Pumpkin and bacon pasta

When I'm surfing the internet, I spend a considerable amount of time looking at other foodblogs. One I particularly like is the petit brocoli illustré, written, it seems, by a belgian expatriate in Italy. It seems, I say, because this blog is so annoyingly beautiful and well-made that I'm not sure there's a human being behind it. If you look here, where the same blogger publishes an Italian (food)blog, you learn a bit more about her, but frankly, I like to console myself by thinking it's all made up because it's just too good to be true... I look at entries such as the spaghetti with artichokes and red mullet and I wonder what in the world I am doing, writing about my everyday dishes, illustrating my posts with pictures taken with my mobile phone camera. Well, some kind of naive enthusiasm paired with the firm intention to find ways to improve my blog keep me going.

Anyway, wonderblogger tells us she spent some time in the Abruzzo and she mentions having eaten tagliatelle with pumpkin and mushrooms, which sounds intriguing. Pumpkin is all over the menus at restaurants at this time of the year but to be honest, I'm sometimes a little wary of the myriad of pumpkin dishes on offer. As much as I like its taste, it puts me off when the pumpkin's stringy texture is too prominent which is why, for instance, a slice of grilled pumpking placed on a salad just doesn't do it for me. Of course, when the pumpkin is puréed, there won't be any stringy bits, so that's what I did when, inspired my the above-mentioned abruzzese dish I made my

Pumpkin and bacon pasta (serves two)

- about 400g of pumpkin, cut into chunks
- 1 small handfull bacons cubes or strips
- 1 tablespoon flat-leaved parsley, chopped
- 1 small garlic clove, minced
- 1 teaspoon piment d'espelette
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- salt, pepper to taste
- 180g pasta (I used wholewheat spaghetti)
- grated parmesan to serve

Fry the bacon in a large frying pan until crispy. Set aside. Heat the olive oil in the same pan and add the garlic and pumpkin. Fry the pumpkin, stirring occasionally, adding a little water from time to time until the pieces are falling apart. Place in a food processor and blend into a smooth purée. Add the piment d'espelette and season with salt and pepper. Return to the pan and add the parsley and bacon. Cook the pasta until al dente. Add some of the cooking water to the sauce to loosen it a little bit. Drain the pasta and add to the sauce. Stir carefully until the pasta is evenly coated. Serve sprinkled with grated parmesan.