New Recipe Night: Tomato and Sausage Rigatoni

I was totally blown away by last night's recipe! I knew I wanted some form of pasta and after the idea popped into my head I wasn't going to be satisfied until I had CARBS! I found this recipe online while searching for something that had a protein besides chicken or beef. I had never cooked with sausage or italian tomatoes before and was excited to try something completely new....but I guess it probably comes as no surprise that most recipes are completely new to me considering that this cooking thing is new and all. Once I searched the store high and low for Italian stewed tomatoes I couldn't wait to get home and get to cooking. Hold onto your socks because this spicy and peppy dish will have you eating seconds. Seriously, so good.

Ingredients:

*2 tablespoons olive oil
*1 medium sweet onion, diced
*1 pound sweet Italian sausage meat (stuffing from 4 links)
*1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
*salt to taste
*1 35oz can imported Italian tomatoes
*6 fresh basil leaves
*1 pound rigatoni

Directions:

1. Heat olive oil in a medium sauce pan over medium-high heat. Add onion and sautè, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon until softened and translucent, about 5 minutes.
2. Add sausage meat, red pepper and salt to taste. Cook, stirring occasionally until sausage is browned approximately 10 minutes.
3. In a large bowl, crush the tomatoes with your hands then add them with their juices to the pan. Add 1/2 cup of water and bring to a simmer. Turn heat to low and let simmer until thickened, about 45 minutes. At the very end of cooking, tear 2 of the basil leaves into pieces with your hands and stir into the sauce.
4. While sauce is cooking, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and add the rigatoni. Cook uncovered over high heat until al dente.
5. Drain the pasta and toss with half of the sauce. Dish pasta out into individual serving plates, top with a little more sauce, garnish with the remaining basil leaves torn by hand and serve

I tweaked the recipe a little bit. Walmart did not offer me the fresh basil that I was looking for so I settled for basil from a jar. As usual I didn't read the recipe ahead of time and missed the part about simmering for 45 minutes. Even if I had read it ahead of time I probably still couldn't have waited that long. Flour to the rescue. I tossed in a couple spoonfuls of flour to speed up the thickening process. I let it simmer for about 25 minutes while sprinkling in several extra shakes of red pepper....did I mention that it was SPICY!?!? And did I mention that this has been my favorite Pink Dish recipe thus far? Well it is!!! I'm excited to have a new alternative to regular spaghetti meat sauce. I far prefer this to a jar of Prego...yep, that used to be my specialty! Bon Apetit, right? No more Prego for this girl!


Oh yeah, one more thing.....ENJOY!!

GOT MOTIVATION?