Creamy Pancetta-Sage Sauce over Farfalle

So, I’m horrible at posting, at taking pictures of what I make, talking about how I made it, and how it tasted.

So why stop now?

Here is the recipe I made up for something that really doesn’t have a name – maybe there is one in Italy somewhere.

Here it is: this would serve about 2-3 people if you cooked a pound of farfalle.

1 4-oz package of Pancetta
8 leaves of fresh sage
3 cloves of garlic
3-4 spoonfuls of sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil
Parmesan thinly shredded. This will be added to help make the sauce
Heavy cream or whipping cream.
salt and fresh-cracked black pepper
1 pound of farfalle (Bow-tie pasta. I just like this shape. Small is good cause it holds the sauce best.)

The goal is to cook the pasta the last little bit in the sauce so it soaks up the sauce in each bite of pasta. You want to drain the pasta, throw it back into the pot, and add the sauce and let it cook juuuust a bit in the sauce so it soaks it all up. Go easy on the salt in the beginning because of the parmesan – it can be a bit salty.

Get a nice big stock pot of heavily salted water going for the farfalle. Rinse the sage leaves and roll them up into a little tube. Cut the leaves into thin ribbons. Slice the garlic thinly as well. While the water is heating up, brown the pancetta over low heat in a frying pan. Mine is about 10″. Move all the ingredients around a bit throughout the recipe.

When the pancetta is frying, it will smell amazing. That’s because it’s pancetta and it is amazing. Offer thanks. Then go back to the food.

Add a tiny bit of salt and a little black pepper to the pancetta, then add the sage leaves. They should sizzle just a bit. As that’s going the water should be boiling so you can add the pasta. When the sage is fragrant (oh, it will be) and frying but not burning or browning, add the garlic slices and stir around a bit, again, so that it is fragrant. Then add the sun-dried tomatoes. The last parts of the recipe are really about timing. Add the heavy cream: this is hard to get wrong, honestly. You can add as much or as little as you’d like. The cream will cut the sharpness of the tomatoes and it’s awesome. Anyway, add some and some more salt and black pepper. Cream should fill the bottom of the pan and sizzle and then get a little bubbly. You can add some parmesan to complete the sauce.

The pasta should be nearing completion. Take a coffee mug and reserve a cup of the pasta water. Drain the pasta when it’s time and then add it back to the pot. Add the sauce from the pan with some more parmesan. This is going to be to taste, so if you like parmesan, cool – if not, keep it light. Well, light-ish.

Add the pasta water and move the pasta around in the pot over low heat so it cooks for a few minutes. Adjust salt and pepper.

Mange! Mange!