So I'm trying to come up with more things to do with my pancetta before it goes bad. I don't really eat bacon asside from the occasional piece of pre-cooked stuff on a pizza or breakfast sammich. So there's not much substituting that comes to mind.
But I have had some scallops in the freezer for a little while. They're not very good for wrapping because of the size and shape. So I just added it to the mix.

I tore up pieces & left out some of the fat. I think if I did this again I might leave them in bigger pieces. Maybe. I might have made them this size because that's how it tore. I'd have to do it again to be sure.

So I browned them up just like the last time & then put them to the side.

I got a place to start with the sauce from here. and made some adjustments.

I poured a 1/4 cup of chichen broth (& then a little more) into a pan. Then I added some white wine. What I guessed would be around three tablespoons-ish. A squirt or two of lemon juice, a couple cloves of chopped garlic & some onion powder.
I let that cook on medium & added 2 tablespoons of butter. After the butter melted, I kept it on med-low for a bit & then turned it down to low when I was just finnishing up with the scallops.

I cooked the scallops the same as instructed in the link for the sauce. A little olive oil, some salt & pepper on a baking sheet that I lined with foil. I just eyeballed them & flipped um a couple times.

Half way through I added the pancetta to the sheet. I mixed it up some with the scallop juices & olive oil that was all around & let it heat up again in the oven with the scallops.

I thought of a few ways to do it, like adding the pancetta to the sauce or finnishing up cooking the scallops in the pan with the pacetta, but this way worked best with the way I had everything set up.

Here it is on plates, with the sauce poured over it.


Donnie liked it a lot.
I find it sad, but I think I'm loosing my taste for scallops. I used to love them but the last few times I've had them there's something about it that's not quite fufilling. Not bad by any means. Just not as good as they used to be to me. Maybe I just need to give it a long break before I try them again.

I got some spinach the other day to make some more pesto with a different recipe, but as it turns out all my basil had gone bad. :(
So I looked up something else to do with spinach & came across this.

I used bowties instead because well, that's what I had.

Though I did go out and find some pancetta because the closest thing we had to that around the house was pre-cooked bacon. I didn't figure that would be close enough.


I got a little worried because the woman at the meat department of my grocery store didn't know what I was talking about. Thankfully the girl in the deli did and pointed me to the fancy cheese & other specialty items cooler.

I happened to have just as much spinach as I needed. That was pretty cool.


These colors are so pretty when they're all together.


I started to get a little worried when I realized there wasn't actually much of a "sauce" to this. Donnie seems to be attached to the idea that pasta has to have a sauce (at least that's the impression I've got before) but even I was afraid the pasta might be too dry or not have enough flavor to it. But I didn't even have to add any extra pasta water.


I loved the way the strong flavor of the pancetta countered with the mildness of the egg and noodles. I thought it was a really great combination. And not too heavy. It filled me up but didn't leave me stuffed.


I have more pancetta left over, and while I plan on searching around for more recipes, I'd love to hear any sugestions anybody may have!