La Cucina Italiana - De Italiaanse Keuken - The Italian Kitchen

During the snow storm of the century in Central Italy, I can't think of a better way to warm up than devouring a plate of rich & creamy pasta with a good bottle of red after a day of shoveling the drive. Perfect for a cold winter's night, lasagna bianco, 'white lasagna' is made with porcini mushrooms, sausages & bechamel, a local classic in northern Le Marche. A refined take on the usual red sauce classic, that will have your mouthwatering for more after the first bite.

Extra Delicious Tip: Make sure to have your pasta sheets large enough to hang over the edges creating golden crispy edges!

Lasagna Bianco -White Lasagna

serves 6
1 recipe of egg pasta or 4 sheets of fresh pasta
1 recipe of béchamel sauce
8 oz. sausage meat (250 gr)
2 cloves garlic, whole, peeled
2 big handfuls (about 2 cups) chopped mushrooms (we use porcini, chanertelle and other local wild mushrooms)
small handful of chopped parsley
3 Tablespoons of olive oil
salt & pepper to taste...

Via Mariano Pallottini

Bucatini, spaghetti, tortellini, rigatoni: There are hundreds of kinds of Italian pastas, and each one has its own, special name. That’s pretty confusing… but it’s also fun!

We’ve said many times before that Italian food is regional (in fact, there’s no such thing as “Italian food”). Pasta is a major part of that. Local kinds of pasta in Tuscany differ from those in Rome, Milan, or Puglia.

For us, though, one of the really fun things about Italian pasta—and the names of Italian pastas—are that each pasta name actually means something. Usually, in fact, the name gives away the shape of the pasta itself.

Want proof? Here are just some of our favorite pastas, and what their names mean in Italian!

Bucatini: One of the most popular kinds of pasta in Rome, bucatini look like thick spaghetti—but they have a tiny hole in the middle. (Think of a Twizzler!). What does bucatini mean? “Little holes!”. (Buco means hole, while adding an -ino, or -ini for plural, means “small”). Cannelloni: These big tubes of pasta (usually stuffed and popped in the oven) are named after, well, “big tubes.” (Adding -one, or -oni for plural, means “big”). Full Article

Via Mariano Pallottini