Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage
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Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Calabrian Sausage is a wholesome meal that’s perfect for a weeknight dinner to feed the whole family! Prepared with a flavourful homemade chicken sausage and a rich tomato cream sauce, this pasta dinner can get on the table in just about 30 minutes!
Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage Recipe
You’re home after a long day of work. You’re ravenous. You just want to dig into some crazy comfort food.
Yep, been there, done that. I know the feeling all too well. Now, hold the phone and don’t get takeout just yet! This Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage Pasta recipe will have you covered for those tough evenings! As I mention in my free motivational guide to explore your potential in the kitchen, Make Cooking Fun!!, being realistic with what you can achieve is key to success! While you probably won’t have the energy or inclination to make a four-course meal after a tough day, what you CAN do is try a new fairly fast but super flavourful dinner! You’ll thank yourself later!
Why I Love this Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage Pasta recipe
My perfect formula for a comforting dinner is saucy, meaty, and cheesy. This Orecchiette with spicy Italian turkey sausage checks all those boxes. I especially love my pasta very saucy. I’m team red sauce, how about you? For more saucy and meaty tomato-based pasta recipes, I recommend you check out my Spicy Bacon and Chorizo Penne, the timeless Spaghetti & Meatballs with Classic Marinara, and this Hot & Spicy Cajun Chicken Spaghetti.
I discovered orecchiette not too long ago. I love exploring unique pasta shapes, and this was really standing out to me at the grocery store!
As I’m writing this, I learnt that orecchiette are named for their shape, meaning “little ears.” Guilty, I’ve never made that connection! But that’s super cool!
What I do love about these little guys is that they absorb sauce and cheese so well. Sometimes you’re having some spaghetti and the sauce is just slipping and sliding right off! Spaghetti is my favourite pasta shapes, but for some dishes it just doesn’t do the trick!
Orecchiette really grabs onto the creamy tomato sauce so well. I also love how the little chunks of Italian sausage fall into the grooves of the pasta. The cheese stays nicely coated on top. What more could you love!
The heat in this pasta comes from a twist on my typical marinara sauce recipe. The secret is the addition of authentic Calabrian peppers, which you can learn about in the video! If you haven’t subscribed to my YouTube channel already, be sure you do, and don’t forget to press the bell button to be notified when all of my latest video recipes are live! Let’s get cooking!
Tools Needed To Make Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Sausage
What You Need for Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage Pasta
Scroll to the bottom of this post for the FULL PRINTABLE Recipe Card for all ingredients and their quantities and to save the recipe instructions for later.You can also use the recipe card to scale the recipe based on how many portions of pasta you want to make so that you have the perfect amount of sauce and sausage to make everyone satisfied!
For the Spicy Calabrian Pepper Sausage
Ground chicken: That’s the choice of protein I used here, but you can use turkey or pork if you prefer.
Calabrian chili: You can use this or Calabrian chilli paste, which is also known as Bomba. Because that’s what I had on hand and it’s more accessible to me, I used bomba.
Thai green chilies: This adds a bit of heat to the sausage.
Fennel seeds: Use whole seeds that will be ground up.
Anise seeds: To be ground up with the fennel seeds.
Honey: A bit of sweetness to balance out the sweetness.
Water: Optional, but it helps bind the ingredients better into the sausage.
For the Orecchiette Pasta
Olive oil: This will be used to sauté the veggies for our tomato sauce.
Garlic cloves: Mince fresh garlic cloves into the sauce.
Heavy cream: To make a pink sauce! You can use lighter cream, but you’ll need to use more of it. You only need a splash of heavy cream to get the desired result!
Parmesan cheese: To add into the pasta and sauce and then extra for garnish. Please grate it fresh!
Spicy Italian Calabrian Pepper Sausage: As described above, but if you really need to save time, you can just buy one.
Diced tomatoes: Make sure you use plain diced tomatoes and not a can that has seasoning! That will throw off all the flavours here!
Orecchiette: If you don’t have orecchiette, you can use another small pasta shape. Great alternatives include penne, rigatoni, fusilli or rotini.
Onion: I’ve used a diced red onion.
Calabrian peppers: Or Bomba, if you can’t find whole canned Calabrian chilli peppers.
Basil: Fresh basil cut into a chiffonade for garnish.
Making the Spicy CHicken Sausage
In this recipe, I used my own spicy Italian sausage made with Calabrian pepper paste, which you can read about here. In essence, we mix all the above ingredients for the sausage and the sausage is now ready to cook.
If you’re trying to save time, you could purchase a pre-made Italian sausage. Of course I’ll always advocate that there’s more flavour in your own homemade sausage, but this is designed to be a quick and convenient weeknight dinner!
The sausage has a good balance of sweet with spicy from the hot Calabrian peppers and sweetness from the fennel, anise and honey. If you do decide to move forward with a so keep in mind that you may have to make your sauce a bit spicier if you’re using a mild, pre-packaged sausage.
Tomato Cream Sauce
If you have not prepared pink sauce before, this will be a great, simple introduction. While not technically a traditional recipe for pink sauce or Parma Rosa sauce, it has the same elements. The traditional Parma Rosa is a blend of marinara and Alfredo sauce - the latter is just a mixture of butter, cream and parmesan.
We prepare this quick sauce by sautéing the onions, garlic with the sausage. Then adding some diced tomatoes and cooking down the tomato sauce.
Once the pasta is cooked, with toss it with the tomato sauce with a drizzle of cream and a sprinkle of parmesan cheese.
