Italian sausage pasta – a recipe post

This has been a recipe I’ve been messing with and tweaking around for some time. There have been several scrawled hand written ingredient lists and methods left around on dog eared bits of paper. I am a fiend for reusing paper, so some versions were written on the back of printouts of Powerpoint slides for my classes. It’s all reusing, right? But when I dig them up again, they’re always a funny reminder of how the facets of my life are so very different.

The variations I have explored are: fennel sausages or plain? Garlic or no garlic? Wine or no wine? Cream or no cream? Tomato puree and tomatoes or just fresh tomatoes?

 

[Other variations could be: basil or oregano? Wine, vodka, or no alcohol at all? Parmesan or Grano Padano?] 

 

The sausages here are not just British bangers. These are Italian sausages with very high (pork) meat content, making them very dense. This is why I think they’re perfect for skinning and crumbling up into a sauce. I like the fennel flavoured Italian sausages, but if you don’t like this flavour, use plain.

 

In the end, this is what I arrived at. The tomato stem part of the recipe was inspired by seeing “Roasting Tin” cookbook author Rukmini Ayer on the TV saying that her top cooking tip for intensifying tomato aroma and flavour was to save up the stems and add to soups, sauces and stews. It was a solid cooking hack I have been using ever since. (Don't forget to fish them out before serving, though!)

 

 

 

Serves 2

 

Ingredients

2 echalion shallots, finely diced

3 cloves garlic, peeled, sliced across their width with the slices cut into 3 or 4

4 Tuscan sausages or 5 smaller Fennel Italian sausages

250-275g cherry or similar small, ripe tomatoes, diced

Any tomato stems you may have

1/4 (quarter) teaspoon dried oregano or half a teaspoon of fresh

60 ml white wine

1/2 teaspoon plain flour

60 ml double cream

3 tbsp fresh basil leaves, roughly chopped

2 tbsp olive oil

250g dried pasta of your choice, I used bronze die extruded fusilli

4-5 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

If you don’t have fennel sausages and like the flavour, a pinch of fennel seeds

Salt

Freshly ground black pepper

 

You will need

Two saucepans, a colander, a fine grater, Knife/chopping board

 

Instructions

Put some water on to boil to make your pasta. Add salt to the water.

The sausages need to be peeled and crumbled up first. I use a sharp knife to cut the skin along the length of the sausages very shallowly, so the skin can just be pulled off. Break up into chunks.

 

 

 

Add the olive oil to a frying pan on a medium heat. Fry the shallots for 5 minutes.

 

Then add the garlic and lower the heat. Cook for 3 minutes.

 

At around this time put your pasta on. Cook it to the Al Dente time on the packet if you like it cooked. Or take a minute or even two off the Al Dente time if you like it Al Dente. (It will be cooked again at the end.) Drain the pasta and reserve a little pasta water in case you need to loosen up the pasta and sauce later. Do not rinse the pasta!

 

Now add the sausage meat, raising the heat back to a medium heat. If you want to add the pinch of fennel seeds, add them now.

 

Fry off for 7-8 minutes, until they have changed colour. If you've crumbled up into small pieces, you might need less time here.

 

Turn the heat off and take everything out of the pan, leaving on a plate near the hob.

 

Put the heat back into a medium high heat. Now add the wine to the pan. When bubbling, add the flour. Stir thoroughly. Keep stirring until you can't smell raw wine any more.

 

Add the tomatoes and any stems and oregano and cook for 5-7 minutes. You want the tomatoes to start breaking down and for the juices to escape the tomatoes and begin to thicken.

 

Add the sausage meat back in and combine thoroughly. Make sure the meat is heated through.

 

Once warmed through, add the cream, stirring constantly. Once combined, reduce the heat to low.

 

Now add the chopped basil and mix through. Remove the tomato stems.

 

 

Add the cooked pasta. Mix everything together, keeping it moving. If you think it needs loosening up, add some of the pasta water and mix through to the desired consistency. When all warmed through, and at a hardness you like your pasta at, serve in bowls. Top with the Parmesan cheese.

 

 

Enjoy immediately.