Recipe: Orecchiette with Garlic Toulouse Sausages

A hearty dish packed with flavour, this recipe is from everyone’s favourite London butcher, The Ginger Pig, and features its very own garlic Toulouse sausage, charred courgette, and orecchiette. A pasta typical of the Apulia region in the south of Italy, its name translates to ‘little ears’: the pasta has a thicker, slightly chewy nature, with an indent that holds all the saucy goodness. 

In this recipe, the emulsification of pecorino cheese and starchy pasta water makes for a light, silky sauce, and the flavour is ramped up thanks to the garlicky Toulouse sausages and the hit of chargrilled courgette. Ellie Morris, Seasonal Recipe Developer at The Ginger Pig says: ‘The Toulouse sausages, made simply with just four ingredients of curing salt, brown sugar white pepper and garlic, offer a wonderful crumbly texture against the slightly chewy pasta and earthy mushrooms. It’s a lovely meal for those evenings when the days feel rather long.’ If you don’t have orecchiette to hand, try penne, farfalle or tubettini as they also allow for a good coating of sauce.

Recipe: Orecchiette with Garlic Toulouse Sausages

Serves 2

Ingredients:

• 250g orecchiette pasta
• Olive oil, for frying
• 600g Garlic Toulouse sausages
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
• 800g courgettes, cubed into 2cm pieces
• 500g woodland mushrooms (or mushrooms of your choice)
• 150g kale
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp chilli flakes
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 2 tsp dried oregano
• Pecorino cheese, for grating
• Extra virgin olive oil, for drizzling

Method:

1. Place a wide and deep-ish pan on a medium heat with 1 tbsp olive oil, remove the casing from the sausages and crumble into the pan. Fry until browned and slightly crispy, approx. 10 minutes. Remove and set aside for later.
2. Add in the cubed courgettes and turn the heat up slightly, fry until softened and have become charred, when they are nearly done add in the garlic, and continue to cook until the garlic has softened and become fragrant. Turn the heat back down to medium.
3. Set a pot of well-salted water to boil, add the orecchiette, and cook for approx. 6 minutes (this is for dried pasta not fresh, reduce the cooking time by half for fresh pasta).
4. Add the mushrooms and kale into the pan with the courgettes, and cook down so the mushrooms soften and the kale wilts but still has a crunch. Add in the chilli flakes and oregano and stir through the veg.
5. Add the sausages back in and toss well to combine and season with salt and pepper at this stage.
6. The orecchiette should now be al dente, begin by spooning the pasta straight from the pot into the pan with the sausages and veg, and include a good few spoonfuls of the starchy pasta water.
7. Grate in a very generous amount of pecorino (don’t be shy, the amount is as much as you like), and toss the pan so the cheese begins to emulsify with the pasta water, creating a wonderful silky sauce that will coat everything beautifully.
8. Grate in the lemon zest at this stage and stir through.
9. Keep on the heat for a further 5 minutes, tossing occasionally, this will help thicken the sauce a little.
10. Spoon into bowls and finish with a grating of pecorino, a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and a final zest of lemon for freshness.

Recipe taken from The Ginger Pig