Crawfish Porcini Fettuccini Alfredo

Name: Crawfish Porcini Fettucini Alfredo
Prep time: 60 min
Cook time: 30 min
Total time: 90 min
Yield: 6
Cuisine: American

Staff Writer | February 1, 2022

Photo Credit: Keith Knoxsville

A Hen and a Drake Green Teal on the truck bed. Not a limit on anything, but a fun morning out.

We made a Crawfish Porcini Fettuccini Alfredo out of the unique ingredients the eastern sierra mountains have to offer. Our recipe makes use of fresh crawfish meat, and wild-harvested porcini mushrooms, but you could substitute another shellfish and any other varieties of mushrooms that are more available in your area. In addition to the ingredients for fresh pasta and alfredo sauce, you will want fresh parsley and cracked black pepper for garnishing.

While our version requires a significant amount of effort, from catching crawfish to cooking and peeling crawfish, harvesting mushrooms, and making pasta from scratch, the level of effort can be simplified by substitution and using already made pasta.

Preparation Time

~1 hour

Cooking Time

~30 minutes

Total Time

1.5 to 2 hours

Servings

4 to 8 servings

Fresh Pasta

Freshly made fettuccini pasta ready to cook.

Ingredients

2 Cups All-Purpose Flour

3 Eggs

1 Tsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil

½ Tsp Sea Salt

Directions

Make a well in a mound of flour on a clean countertop.
Add eggs, EVOO, and salt to the well.
Using a fork, slowly whisk wet ingredients. Try to maintain the integrity of the well. Slowly incorporate the flour until you have a shaggy dough.
Knead the dough for 5 to 6 minutes
Cover dough with a towel, let sit for 30 minutes.
Roll out dough
Let sit for 10 mintues
Cut to desired pasta size
Boil until cooked ~10 minutes

Porcini Mushrooms

Foraged wild Porcini mushrooms sauteing in a 12 inch Lodge cast iron, with a little butter.

Ingredients

¾ – 1 lb Porcini Mushrooms

3 tbsp butter

Directions

Slice mushrooms into small pieces
Sautee mushrooms until cooked, and soft
Optionally increase heat and crisp outside of mushrooms for a stronger texture later.

Alfredo Sauce

Ingredients

½ cup butter

1 ½ cups cream

½ tsp Salt

¼ tsp black pepper

2 cups grated parmesan

2-3 tsp minced garlic

½ -¾ lbs. crawfish meat

Fresh crawfish meat, ready to be mixed into an alfredo sauce.

Directions

Simmer butter and cream for 2 minutes.
Add salt, black pepper, and garlic.
Simmer for another 2 to 3 minutes.
While stirring constantly, add Parmesan cheese.
Continue stirring for 5 to 6 minutes, or until sauce has slightly thickened.
Pour sauce over pasta and mix until pasta is evenly coated.
Add crawfish meat and porcini mushrooms, gently mix so that distribution is even.
Serve Immediately.
Garnish individual servings with chopped parsley and freshly cracked black pepper.

Notes

Garnish with parsley and fresh cracked black pepper, enjoy with a glass of great wine. We recommend a crisp dry white, something with good minerality, or a rosé.

A fresh plate of Crawfish Porcini Fettuccini Alfredo, garnished with parsely and fresh cracked black pepper.

Tags: crawfish, foraging, mushroom | Comments

Garden Pesto

Staff Writer | August 23, 2021

Photo Credit: Keith Knoxsville

A Hen and a Drake Green Teal on the truck bed. Not a limit on anything, but a fun morning out.

A garden pesto is a great way to use greens from a garden of mixed greens, herbs, or maybe some overgrown tomatoes. It’s also simple and can use the waste produced from pruning your plants. Making a garden pesto takes about 10 minutes, and is great on pasta or as an addition to a cheese plate. It can be added as a flavoring to hummus, or can even be eaten alone with crackers or pita chips.

The greens can be mixed and matched with whatever you have on hand, or from whatever you can harvest in the garden. It’s also a great use for carrot tops, radish greens, or tomato trimmings that you may not normally use.

If you had always heard tomato leaves, or the leaves of anything in the nightshade family are toxic, and this pesto sounds like a no-no, well fear not because we had the same fears. There are alkaloids present in your everyday veggies, but you could never eat enough of them in one sitting for the alkaloids to be harmful. When it comes to the alkaloids present in tomato leaves, you would need to eat about a pound of tomato leaves to feel any of the toxic effects. Although it will take more than what you’ll ever consume in a single sitting, you can skip the tomato leaves if you are wary, and stick to other greens.

Our recipe uses 2 1/2 cups of greens total, so you can adjust your volumes of greens to exclude tomato leaves if you prefer. The recipe makes about 1 cup of green gold. We use a Cuisinart Stick Blender, but the Ninja BL610 Professional Countertop Blender is also a great option for making a smooth and creamy pesto.

Disclaimer: We can’t guess whether you have an allergy to an ingredient, especially nut or ragweed allergies, or maybe you are actually extra sensitive to a specific alkaloid, so we’ve included a disclaimer. Eat at your own risk, we aren’t responsible for allergic or adverse reactions, injuries, or death occurring from the preparation or consumption of our recipe.