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Dinner Tonight: Linguine With Squash, Bacon, and Goat Cheese

Posted by Nick Kindelsperger, October 26, 2007 at 4:30 PM

I’ve done this before. Not with the same ingredients, or procedure, but with the unlikely combo of pasta and seemingly inappropriate vegetable. It would seem to be too much starch for any one human to take on. But cooked correctly, the vegetable makes a creamy sauce without all the, well, cream. In other words: It works.

My experience has been with what the Silver Spoon calls linguine al pesto genovese, or potatoes and linguine with pesto. It must be some kind of a classic dish. But this one isn’t, which comes from the Real Simple and replaces the potato with squash. It also adds some bacon—always a welcome addition—and goat cheese. The effect is the same. After cooking with the chicken stock, the squash breaks apart and becomes part of the pasta instead of its own separate entity. Every noodle is coated with this fall-appropriate dish. Oh, and did I mention the bacon?

Linguine With Bacon, Goat Cheese, and Squash

- serves 4 -

Ingredients

1 two- to three-pound squash, peeled and diced
6 slices bacon
2 cloves garlic, minced,
1 1/2 cups chicken stock
4 ounces goat cheese
1 pound linguine
Salt and pepper

Procedure

1. Cook the bacon in a large pot until nice and crisp. Remove the pieces, and keep about 2 tablespoons of the fat. Toss in the squash and garlic and cook for 5 minutes over medium heat.

2. Pour in the chicken broth and season with salt. Bring to a simmer, cover, and let be for 25 minutes.

3. With about ten minutes left, cook the pasta according to the instructions on the box.

4. Add half of the goat cheese and salt to the squash. Mix well. Then dump in the pasta, and mix again.

5. Plate the pasta, crumble the other half of the goat cheese over top, and season with more salt and pepper. Crumble the cooked bacon over it all and serve up.

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Tags: bacon, Dinner Tonight, linguine, pasta

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