Creamy Mushroom and Pea Penne

I love pasta in all shapes and sizes! This is a quick creamy pasta dish that doesn’t take a lot of prep work.

I try to limit my use of oil, so in this recipe, I sauteed the onion and garlic dry and added some vegetable stock as needed. I don’t always have vegetable stock in the cupboard, but I usually have vegetable bouillon cubes. I boiled some water for this recipe and ended up using a vegetable bouillon cube—it works perfectly! I also rehydrated some dried mushrooms I had, which I chopped after they were hydrated and added to the sauce along with some of the water used to rehydrate.

I had a couple of portobello mushrooms in the fridge, so I removed the stem, scooped out the dark portion inside the cap, and chopped those up small, along with some brown mushrooms. You can use any mushrooms you have available to you.

PREP TIME: 10 MIN

COOK TIME: 20 MIN

Dried penne pasta

1 medium onion diced

4 - 7 cloves of garlic (adjust this according to your taste)

1/2 cup vegetable broth

2 tablespoons dried mushrooms (any type will work) rehydrated with 1/2 cup boiled water

3 cups assorted mushrooms - sliced into bite-sized pieces

2 tablespoons tamari

1 teaspoon dried thyme

1 teaspoon dried oregano

pinch dried red pepper flakes

1 1/2 cups oat culinary cream (if you can’t find oat cream, use oat milk instead) **

1/3 cup frozen peas (add as much as you’d like)

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

• Soak dried mushrooms in hot water to rehydrate

• Cook the pasta according to package instructions until al dente

• Saute diced onion in a medium-heat pan. Add a pinch of salt. As the onion starts to brown, add small amounts of vegetable stock to deglaze the pan

• Once the onion is translucent, add the minced garlic and saute for one minute. Add vegetable broth as needed to keep onion and garlic from burning.

• Add the sliced mushrooms and brown over medium heat until they are slightly golden

• Add the tamari to deglaze pan

• Scoop the mushrooms from the water and chop them into small pieces and add to the pan

• Add the oregano, thyme and dried pepper to the mushroom mix

• Stir in the oat cream and bring to a gentle simmer. Simmer for 10 minutes

• Add some vegetable broth if needed, or you can use the water leftover from rehydrating the mushrooms

• Add the frozen peas and stir through the sauce

• Once the pasta is done, spoon the pasta into the sauce, allowing some of the pasta cooking water to get into the pan

• Bring to a gentle boil and simmer for another minute

• Season with salt and pepper to taste

** My favourite brand of oat milk is Earth’s Own