Hearty bucatini pasta combined with kale and mushrooms in a creamy sauce makes a satisfying and delicious meal especially on chilly, winter days!

What is Bucatini Pasta?

Recently, I had creamy Bucatini dishes at local eateries and I absolutely fell in love! So of course I had to make my own Bucatini dish at home. If you’re not familiar with this pasta, Bucatini is a long, thick pasta that’s hollow inside. Creamy sauce fill and coat the hollow center so you get mouthful of yummy sauce with every bite!

Ingredients You Need for this Pasta Dish

Bucatini – One-third of pasta from 16 oz. packet. This portion will serve 3-4.
Kale – There are different types of kale and any type will do. I usually use Italian, Curly or Russian kale.
Mushrooms – I chose shiitake and cremini mushrooms but you can use any mushrooms you like.
Aromatics – Shallots and garlic cloves
Olive oil
Butter
Milk or Half & Half
Grated Parmesan or Pecorino Romano – You can also blend the two for even more in-depth flavors!
Better Than Bouillon – It’s nothing like your traditional bouillon cubes. This concentrated base is a fantastic way to enhance flavors to your dish and I love that it comes in many flavors like seasoned vegetable one I used for this pasta.

Tips for Delicious Results!

Clean mushrooms with damp paper towels – Mushrooms are delicate so avoid washing them with water.
Sauté shallots until translucent – No need to brown or caramelize shallots. For this dish, we want some texture.
Sauté garlic with kale – This will prevent garlic from burning to a crisp.
Don’t overcook kale and mushrooms – We want kale and mushrooms to be tender, but if they are overcooked, they’ll end up limp and tasteless.
Combine grated cheese and pasta with sauce and veggies – Grated cheese will thicken the sauce and every string of bucatini will get coated with the cheesy, creamy sauce!

Serving & Variations of Bucatini Pasta

Transfer your creamy, yummy pasta to your favorite pasta bowl or plate, add some fresh ground peppers or crushed red peppers on top and dig in! Featured here are my pieces from you guessed it, Burleigh Pottery. This is part of the Asiatic Pheasant Plum collection which has been discontinued but if you keep a look-out on online platforms like Ebay, Etsy, and Replacements, pieces do pop-up from time to time.

Here are some variations you can try if you want more protein to this dish:

Pork, Chicken or Turkey Sausage
Bacon
Chicken
Shrimp

More Pasta Recipes

Print Recipe

Bucatini Pasta with Kale and Mushrooms

Prep Time15

Cook Time35

Servings: 4

Ingredients

5.5 oz. bucatini (about one-third of pasta from 16 oz. packet)
1 bunch kale, stem removed and rough chopped
6 oz. shitake mushrooms cleaned, ends trimmed and sliced
6 oz. cremini mushrooms cleaned, ends trimmed and sliced
1 shallot, thinly sliced lengthwise
2 cloves garlic thinly sliced
3 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
1½ cups milk or half and half
½ cup grated parmesan cheese
½ tsp betther than buillon
crushed red pepper or fresh ground pepper (optional)

Instructions

Boil water in medium pot and cook pasta according to cooking instructions. Once pasta is cooked al dente, drain and set it aside.
In the meantime, heat large skillet or cast iron pan over medium heat and add olive oil. Add shallot and sauté until translucent.
Toss in kale and garlic to the skillet/pan and combine with shallots. Cook kale until leaves are tender then stir in mushrooms.
Once mushrooms are tender, add butter and combine with veggies. Next stir in milk or half and half and simmer for 1 minute. Toss in pasta and grated cheese to the skillet/pan and combine with veggies. Make sure cheese gets incorporated into pasta mixture evenly and does not clump up. Turn down heat to medium-low and simmer the mixture for 1-2 minutes to thicken the sauce.
Once pasta sauce thickens, toss in better than bouillon and combine with pasta and sauce.
Transfer pasta to a serving plate or pasta bowl. Add crushed red pepper or fresh ground pepper on top and serve immediately.