Cheesy Baked Mushroom Rigatoni (with peas)

Today's weather was absolutely gross in New York City.  After such a wonderful Labor Day holiday, it was tough enough to be back in the office without having to trek home in the pouring rain!! The only comfort was I knew I was going to make something warm, cheesy, and delicious to make it all better. I turned to my favorite, Epicurious, and adapted another recipe for a cheesy baked rigatoni with mushrooms to make it all better.

This one took some time, so I opened a bottle of red and enjoyed the sound of the rain while I cooked. Here's what I used:
1 red onion
1 package of sweet Italian sausage (4 links)
1 oz dried porcini mushrooms (get the dried if you can so that you can use the water that you reconstitute them in. I bought them in the pasta sauce aisle of Whole Foods.)
10 Shiitake mushrooms, though the recipe called for 1 lb white button mushrooms, aka, my worst nightmare. I almost bought cremini but freaked out that they looked very similar to white button mushroom and therefore might taste the same. The shiitakes did okay, but did get a little slimy because they cook for quite awhile. If you are a mushroom expert, you may know a better one to substitute. I used about 10 big shiitakes.
1 TB chopped rosemary
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 can of beef broth (7 oz)
1 cup shredded pecorino romano and I added some shredded Monterrey Jack as well because I had it in the fridge and thought it would be a little melty-er and gooy-er than the pecorino (it was!)
One swirl around the pot of half and half (about 1/4 a cup?)
1 cup frozen green peas
1 lb box of rigatoni

The first thing I did was start a big pot of salted water for the rigatoni and pre-heat the oven to 375.  Then I rinsed the dried porcinis in a small bowl, drained, and added hot water until they were just covered. Let those sit for 20 minutes to reconstitute. You will need this water! Do NOT pour it down the drain when you take the porcinis out! This is where all the delicious flavor comes from.
Then I took the casings off the sausage and chopped to bite size pieces, as well as diced the onion, rosemary, and shiitakes.

Then I heated some olive oil and got the onion going in a heavy pot/dutch oven that can go straight in the oven. I used a red onion, but it will cook for so long that I don't think it matters which type you use.

Once the onion is translucent, add the sausage and cook until it is not pink in the center.  Try to break up the sausage pieces as well as you can.  I had to use a heavy- duty spatula (ok, I actually enlisted hubby to do this while I trekked to the roof in the rain to grab some rosemary.)  It took me about 10 minutes to cook the sausage. While the sausage is cooking, take the porcinis out of the water and give them a rough chop. SAVE the water.  Look how dark it is in the photo below! That is a lot of flavor!

Then I added my fresh mushrooms and cooked a minute or two to soften them.  To that, I added the chopped porcinis, white wine, and rosemary and let it cook down 3-4 minutes until most of the liquid was gone.  Next add the porcini water (I had about 1 cup) without adding whatever grit settled to the bottom of the bowl. Stir that in and add the beef broth. This will now cook down for about 15 minutes, which means it is the perfect time to add your pasta to the boiling water. My rigatoni box said it should cook for 14 minutes.

Not much to look at here, but it was starting to smell DELICIOUS.
Stir occasionally to make sure nothing is sticking to the bottom but otherwise it's a good time to shred the cheese, if it's not already shredded.   I got about halfway through this process and I started feeling guilty that this dish was going to be almost all brown and tan (meaning not enough veggies for us!) so I added a half a bag of frozen peas that I had on hand. Problem solved! And they made a delicious addition.
Once the pasta is done, strain it and set it aside just for a minute.
When the sauce has reduced until there is still liquid, but it looks more like syrup than liquid, you are good to go (again, it took about 15 minutes to do so.)  Add the swirl of half and half to make it a little creamy and stir together. Add the pasta directly to the pot and take it off the heat. Stir really well to cover the pasta in the sauce and then gradually fold in the cheese. Yum. Bake covered (or covered with foil) at 375 for 25 minutes.

This was so rich and delicious. The porcinis added such a wonderful flavor and there was just the right amount of creaminess without it being overkill or too rich.  Hubby reluctantly gave out a 10 - he said he is worried to say it was a 10 lest I give up cooking at having reached my goal.  Not to fear, sweetie; I'm just getting started. Enjoy!