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This One Pot Sausage and Broccoli pasta is giving me all the feels! Pasta flavoured with spiced sausage and broccoli, then generously sprinkled with Parmesan cheese and herb and garlic breadcrumbs. You will love it for the savoury flavour and the satisfying feeling you get after the meal!
If you love pasta recipes, check out my basic pasta in cream sauce aka Pasta Alfredo or Sausage Pasta Bake.
I was introduced to this sausage and broccoli pasta by a group of students from Puglia in Italy. We were talking about national dishes and, with dreamy looks in their eyes, they told me about ‘pasta with turnip’
This had my curiosity, based in the belief that even Italians couldn’t pull off turnip pasta. Turns out this was just a poor translation of a dish called Orecchiette alle Cime di Rapa, or Orecchiette with Broccoli Raab.
Phew… THAT I can understand and get on board with!
I pent a long time looking for broccoli raab (aka rapini) but with no luck. I turned to my Italian friend and she informed me it was difficult to find this interesting green in London but she uses tenderstem broccoli (aka broccolini) in its place.
Orecchiette can also be hard to location but fortunately the situation is slightly less dire. It is possible to find it in specialty Italian shops even if it’s not really sold in supermarkets.
In the end, I settled for capunti pasta from Puglia, with is not exactly orecchiette but having the same thickness and chewiness.
So this dish is some distance from the Orecchiette alle Cime di Rapa introduced to me by my students, but it’s based in the same ideas, flavours and textures. I know you’ll love it!
How to cook pasta like an Italian
I make a lot of pasta dishes. And every time we visit Italy I talk to amazing home cooks to learn their tips and tricks on how to get the most flavour.
It might come as a surprise but very few traditional Italian pasta dishes are creamy or cheesy. A handful of parmesan or Grana Padano is how most Italian cooks finish off their dishes, yet they pack huge amounts of flavour!
How? They use only the best ingredients and they let them shine. Italians really distrust food with too many ingredients. They also possess mad cooking skills that allow them to extract maximum flavour!
The trick is to pick the right quality ingredients, and then show restraint so they can really shine. Don’t add too much sauce or cheese.
How to make it
- Buy quality pasta, it should be labeled as 100% durum semolina. It is law in Italy for all pastas to be made with 100% durum semolina, but not the case for most North American producers.
- Always salt the water you cook your pasta in. I once heard the water should taste like it’s been taken from a sea. Leave it to an Italian to turn cooking into poetry.
- Reserve a cup of starchy water to add to the sauce later, it will loosen creamy and tomato sauces and will lighten them up.
- Always add pasta to the sauce and then toss it to coat. Do not serve pasta and sauce separately. It’s a big NO for Italians.
- Do cook your pasta al dente; it should have a bit of resistance when you bite into it, which usually can only be achieved with 100% durum semolina pasta.
- Add enough salt to the finished pasta. 90% of the time when people complain about the lack of flavour is due to the lack of salt, which is very easy to fix.
- Deglaze the pan you make sauce in after browning with either wine, stock or starchy water, depending on the recipe. That little step is hugely important in creating additional flavour.
Herb and Garlic Breadcrumbs (Pangrattato)
Now let’s talk about this sausage and broccoli pasta. It can taste phenomenal or plain depending on how it is made, and because of that I decided to throw in a huge flavour maker into the mix.
And that is the Herb and Garlic Breadcrumbs. Not only do they add a wonderful crunchy texture, they also bring more flavour than you would expect.
Don’t even try making this sausage and broccoli pasta without them!! They are salty, garlicky and crispy. They are the perfect topping for this pasta!!
In my humble opinion, they take this bog standard sausage and broccoli pasta to a new height! They make it extra-ordinary.
Now let’s make it, shall we?
Serving suggestions
This pasta dish is a meal in one pan, if you want it to be, which makes it ideal for a quick lunch or dinner. But I like to round it out with something fresh such as caprese salad, plus steaming hot garlic bread.
Or you can go even further and add a whole course! There are a lot of options for antipasti. But I’m a fan of mushroom crostini, although I have a lot of other crostini options as well.
And you can always finish off with tiramisu or affagato!
Storage and leftovers
Keeping cooked pasta for another day unfortunately means that it will lose some of the al dente texture. So always best to cook only what you plan to eat.
