Noodle Night: Orecchiette with Sausage and Cream
If
ever there was a food that encompasses every mealtime from a fancy night on the
town to the humblest kitchen table, that is pasta. Pasta tickled us as kids from a macaroni
box, the miasma of orange powder and milk our earliest collective lesson in
kitchen chemistry. Pasta fills our chicken soup bowl to nourish body and spirit when we
are sick. Pasta lurks in oil at the salad bar, in mayo at the deli, in the steam table of a street cart.
Pasta fills our autumn dish with seasonal pumpkin or repurposed turkey, awakens our springtime palate with
primavera, helps us trudge through winter with the supreme comfort of meatballs
and red sauce. Pasta is weeknight dinner, Sunday Supper, leftovers lunch, and
midnight snack, and multitasking pasta often fulfills these offices from a
single afternoon of cooking.
One click on the pasta tag, and one can see how much we love pasta
in our urban home. I always spend a cozy September Saturday making meatballs to
freeze for Saturday night dinners through the upcoming dark months. Of course
that means spaghetti and meatballs for dinner that night, accompanied by Insalata Mista and a favorite red wine such as Loring. There will be a casserole of baked rigaboni during Halloween, a bowl of linguini after Thanksgiving, red peppers and orecchiette in December before the carbohydrate bigotry of January dieting.
Those carbs can be a conveyance for family history just as surely as genetics. Heirloom
recipes for gravy or sauce are as sacred as the family Bible where they are
enshrined as a folded receipt, barely legible in Nonna’s faded script. But one
doesn’t have to be Italian to like pasta or have it coded into genetics: lo
mein, spaetzle, udon, couscous, Pad Thai, pastitsio, kugel, satay, ramen, and tuna noodle casserole are just some of the ways that pasta
arrives at the world table.
However your pasta arrives at table, it
journeyed through kitchen private or public. Learning to make fresh
pasta is worth any cook’s time who wants to do it. The process of bringing
together this humble mixture of wheat, water or oil, eggs, and effort has a meditative, even healing effect. Because it is simple, it is
profound. Gently kneading the pasta, rolling it thin, cutting it into shapes or
pulling it into strings, connects us with the countless loving hands that have
prepared pasta on floury boards and conveyed it into salted water.
From there, pasta remains the humblest of
foods when tossed with simple ingredients from oil and garlic to stock and broth. One of John’s favorite dishes, which I
make for him when he is sick or just in need of some love, is penne tossed with
butter. But then who doesn’t love buttered egg noodles, swimming in soup or slithering under goulash? Another
favorite, equally comforting, is spongy udon, dunked in dashi mixed, some would
say heretically, with soy sauce.
We all learned, or didn’t need to learn if
we had been listening to our grandmothers, the importance of a well stocked pantry during the pandemic. Along with flour,
sugar, and coffee, dried pasta is a pillar of the pantry’s
obligations to preparation and readiness. After long waits to get into a
grocery, supermarket, or box store, we all encountered shelves labeled with
purchase limits on pasta boxes – or shelves empty of them altogether. During
those times, I made countless dinners of such simple but good pasta as puttanesca and carbonara, with leftovers, if there were any, for
lunch the next day.
That is the power of Noodle Night: it
comes from simplicity to sustain through times of want and worry and to celebrate during times of kinship and festivity. Noodle Night is not de facto modest.
Lasagne anchors family gatherings from Christmas to weddings, as does pastitsio
for Sunday Supper or Easter dinner, or kugel during Rosh Hashanah,
Yom Kippur, or Shabbat. If your idea of celebration is unfolding a menu at a
favorite restaurant, in many of them, pasta has its own page. I will always
remember the chicken piccata, served over spaghetti with oil, at a
favorite local restaurant that I am sorry to report did not survive lockdown. During
a trip to New York this summer, one of the best meals of my
life – with some of the best friends in my life – was anchored by award-winning
game for the rest of the table, and pasta for me. And when we return to our
beloved Santa Ynez Wine Valley, I so look forward to the California Casual elegance of pasta dishes matched to local
wines.