The flavour and appearance of this sauce will make it seem you spent hours slaving over a marinara and Alfredo, while you know the the secret to the sauce. Isn’t that great?
Top it Off!
I love to top this off with some basil chiffonade for a pop of colour and some grated Parmesan cheese. I love the nutty flavour of the Parmesan cheese, and it contrasts nicely with the heat in the tomato sauce and the sausage.
So there you have it! If your sausage is already prepared, this (almost) one-pot meal comes together in no time, perfect for hosting guests or to make for the entire family on a weeknight when you’re ravenous. Give it a try!
Tips for A Delicious Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage
You can adjust the amount of sweetness and heat in the sausage based on your preferences. To test whether you’re happy with the flavour of the sausage, cook a small piece of it as a tester. Then, you can adjust the batch overall before cooking it.
Reserve pasta water so that you can use it to thin out the sauce, if needed. The starches in the water help bring the dish together.
You can cook the sausage the day before, if desired. However, if you are cooking the sausage in advance, make sure to reserve some of the juices so that you still get that flavour into the pasta and the tomato sauce.
If you don’t have diced tomatoes, you can use whole San Marzano tomatoes or even fresh, if that’s accessible to you!
Variations of Spicy Italian Chicken Sausage Pasta
Add veggies: You can add a nutritional boost to this pasta by throwing in red peppers, zucchini, mushrooms, and/or carrots.
Meat: If you don’t want to use the sausage, that’s fine! This will still be delicious with some bacon, Italian-Herb Grilled Chicken Breast, leftover Roast Chicken, or even ground beef! You could even switch up the sausage by trying out Pork-Bacon Sausage.
Cheese: You can substitute the Parmesan for Gruyere or Pecorino Romano.
Serving Suggestions for Orecchiette and Sausage Pasta
Appetizers: The BEST Mozzarella Sticks, Restaurant-Style Buffalo Chicken Wings, Chick-Fil-A Waffle Fries
Bread: Garlic bread, baguette, or Soft and Fluffy Dinner Rolls.
Salad: Grilled Chicken Caesar Salad, Gurkensalat (German Cucumber Salad) or Arugula Goat Cheese Salad.
Other greens: Garlic Butter Broccoli, Garlic-Creamed Spinach.
Storing Leftovers
While I think that this delicious Orecchiette with Italian Sausage will just disappear off of everyone’s plates, if you do have leftovers, then don’t worry about it! All you need to do is transfer the leftover contents into an airtight container. Then, just reheat in the microwave for 2-3 minutes, stirring occasionally to ensure that the pasta is evenly warmed through.
Watch How to Make Orecchiette with Spicy Italian chicken Sausage Here:
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Orecchiette with Spicy Italian Sausage
Ingredients
- 6 oz ground chicken/turkey/pork
- 1 tsp roughly chopped Calabrian chilli peppers OR Calabrian chilli pepper paste (bomba)
- 1 tsp Thai green chilies, chopped
- 1/4 tsp fennel seeds, crushed
- 1/4 tsp anise seeds, crushed
- 1 tsp honey
- 1 tsp water
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 1 Tbsp olive oil
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 small onion
- 14-oz can diced tomatoes
- 2 Tbsp roughly chopped Calabrian chilli peppers OR Calabrian chilli pepper paste (or bomba)
- 8 oz orecchiette
- 1/2 tsp Greatest Homemade Italian Seasoning
- Calabrian Chicken Sausage, as described above
- 1/4 Cup- 1/3 Cup heavy cream
- 1/4 Cup Parmesan cheese
- 1/4 Cup fresh basil, cut into chiffonade
- salt to taste
Instructions
- Begin by crushing the fennel seeds and the anise seeds in a mortar and pestle. If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, measure and arrange the whole spices on a paper towel.
- Fold the paper towel over the seeds, making sure to have the spices gather in one spot. Using the back of a knife or a rolling pin to crush the seeds. It does not need to be completely powdered, the coarseness adds to the texture and flavour of the sausage. Crush just enough to break down the spices and release their flavour and fragrance.
- In a large bowl, add the minced meat (chicken/turkey/pork) and mix all the ingredients together until well combined.
- Heat a pan on medium heat. Add the olive oil and garlic and mix. When the garlic starts to become light brown, add the onions and mix. Sweat the onions until they become soft.
- After about five minutes, add the sausage and break down the meat with a wooden spoon. Cook out the sausage until the meat is no longer pink.
- Add the diced tomatoes and allow the tomatoes to come to a simmer. Once the tomatoes are simmering, add the Calabrian peppers. Turn down the heat to medium-low, add salt, Italian seasoning and mix.
- As the sauce is simmering, cook the orecchiette until it is al dente, as per package directions. Stir every few minutes to ensure that the pasta does not get stuck together.
- When the pasta has finished cooking, reserve about 1/2 cup pasta water.
- Once the tomato sauce is fragrant and has thickened, drain the pasta and add it to the sauce. Gradually add the pasta water to thin out the sauce as desired.
- Finish with cream and simmer for one more minute. Garnish with Parmesan cheese and fresh basil. Serve hot and enjoy :)
Nutrition info excludes mango puree and toppings.
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Welcome to Cooking With Anadi. This platform is all about making cooking exciting and finding new ways to bring classic flavours and recipes at your service. Join me in my personal journey in the world of cooking. Hope you have a great ride!
