Very Bacony and Garlicky Spaghetti

The main ingredient for this dish was meant to be thick slices of pancetta cut into cubes. However, the grocery store next door does not carry such ingredient. Maybe it ain't so bad for me? Last time when I bought those Italian cured meat, just 2 slices of pancetta cost me $$$ compared to the more wallet-friendly and more accessible bacon counterpart.

Bacon it is.

Very bacony and garlicky spaghetti -

Ingredients (3 to 4 portion)?

8 strips of smoked bacon
8 cremini mushroom
2 Roman tomatoes
1 bundle of spinach
4 garlic cloves
1 teaspoon of red chili flakes
Some sea salt
Some freshly ground black pepper
3 to 4 portions of spaghetti

How?

Bring a big pot of water to a boil, add in few pinches of salt,
Cook the spaghetti in boiling water according to package instruction,
Preferably al dente in texture. Once done, drain well and aside for later use.

Cut the bacon into bite size pieces, toss half of the bacon to the pan then turn to medium-high heat.

While rendering the fat, let's dice up the remaining ingredients. Do remember to check on the bacon and give it a quick stir once a while to prevent burning.

Peel and finely chop the garlic,
Cut the mushroom in half then roughly slice it -

Dice up the Roman tomatoes, there's no need to remove the skin first -

Give the spinach a few chops to shorten the length -

Back to the bacon,
Add in the remaining 1/2 of bacon, all the chopped garlic, and chili flakes,
Sprinkle some salt and pepper, cook for about 30 seconds -

The reason why I add the bacon in separate batches is to get two different textures while biting into the pasta. You get that semi-burned yet crunchy edges together with soft and moist fat at the same time, how good can it be?

Toss in sliced mushroom and sprinkle some more salt, we want to season every layer for this recipe.
Cook for about 30 seconds,
Add the cubed tomatoes and sprinkle some more salt.

On top of juicy tomatoes, adding salt will further help in drawing out the liquid from them. Those yummy juices will then be absorbed by the mushroom - the flavor just keeps building up in our magic pan.

Lastly, toss in the spinach and cook till it starts to wilt, sprinkle some more salt if needed. It should be on the slightly salty side since we are going to mix in the spaghetti, which will dilute the taste a bit.

Once the flavor is checked, mix in the spaghetti and you'll have a very bacony and garlicky meal. I suppose some freshly grated parmesan will be a great addition to the pasta!

Buon appetito!

Cindy's Rating: 8