Italian sausage ragu with penne pasta is a delicious dish that features onion, celery and carrot slow cooked and caramelized into the sauce along with fresh basil and thyme and a white wine reduction! Join Eric from Simply Elegant Home Cooking as he demonstrates his method for this amazing pasta dish! While today the ragu sauce is served over penne pasta, this would be equally well with rigatoni or other larger shapes of pasta. They key to this dish is to cook everything very slowly to draw out the maximum amount of flavor.
There are many ways to customize this recipe. Today Eric is using sweet Italian sausage but hot sausage works well too. Also, you can get creative with the fresh herbs. Herbs such as Italian parsley, oregano or sage would work well in this pasta sauce. It is imperative that cook your pasta al dente and do not rinse it! Also, do not spoon the sauce over the pasta but instead finish the pasta in the same pan as the sauce with some of the starchy water added in to create the desired consistency.
This dish is Italian comfort food at it’s best! Enjoy!
Ingredients:
-1 ¼ pound Italian sausage
-3 tablespoons olive oil
-1 white onion
-1 stalk celery
-1 carrot
-4 tablespoons tomato paste
-3 cloves garlic
-2 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves
-1 large handful fresh basil
-1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
-1/2 cup chicken stock
-1/2 cup Italian dry white wine
-1 can (28 oz) San Marzano tomatoes
-1 ½ tablespoons butter
-1/2 cup grated Parmiggiano-Reggiano cheese
-1 pound pasta
-salt and black pepper