Recipe Steps for Pasta with Artichokes and Bacon

• Let’s clean the artichokes well, removing the outer leaves, cutting off the stem, and putting them in a bowl, about 30 – 40 minutes before cooking them, soaking with water and lemon.

  Once this time has passed, cut them into not too thin slices. Generally, I cut first in half and then again to get 4 wedges from each artichoke.

  Take a nice spacious non-stick pan, add a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and fry the chopped quarter of an onion, finely chopped. If you like, at this stage of the recipe, you can add a clove of garlic which we will then remove after our sauté is well flavored.

  Now add the artichoke wedges, remove the garlic, and wet everything with the tablespoon of white wine. You can add more if you have it. Sprinkle with the finely chopped parsley, but not too much at this stage of the recipe. A pinch of salt and pepper and continue with the recipe.

  Let it cook over medium-low heat with a lid for about 20 minutes.

  Meanwhile, let’s prepare the bacon or pancetta. You can indeed choose between these two ingredients. If you bought bacon cut into slices, as in my case, you can toast it in a pan without adding oil or other fat. We will in fact cook the bacon with its own fat until it becomes nice and crispy and golden. If instead, we have chosen a bacon already cut into cubes, proceed with cooking the cubes in the pan. If instead, the delicatessen sold you a thick slice of bacon, we will have to cut it into cubes ourselves.

  Cut into medium-small pieces, we will put the bacon to cook in a pan, always without adding oil or other fats, letting it toast until it is nice and crispy and golden.

  In all three cases, we will not throw away the fat that the bacon will leave in the pan. As for the Carbonara, it will serve us to give more flavor and taste to our main pasta dish with artichokes.

  When about 20 minutes of cooking the artichokes have passed, we will add the bacon to the pan and let the ingredients cook for another 15 minutes or so. If necessary, during cooking, add a tablespoon of water or white wine.

  

• During this last cooking time we can bring the water for the pasta to a boil. Place a pot with plenty of water on the stove and add the salt. When it comes to a boil, we can pour into the pot the pasta shape we have chosen. In my case, Rigacuore, a very pretty pasta shape similar to penne but heart-shaped.

  Leave the pasta about a minute short of cooking, drain well with a colander and add the pasta to the pan with the artichokes and bacon. Sauté for a few moments, sprinkle with the fresh parsley we previously chopped finely. Adjust the salt and pepper if necessary after tasting the ingredients we used.

  Before serving, add a nice handful of Pecorino Romano in flakes or another cheese to grate as you like. All that’s left is to wish you a good appetite and remind you that I await you every morning with the recipe of the day on the blog Le Ricette di Bea!!! See you soon!