Creamy Sausage & Mushroom Strozzapreti

Thanksgiving is coming... are you thinking about what to cook for the dinner? Turkey, brussels sprout, stuffing, mashed potato or butternut squash.... and you will probably need at least one starch dish.

Here is a simple but earthy and hearty pasta dish you can easily pull off for the busy evening. Please make the mushroom and sausage mixture ahead of time, and cook pasta at the last minutes right before the Thanksgiving dinner. Finally, mix the pasta with the mixture - simple enough, isn’t it?

Creamy Sausage & Mushroom Strozzapreti
(Yield: 4 servings / Cooking time: 40 minutes)

Ingredients:
+ 250g(17.6oz) strozzapreti*
+ 2 mild Italian pork sausage, only the meat removed from the casing
+ 100g bunashimeji mushroom
+ 5-6 small kale leaves, roughly chopped
+ 2-3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
+ 3 Tbsp ricotta cheese
+ 1 Tbsp sour cream
+ olive oil
+ freshly chopped parsley for garnish
+ parmigiano-reggiano, grated
+ salt and pepper


* You can use any dried short pasta, like penne or rigatoni.

Procedures:

1. Sauté pork sausage meat with a bit of olive oil. Break the meat with wooden spoon while cooking over medium to high heat. When pork is cooked golden brown, take it out from the pan.


2-1. Wipe the pan with dried paper towel, and drizzle a bit more olive oil on the pan. Sweat roughly diced garlic. Please be careful not to burn the garlic... as it tends to burn easily.
2-2. Add mushrooms and sauté over medium to high heat until mushroom is cooked. Season mushroom with salt when mushroom is almost cooked.
2-3. Add back the browned pork sausage.
2-4. Lastly, add roughly chopped kale, and sauté until the kale is wilted.


* NOTE: You can make this mixture up to this point ahead of time, and cook pasta and add to the mixture with cheese & sour cream later, right before the dinner.

3. Boil a pot of water and salt the water when it boils. Cook strozzapreti for 6-8 minutes according to the instruction on the package.


4. Drain the pasta and add it to the sauce with ricotta cheese and sour cream. Mix well while the past is still hot. Taste and season with enough black pepper.


5. Garnish the pasta with freshly chopped parsley and grated parmigiano-reggiano, and serve immediately.

Enjoy~