Rosalie's Sausage and Pepper Sauce

If you like peppers and sausage, you'll love this dish.

Dip Italian bread in the sauce for an extra treat.

~ my friend Rosalie Fiorino Harpole, 

from her cookbook Rosalie Serving Italian

Recently I tried a new recipe, thanks to a Friday Foodie nudge from blogger Kathy McElhaney at McMoments and Memories.  She was hankering for something spicy and this recipe from Rosalie's Serving Italian cookbook fit the bill.

The day I read Kathy's Friday Foodie post, my own menu read "make something with peppers."  I'd found some beautiful American-size yellow and red bell peppers (rare!) recently at a local market here in Manila.  Thanks for the nudge, Kathy!  Ditto: Rosalie's recipe fit the bill!

However, I have to admit, I somehow missed the fact that Kathy had gleaned this scrumptious recipe from the very cookbook that rests on my own kitchen's shelf until after I'd washed all our dinner dishes!

So, before I share Rosalie's quick and easy "Sausage and Pepper Sauce" recipe, I have to put in a plug for this personal friend of mine from the good ol' Show Me State (that's Missouri!).  She said, "Kelley Highway readers can order Rosalie Serving Italian and Rosalie Serving Country for $29 (includes shipping inside the continental US)."  You can check out Rosalie's Web site Rosalie Serving here.  Sign up for her e-newsletters, too!  Click Contact and she'll tell you how you can order her delightfully colorful, glossy page-filled cookbooks packed with delicious recipes and helpful "teaching hints and family insights."

Sausage and Pepper Sauce

1 pound rotini (Kathy stated that she prepared whole wheat.  I haven't located whole wheat pasta here yet, but I had tricolor spiral pasta in the freezer so that's what I used.)

1 Tablespoon salt for the water to cook the pasta

1/2 cup reserved pasta water

1/4 cup olive oil

3 peppers: green, red, yellow OR mixed (I used two yellow and one red.)

1/2 cup chopped onion (I sliced two small onions.  I did not chop them.)

2 cloves garlic, chopped (I used 4 or 5!)

salt and pepper to taste

2 Italian sausage links, cut into 2" rounds (Mine were spicy, and I removed the casings and casually formed them into 1-inch mini meatballs.)

In a 2-cup measuring cup or a bowl, stir together:

1 15-ounce can tomato sauce (I didn't have any, so I used 15 ounces canned spaghetti sauce.)

1/2 teaspoon sugar (I omitted this.)

1/4 teaspoon dried basil leaves

1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1/4 cup chicken broth

salt and pepper to taste

freshly grated Parmesan cheese

olive oil

Directions:

1.  Wash, core and seed peppers.  Julienne them, but not too thinly.  (Next time, I will cut each strip in half lengthwise.)  Place the olive oil, peppers, onion and garlic in a saucepan over MEDIUM heat.  Salt and pepper to taste.  (This is the only place I salted and peppered this dish.)  Add the sausage pieces and saute until peppers are tender and the sausage is cooked.  (I pushed the sausage meatballs to the bottom of the pan, making sure they got cooked well on all sides.  After about 5 or 10 minutes, I also covered the saucepan, stirring the contents every few minutes.  This took 15 to 20 minutes.)

2.  Stir together the tomato sauce, basil, pepper flakes and chicken broth.  When the sausage is cooked and the peppers are tender, add the sauce to the saucepan.  Simmer on LOW heat 15 minutes.  (I covered the pan, stirring every 5 minutes or so.)

3.  In boiling salted water, cook the pasta al dente.  Toss the pasta with the sauce.  (As you can see in the photo below, somehow I missed that "toss" part on Kathy's blog post, too!  *sigh*)  Add 1/2 cup reserved pasta water.  (I omitted that.)

4.  I served our pasta in soup plates and did not garnish with grated Parmesan cheese or olive oil as Rosalie suggests... because I hadn't read that yet!  Next time I will add the Parmesan!

I'm not thrilled with how the lighting over my dining table

alters the reality of the dishes I photograph there.  Gotta work on that.

I served our sausage and peppers with a garden salad, but next time I'll prepare a completely Italian meal divine: insalata verde (simple green Italian salad of Romaine leaves, freshly sliced white onion rings and black olives, freshly cracked black pepper, dressed with a light olive oil-based dressing), Rosalie's Sausage and Pepper Sauce with rotini, Italian bread and olive oil for dipping, and for dessert, (easy!) panna cotta!

Let me know if you try this!  Enjoy!