Pasta with Caramelized Tomatoes and Sausage Recipe
Less is more in this dish: Just five ingredients combine to make a satisfying meal. A pleasing level of heat is provided by the red pepper flakes, though you can omit them if you’re not a fan.
What to buy: Sweet Italian sausage, sometimes called mild Italian sausage, is flavored with fennel and garlic and can be found in most supermarkets. We call for the cooked variety, but if you can’t find it feel free to substitute fresh and simply cook it before using. If you want more heat, replace the mild Italian sausage with hot Italian sausage.
Game plan: If tomatoes are not in their prime and you’re dying to make this pasta, toss the chopped tomatoes with a pinch of salt and set them in a fine mesh strainer over a bowl for at least 10 minutes to boost their flavor.
This recipe was featured as part of our Tomatoes! photo gallery.
- 1 pound fully cooked sweet Italian sausage, sliced into 1/2-inch rounds
- 8 ounces grape or cherry tomatoes, halved (about 1 1/2 cups)
- 1 pound dried pasta, such as rigatoni or farfalle
- 1 to 1 1/2 teaspoons red pepper flakes
- 2 ounces Pecorino Romano cheese, for garnish
- Bring a large pot of generously salted water to a boil. Meanwhile, heat a large saucepan over medium heat and, once heated, add sausage. Cook, stirring occasionally, until well browned, about 10 minutes. Remove sausage from the pan with a slotted spoon and set aside.
- Drain and discard all but 1 tablespoon of fat from the pan. Return the pan to medium heat and add tomatoes. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper and cook, stirring only occasionally, until tender and caramelized, about 3 minutes.
- Cook pasta according to the package directions. When it’s al dente, drain, reserving 1/2 cup of the cooking water for the sauce. Add pasta water to tomatoes and use a wooden spoon to scrape up any browned bits that may have stuck to the bottom of the pan.
- Add drained pasta, red pepper flakes, and cooked sausage to tomato mixture. Stir gently until pasta is well coated with sauce. Serve topped with shavings of Pecorino Romano.
Beverage pairing: Contesa Montepulciano d’Abruzzo Vigna Corvino, Italy. The Montepulciano grape makes honest, everyday wines that might not often be spectacular but are simply delicious and food-friendly. This wine has buckets of cherry fruit and an inky, violet edge. Its acidity will keep up with the tomatoes, but it also has enough stuffing to carry on with the sausage.
I made this using hot italian sausage (instead of sweet) and I bought the precooked kind because it saves a lot of time when making this on a weeknight.
And I do believe I am wrong, as I just read the notes. Hmmm...
I do believe the writer of this recipe is implying that you cook your own Italian sausage fully before adding it to the recipe.
I've been looking for a recipe I got in one of those little grocery store recipe books at least a decade ago. It consisted of hot breakfast sausage, sour cream, tomatoes, onions and pasta. If anyone can remember the particulars, please let me know!
I tried making it this morning, with just those ingredients, but something is missing. I tried adding cheese...that isn't it. I do love the sour...+READ
I've been looking for a recipe I got in one of those little grocery store recipe books at least a decade ago. It consisted of hot breakfast sausage, sour cream, tomatoes, onions and pasta. If anyone can remember the particulars, please let me know!
I tried making it this morning, with just those ingredients, but something is missing. I tried adding cheese...that isn't it. I do love the sour cream taste mixed with the hot sausage taste...the cool versus the hot! yum!-COLLAPSE
Tried it and loved it. Also tried whackfood's version. I like the addition of the basil, onions, garlic, and peppers. But found that the sauce was better, lighter, fresher with the grape tomatoes. So that is what i now use.
how lazy can you get..cook your own sausage
Fully cooked sausage deprives you of all that great fond. I like to de-glaze my pan with a nice rustic red and finish the sauce with pasta water. Be careful because if you have adequately salted your pasta water you won't want to add any more salt to the sauce. Also, I'm with whack, fresh basil is a must.
This is a typical dish at our place when we want something easy and tasty tho we do it a bit different with little extra effort.
1. I start with julienned red bells about 3" long in a hot dry pan till starting to char
2. Toss in julienned onions, a lot of garlic, and sausage
3. I also use uncooked sausage squeezing out blobs from the casing like toothpaste - blobs are far better than slices in...+READ
This is a typical dish at our place when we want something easy and tasty tho we do it a bit different with little extra effort.
1. I start with julienned red bells about 3" long in a hot dry pan till starting to char
2. Toss in julienned onions, a lot of garlic, and sausage
3. I also use uncooked sausage squeezing out blobs from the casing like toothpaste - blobs are far better than slices in this dish cooking them till they are JUST not pink on the inside
4. When sausage is just about cooked, dump in canned, diced, tomatoes (in this case don't sub fresh) without juice (tho adjust with a little once cooking down a bit - should be stewy to saucy.
5. Oh, spices, toss in red pepper and maybe salt with the onions, and anything else (especially green stuff) with the tomatoes
6. Basil is imperative and heavy, coarsely shredded parm/rom/asiago/etc
Sauce ought to take less than 10 minute total to capture a fresh. light taste.
Pasta ought to be something like fettuccine or wide stripped pasta that can "wrap" the sausage not compete with it - rigatoni as suggested would not allow you get pasta AND sausage in one bite easily tho I would sign up with farfalle.
Finally, if sweet Italian sausage is sometimes labeled as mild Italian sausage than you might as well point out that it might also be labeled tuna as they are both wrong. There is sweet, mild, and hot. Sweet adds fennel to give it a licorice taste - the others do not. We go hot. Screw the kids.-COLLAPSE
I make a similar version of this, except I use uncooked sausage. Before frying, I take the casings off and let the sausage crumble in the frying pan a bit so it mixes into the sauce better and you get sausage in every bite.
Hubby and I made this last night. A few things we would do differently:
1. We used a very large rigatoni and would definitely use a smaller pasta next time.
2. I would add another 4 oz of tomatoes.
3. We used hot Italian sausage and 1 t red pepper. This was borderline too hot. If using the hot sausage, I would only use a 1/2 t of the pepper.
Nice, easy dish for a quick meal.
edzo: we found fully cooked sweet Italian sausage at Whole Foods, but you could always buy uncooked sweet Italian sausage and use it here (just make sure you cook the sausage thoroughly in step 2).
Where the heck do you get "fully cooked sweet italian sausage"?