morel pasta with cream, parmesan and thyme

This morel pasta is filled with the rich flavor of morel mushrooms, nutty parmesan and fresh thyme. It’s a decadent pasta dish that is so worthy of your special morel stash!

The morel cream sauce in this pasta recipe is one of my absolute favorite ways to cook morels. The morels infuse their rich flavors into the cream, then soak it back up and turn into sponges of pure decadence. I’ve served it over steak and put it on pizza, but the best way to use them is on pasta.

The creamy morel sauce coats the noodles and gushes out with each bite. It’s filled with the intense earthy flavor of morels, a hint of garlic and aromatic shallots. I use white wine in the sauce to add some acidity, but sometimes I sub in dry vermouth if that’s all we have. Both work great.

Don’t be shy with the salt as the sauce is cooking— it takes more than you’d think to really bring out the flavor of all those morels. This morel pasta is one of our very special occasion meals. Morels are so special and rare. Treat them right with a slow simmer in heavy cream, fresh thyme and your favorite pasta!

what you need to make morel pasta:

• morels (dry or fresh)
• butter
• shallots
• garlic
• white wine
• heavy cream
• fresh thyme
• pasta
• parmesan

how to make morel pasta:

1. rehydrate morels, strain soaking liquid
2. saute shallots, garlic and morels in butter
3. add white wine, cook down
4. add cream and morel soaking liquid, cook down
5. cook pasta, reserve 2 cups of pasta water
6. add pasta, parmesan and some pasta water to morel cream sauce
7. toss and cook until sauce is velvety smooth
8. serve!

how to use fresh morels versus dried morels in this recipe:

If you can get your hands on fresh morels, this recipe is even easier! Skip the rehydrating step and go straight to cooking the fresh morels in butter (in step 2). You won't have mushroom soaking liquid, so replace that liquid with 1 ½ cups of your favorite vegetable stock or chicken stock. Proceed as written!

how to make the creamiest sauce: pasta water!

The key to this morel pasta recipe is in the liberal use of pasta water. We reduce the cream sauce quite a bit, in order to deepen the flavor and get the most out of our precious morels. So when you add the sauce to the cooked pasta, you’ll also need to add at least 1 cup of pasta water (but probably more like 1 ½ cups). This will create a silky, blanketing sauce, versus a stiff and gloppy one. Make sure to simmer and toss everything together to let the starches in the pasta water pull the sauce together and coat all the noodles. And remember— cream sauces tighten up as they cool, so aim for a loose sauce.

what to wine to drink with this morel pasta

Morel mushrooms are a treat. They’re rare and expensive, so if you’re splurging on them you should treat yourself to a great wine, too. The nutty, earthy flavor of the morels is front and center in this pasta, and I love to echo that earthiness with an aged, old world wine. Both a delicate red wine or an intensely flavored white wine could complement the rich flavors of the morel cream sauce. 

Here are some delicious wines to pair with your morel pasta:

• 1er or Grand Cru Cote de Nuits (Burgundy, France): when aged, these wines are known for their truffled, forest floor aromas, red fruit and silky texture. Depending on your budget, you’ll get some of the finest Pinot Noirs out there. What a way to complement your morels!
• Willamette Valley Pinot Noir:  velvety texture, brimming with red berries and herbs
• Meursault: If ever there was a dish to break out the Meursault— this is it! Creamy white wine, filled with flavors of hazelnut, almond and lemon, then balanced with bracingly fresh acidity.
• Sonoma Coast Chardonnay: striking acidity, rich textures and ripe lemon and apple flavors

And if you’re really up for celebrating a special occasion, you can’t go wrong with Champagne!

more dried morel and mushroom recipes:

morel pizza with fontina and crispy shallots

truffle cream sauce

wild mushroom toast with brown butter, ricotta and parsley

wild mushroom leek frittata with truffles and gruyere

farro risotto (farrotto) with wild mushrooms

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