, don’t add strongly scented ingredients (onion, garlic) or overly spicy seasonings, as they can drown out the delicate flavor and aroma of fresh mushrooms. Mushroom pasta should have the subtle aroma of fried mushrooms. For example, to keep the flavor and aroma intact, only a little black pepper and salt are added to fried chanterelles to bring out the flavor.

Mushroom pasta can be made with any kind of pasta, whichever you choose and like. I prefer long shapes: fettuccine, tagliatelle, spaghetti; you can make them yourself. By the way, spaghetti with wild mushrooms, although a different dish, is also incredibly tasty. What matters for this dish is that the pasta is cooked al dente.

Making a mushroom sauce for pasta from mushrooms alone is quite difficult. Mushrooms don’t cook down and don’t thicken. They are usually combined with vegetables such as onion and potato. As it cooks, the vegetable mass forms a sauce with pieces of mushroom.

Fresh champignons fry easily and are stewed briefly in butter. Then, on the principle of béchamel sauce, a little wheat flour, very few spices and some liquid are added to the mushrooms. The result is a thick, tasty sauce with pieces of fried mushrooms. The pasta holds the liquid part of the sauce very well and becomes juicy and satisfying. As a bonus, the pasta is sprinkled with a little Parmesan or Pecorino, which only underlines the flavor of the champignons.

Ingredients

2 servings

For the pasta

  • Fettuccine (tagliatelle, spaghetti) 160 g
  • Water for boiling the pasta 2 l
  • Salt for boiling the pasta 14 g (7 g per 1 l of water)

For the mushroom sauce

  • Champignons 150 g
  • Butter 30 g
  • Wheat flour 1 scant tbsp (8 g)
  • Water for the sauce 1/4 cup (not too hot) (50 ml)
  • Salt, black pepper to taste

For serving

  • Hard cheese (Parmesan, Pecorino) 50 g
  • Dried mild chili pepper, coarsely ground a pinch, optional
  • Parsley a sprig, for garnish

Step-by-step recipe

Pasta and mushrooms

Mushroom pasta can be made with any kind of pasta, but the main thing is to cook it al dente. While the pasta boils, you make the sauce of fried mushrooms.

  1. Put a pot with 2 l of water and 14 g of salt (7 g per 1 l of water) on high heat. While the water comes to a boil, prepare the mushrooms.

    For this recipe I chose long, wide fettuccine, although you can use other kinds of pasta too. The pasta should be good quality, not some flour compilation made by who knows whom. That guarantees the mushroom pasta will be tasty and look good; otherwise you will end up with dumplings with mushrooms stuck together in one lump.

    Fettuccine pasta.

  1. Prepare the champignons: depending on their size, leave them whole or cut them into pieces. The pieces should be large enough to be easy to pick up on a fork.

    It is better to take champignons that are not the largest, or even quite small ones, so you can cook them whole without cutting. Often the shops sell brownish or even quite dark mushrooms, and I don’t like them. I prefer champignons that are white or slightly cream-colored. The mushrooms should be fresh, firm and evenly colored, with no signs of spoilage or darkening.

    Champignons.

Mushroom sauce

  1. Fry the champignons in butter. Melt a piece of real butter in a frying pan, add the mushrooms and stir.

    Frying the mushrooms in butter.

    Stirring constantly, fry the champignons for 3-4 mins over medium heat until they turn a nice golden color. Don’t cover the pan with a lid, or the mushrooms will quickly release water and wilt. Don’t salt the mushrooms or add spices while frying.

    Fried mushrooms.

  2. Add a scant tablespoon of wheat flour (8 g) to the fried champignons and stir with a spatula. The flour must blend with the fat; this technique is used when making béchamel sauce for lasagna.

    Adding flour to the mushrooms.

  1. Pour in a quarter cup of not-too-hot water and stir thoroughly, breaking up all the lumps. The sauce must be smooth, or the mushroom pasta may end up with bits of dough. Heat, stirring, until the sauce thickens.

    Season the sauce lightly with salt and pepper. Don’t add much pepper: it is an aromatic spice and its taste comes through quite strongly in the dish. The pepper should be barely perceptible and only underline the flavor of the champignons.

    Mushroom sauce.

Pasta

  1. Boil the fettuccine in boiling salted water until al dente; the cooking time is on the package. Drain the pasta in a colander so the water runs off, add it to the champignon sauce right in the pan and toss gently.

    Pasta with mushroom sauce.

Serving

  1. Divide the fettuccine with champignons among pasta plates and sprinkle with grated cheese. Parmesan or Grana Padano, Pecorino or another cheese will do, but not a soft one, since it would melt into a puddle. You need only a little cheese.

    pasta with champignons

  2. If you like, add a small pinch of coarsely ground dried mild chili pepper; it does not change the aroma of the dish and hardly overpowers the taste of the fried champignons. Serve the mushroom pasta right away, while it is still hot. You can garnish the dish with a sprig of parsley.

Calories and macros

435 kcal

Serving ≈ 200 g

  • Protein13 g13% of kcal
  • Fat14 g29% of kcal
  • Carbs62 g58% of kcal

100 g219 kcalProtein 6.7 gFat 6.9 gCarbs 31.1 g

Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.

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