In celebration of Noodle Night, and in
recognition of the traditional pasta recipes available at
Urban Home, here
is the first of three pasta dishes inspired by California cooking: a weeknight sauté of sausage, tomatoes,
and cream, served over the chef’s kiss cut of orecchiette. This urban home
favorite comes together easily and satisfies deeply. Serve this pasta dish with
leaf lettuces tossed with mustard- or sherry-orange vinaigrette, and a full-bodied California white such
as Foxen’s creamy, floral Chenin Blanc.
Orecchiette with Apple Sausage, Tomatoes,
and Cream
Chicken sausage with apple is a common
supermarket staple, especially during autumn and winter. Look for it among the
wursts in the cold case, or ask for it from the service deli. Like many pan
sauces for pasta, this one includes some inexact measurements: starting slow
and tasting as you go until it’s right is part of the pleasure of making pasta!
For the sauce
1 pound chicken sausage with apple
2 large shallots
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup sun dried tomatoes, rough cut or
torn to bite-sized pieces
1/3 cup dry vermouth
Chicken stock
Heavy cream
Extra-virgin olive oil
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Fresh rosemary
For the pasta
1 box small cut pasta
Orecchiette is the perfect cut for this
creamy sauce, but any short cut pasta with a scoop shape will work, such as
pipette, campanelle, or gemelli.
Prep the ingredients
- Peel each shallot and discard the root end. Cut each shallot in half lengthwise, then cut across each half to form half rings.
- Peel each garlic clove. Cut away the root end. Cut each clove in half; remove the bitter green inner pith if present. Cut each half into rough dice.
- Cut away tough casing if present on the sausage. Cut across each sausage to form thin coins.
Make the sauce
- Drizzle a large skillet or sauté pan with olive oil to coat thoroughly.
- Scatter the shallots and garlic across the oil. Sprinkle the shallots and garlic with several grindings fresh black pepper and a pinch of salt.
- Place the coins of chicken sausage in the pan, cut side down. It is okay if the sides touch, or there is some overlap. Scatter the sun-dried tomatoes across the sausage.
- Turn the burner to low and cook until the shallots and garlic start to give off their fragrance, and the sausage begins to brown.
- Stir occasionally to keep heat even, but not too often – you want the sausage and shallots to lightly caramelize.
- Once the pasta water (see below) boils and the noodles go into the water, measure the vermouth into the pan containing the sauce. Shake the pan gently to loosen the sausage and shallots. Cover the pan so that the vermouth cooks down a bit, about five minutes on low heat.
- After about five minutes, remove the lid from the pan containing the sauce. You should have a fragrant, lightly oily mixture in the pan.
- Starting with about ¼ cup, slowly measure chicken stock into the pan until the sauce tastes slightly sweet from the sausage and vermouth, cut with the warmth of the chicken stock. It shouldn’t take more than ½ cup.
- When the pasta is ready, turn off the heat from the pan containing the sauce. Use one hand to gently shake the pan as you drizzle heavy cream into the sauce. The mixture should be savory and slightly sweet, with the richness of the cream; typically about 1/3 cup. Cover the pan until ready to serve.
Assemble the dish
- Place two scoops of pasta into a pasta bowl. Give the sauce a stir to ensure that it is creamy. Divide the sauce between the bowls. Sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper. Strip a few blades of fresh rosemary onto each serving. Serve with grated Parmesan.
How to cook dried pasta
- Pasta likes as much room as it can get while it cooks, so use the largest pot you have but be sure someone can lift it when it’s full. Many pasta recipes are timed to the steps in making the pasta – usually sauce and pasta are cooking at the same time.
- Fill a large pot with water. Place a generous measure of salt into the water.
- Carefully transfer the pot to the stovetop. Turn the burner to medium high.
- Once the water achieves a full boil, gently pour the dried pasta into the water. Be careful of splashing! The water may cloud, and the boil will go down.
- Use a slotted spoon to stir the pasta – this separates each shape / strand.
- Let the water return to full boil. Stir the pasta occasionally, being careful of splashing.
- Cook the pasta until al dente – slightly firm to the bite. This usually corresponds to the cooking time given in the instructions on the box, less one minute.
- Once the pasta is cooked, turn off the heat. Carefully carry the pot to the sink, and being very careful of splashing, pour the water and pasta into the colander.
- Allow the pasta to drain for about a minute. Return the pasta into the pot. Place the pot back on the burner (no heat), and cover until ready to serve.
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