If there’s a downside to this Blue Cheese, Leek, and Mushroom Pasta Bake, it’s that you won’t want to stop eating it. It’s got all the comfort foodiness that you can imagine in a baked pasta dish, with that unmistakable tang of blue cheese. Even if you don’t love blue cheese, you should make note of the cheese mixture that I used, and give this a shot. It’s mildly blue and intensely delicious. I made it to use up the last of my cache of blue cheese, but I’d go out to buy more just to make this again.

Ingredients to serves 8:

1 lb. dried penne or rigatoni
1 Tbs olive oil
A knob of butter
1 leek, cleaned and sliced (use some of the more tender green parts)
¼ lb. mushrooms, sliced
2 tsp dried rosemary, optional
1 egg
2½ oz. heavy cream
White wine
6-12 oz. frozen peas, optional
1½ cups blue cheese or a cheese mixture, divided (see note)
½ tsp salt, or to taste
1 tsp freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
Crusty bread, for serving, optional

1. Cook the pasta in lightly salted boiling water according to instructions, minus a couple of minutes. Meanwhile, start in on the veggies, and pre-heat the oven to 357°F. If the pasta is done before it’s time for you to add it to the rest of the casserole, drain and rinse it so that it doesn’t stick together while it’s sitting.
2. Heat the oil in a large casserole. Add the butter. When it has melted, add the leeks. Gently cook over low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the mushrooms (and rosemary), put the lid on the casserole, and continue to cook another 5 to 8 minutes until the mushrooms have softened, stirring occasionally.
3. Meanwhile, break the egg into the cream and beat until homogenized. Set aside.
4. Once the vegetables are cooked, add a generous splash of wine. Raise the heat to medium, and simmer for 2 minutes before stirring in the cream mixture. Add the ⅔-¾ of the cheese and stir until it melts. Off heat. (Add the peas.)
5. Season to taste. In the end, it will want more salt than you might think.
6. Tip in the cooked pasta and stir it all up. Dot with the remainder of the cheese. Cover the casserole, and bake until it’s good and bubbling, about 15 minutes. Uncover and bake 10 minutes more, until the edges and top just begin to crisp.

Serve this with a crusty bread and the rest of the wine you opened for the ingredients. It will stay warm for a long, long time if you put the lid back on the casserole once you take it out of the oven. I recommend letting it sit like this for at least 10 minutes before serving. Makes kick-ass leftovers – not quite the same as fresh, but still totally cravable.

Notes:

1. The pasta should be slightly undercooked when goes into the oven.
2. I prefer the cool blue color of a classic Bic pen to the intensity of cobalt, so I used a 50/50 mixture of blue cheese and Big John’s Cajun Rub cheese. The latter is delicious. It doesn’t pack quite the punch it might, given the name – it’s actually mild – but it is nonetheless fantastic. I also added a handful of Parmesan to the cheese that went on top. Now, here’s the thing: I don’t really love blue cheese. I’m just OK with it. But if you tone it down a bit, then I find it beguiling and sinfully alluring. Blue cheese pairs well with milder cheeses, so it’s easy to create a blend that’s intriguing, but not overpowering.
3. I know, 6-12 oz. is a big spread on the peas. I guess it depends on how much you like peas. The full 12 works, and I swear by it.
4. My 5-quart casserole pot – which people sometimes mistakenly refer to as a Dutch oven – could accommodate a double batch of this recipe. So, before popping it in the oven, I ran a spatula around the inside of the pot – the part above the food, that would be exposed to the air as the casserole bakes – to push any liquid down into the food. Otherwise, any liquid there would just scorch – which is fine, but unsightly. If you have a smaller casserole, by all means use it.
5. Additions to consider: leftover Thanksgiving turkey, Dijon or grainy mustard, fusilli instead of penne; cheddar instead of the blue cheese, but come o-o-o-on; possibly broccoli, but only if you charred it first – better yet, broccoli rabe.

Just wait until you take the lid off this pasta bake and the aroma fills your house. It’s the old-school kind of “everything’s right with the world” fragrance that transports you to a time when, well, we all had a lot more time. This is exactly what home is supposed to smell like. And then, to top it off, this pasta bake is the essence of comfort food. You can enjoy a bowlful of it, snuggled up in your house that’s so warm because the oven’s been on, and not even care that it’s freezing outside, and that you live in a country that needs to arm its public school teachers.

Blue Cheese, Leek, and Mushroom Pasta Bake

Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man! This content was not solicited by anyone, nor was it written in exchange for anything. Thank you, Textalizer. This recipe is an adaptation of one from The Guardian. Cottage cheese would just take this casserole from a showstopper to “I coulda been somebody.” But someone how I know it would taste good. Maybe cottage cheese on the side? As some weird garnish? I can’t feel it, but I know it’s there.