Vincisgrassi (pasta baked with parma ham)

I invited my sister and family today with the promise of a roast lamb lunch, only to find that when I got my online shop delivered this morning, I'd ordered a frozen leg of lamb. There was no way that was going to defrost in a hurry. Luckily I had also shopped for the ingredients for a meal I liked the look of in this months Olive magazine. A good time to give it a try it then. Thankfully it was really lovely and didn't disappoint. Quite rich and creamy, the recipe for 6 served 8 of us, although one little person doesn't eat very much. It wasn't the quickest dish to prepare, but I had plenty of time this morning to prepare. I used less parma ham than the recipe stated, and I didn't cook the pasta first, I've had problems with it sticking together in the past. I also wondered why the recipe states to blend the sauce after reducing it, I couldn't see any benefit of doing that and wouldn't bother next time. I served the dish with crushed new potatoes and a green salad. 


Ingredients
Serve 6
30 g dried porcini
500ml double cream
500ml chicken stock
1 bay leaf (I didn't have any)
olive oil
400g finely chopped flat mushrooms
300g shredded parma ham
1 egg
6 large sheets or 12 small sheets of fresh pasta
150g grated parmesan
25g butter


Method
Just cover the porcini in boiling water. Put the cream, stock and bay in a large frying pan, bring to a simmer and reduce by half ( I found it didn't reduce that much)
Remove the porcini, squeeze dry and finely chop. Add the porcini soaking liquid to the cream while it's reducing. Put 2 tbsp oil in a large pan and add the mushrooms and porcini and cook until browned and the liquid has been reabsorbed. Stir in the parsley and the ham. Cool.
Heat the oven to 200C. Pour the cream into a blender and whizz, add the egg then whizz again. Boil the pasta for 1-2 mins then drain. Brush a baking tray with butter, add a layer of pasta. Ladle cream onto the pasta, then sprinkle with parmesan. Scatter with the mushroom mix, add more pasta. Continue layering pasta with cream, cheese and mushroom, finishing with pasta topped with cream and cheese. Bake for 20 mins until golden and bubbling.