But not everything works out that neatly, in which case the pasta can be stored for 3-4 days, refrigerated in an This is an affiliate link.airtight container. Just know that it’ll get softer the longer it sits. It’s simplest to warm it back up in a microwave.
More delicious pasta recipes
- Cream sauce pasta
- Pasta with smoked salmon
- Creamy pasta with pancetta and peas
- Baked sausage pasta with arugula
- Vegetarian Mushroom Carbonara
Sausage and Broccoli Pasta with Herb and Garlic Breadcrumbs
Ingredients
For the herb and garlic breadcrumbs
- 100g / 1 cup breadcrumbs, prepared or your own
- 1 tbsp This is an affiliate link.olive oil
- 1 tbsp butter
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 2 tbsp parsley, minced
- 1/2 lemon, zest only
- salt to taste
For the sausage and broccoli pasta
- 1 tbsp This is an affiliate link.olive oil
- 375g / 13oz sausage
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 tsp dried basil
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano
- 1/4 tsp fennel seeds
- salt
- 1/4-1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes
- 450g / 1lb short pasta
- 5oz / 140g Tenderstem broccoli
- 2/3 cup / 80g grated parmesan or Grana Padano
Instructions
To make herb and garlic breadcrumbs
- In a frying pan heat olive oil and butter, then add garlic and fry for a few seconds over low heat, add breadcrumbs, parsley, lemon zest and salt, fry while stirring once in a while until golden for approximately 2-3 minutes. Remove from the pan and set aside.
For the sausage and broccoli pasta
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil, add salt and pasta and cook according to package directions. Add tenderstem broccoli to the pot for the last 5 minutes of cooking.
- Meanwhile remove sausage from casing and cook in a large and deep frying pan with 1 tbsp of olive oil, minced garlic, basic, oregano and fennel seeds over medium heat for approximately 7-10 minutes until no longer pink.
- Scoop out 1/4 cup of pasta water and add to the pan with the sausage, scrape the brown bit to release them into the sauce. You should have enough liquid just to cover no more than the bottom of the pan. Take it off the heat until pasta is ready.
- Drain your pasta and broccoli while reserving 1 cup/250ml of pasta water.
- Add pasta and broccoli to the pan with sausage, add half of the reserved water and parmesan cheese, stir to coat over low heat, add chilli flakes and taste if additional salt is needed. Add more water if the pasta is too stiff, it should jiggle if you shake the pan. You shouldn’t have any liquid in the pan but pasta should be coated in silky, cheesy coating.
- Serve topped with breadcrumbs and additional grated parmesan. Freeze leftover breadcrumbs for another use.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Hi…the ingredients list for the breadcrumbs does not actually list the breadcrumbs. How much should I use? Thanks
They were there but somehow got mixed up with the line above, which I corrected. Thank you for letting me know, Betsy. It’s 1 cup of breadcrumbs.
I have cooked this many times and it always tastes good! A family favourite and highly recommended. So easy to make as well!
It’s one of our favourite pasta dishes as well! Thank you for your wonderful review!
where else can i use herb and garlic breadcrumbs?
There are so many ways! You can top your casseroles, pasta bakes or coat chicken, fish in them.
Though I wouldn’t call a Cajun sausage a typical Italian ingredient, I decided to give your recipe a try, since I needed to use a lonely Andouille sausage in my fridge. I omitted the red pepper flakes – the sausage is spicy enough – and it turned out really tasty.
Great to hear it, Karin! I am sure it tasted delicious with spicy Cajun sausage!
Excellent. Always one of my favorite dishes but, especially liked this due to the addition of the breadcrumbs.
Thank you for your wonderful review, Anne. This recipe is one of my favourites as well and so easy to pull together.
Excellent, loved the addition of the breadcrumbs.
They do add so much flavour and texture!
Oooh this is making me hungry!! I love the little story. Teenagers definitely are an interesting bunch! Those are good tips too. I definitely try to heed them myself when I cook. So many people underestimate the amount of salt needed and then come and yell at the recipe developer that the meal is tasteless. #foodbloggerproblems 🙂
Hahaha yes, that is so true, salt is so underestimated but there is a reason “the salt of the earth” saying exists because it’s mega important!