Sausage & Peppers
This past week-end we visited with long time friends in Ridgefield. During the week I thought about what food – ingredients and prepared dishes we could bring that would be easy to get on to the table with a minimum of fuss in someone else’s kitchen. The answer: Winter pesto (published in a previous blog), Sausage and Peppers, and Chocolate Sauce (the next two blogs), and a bottle of Prosecco. (Wouldn’t you like us to visit you for a week-end?)
We had plans to be out and about Saturday during the day and other friends scheduled to come for Saturday dinner followed by a merciless session of Trival Pursuit. Who won is still in dispute…
Menu
Sausage & Peppers
Winter Pesto w/ Festonati pasta
Broccoli Rabe
Arugula Salad w/ Bosc Pears and toasted Pecans
Mango Sorbet w/ Chocolate Sauce
We arrived home late Saturday afternoon about an hour before guests were scheduled to arrive. We picked up a box of arugula, two bunches of broccoli rabe, a few Bosc pears, a couple of pints of Sorbet – Mango & Raspberry, and assorted fresh berries.
The sausage and peppers just needed to be re-heated, pasta cooked for the pesto, salad put together, and broccoli rabe sautéed w/ garlic. We were ready with plenty of time to spare.
Sausage & Peppers – serves 6
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 leeks
4 peppers – 2 yellow and 2 orange
6 plum tomatoes
2 medium size cloves of garlic (to your taste)
6 Italian sausages (about 2 pounds) 3 sweet / 3 hot (pork or chicken – your choice)
2 teaspoons crushed bouillon cube or 1 cup concentrated chicken or vegetable stock
You can practice your knife technique cutting these vegetables into bite size pieces, or use a Cuisinart to process into small pieces. Use leek from top to bottom, slice the leeks lengthwise in half and run under cool water to remove sand and clay-like soil. Slice leeks bottom to top on a slight diagonal in half-inch pieces. Slice tomatoes lengthwise in half, scoop out seeds, it’s to leave the skin on and dice. The peppers need to be hand sliced for texture and color in this dish. Halve and seed peppers, slice in lengthwise quarter-inch strips.
To process cut vegetables in pieces so they fit in the bowl of the cuisinart, pulse 5 short pulses 5 times for leeks, 4 times for tomatoes.
Heat a large sauté pan over medium heat for 2 minutes, add olive oil and leeks, stir or shake pan to distribute evenly, sauté about 4 minutes. add to leeks and sauté another 4 minutes, dice tomatoes, add and sauté another 4 minutes. Make a hole in the center of your pan, push the vegetables aside, add about 1 tablespoon olive oil, let it heat for a minute and add garlic sliced in thin pieces. When the garlic begins to sizzle mix it into the vegetables. Spoon the vegetables into a large bowl and set aside while you cook the sausage.
Remove the sausage from their casing, re-heat pan and drop in bite size (aprox. 2 teaspoon size) pieces of sausage, do not shake or stir. Let brown for 4 minutes, shake or use a spatula to turn the sausage pieces, add vegetables back into the pan, stir in bouillon or stock, lower flame, cover and cook 3 minutes covered.
If you want to serve immediately, cook another 2 minutes, remove cover, turn heat off and let sit 5 minutes. Transfer to a heated platter and serve. You don’t need a garnish, the peppers, tomatoes, and sausage present an attractive dish.
If you want to cool and serve later, turn off heat, remove cover and let pan sit on hot burner. This works for a gas flame. If you have an electric or radiant heat stove, it may be best to leave it half on burner and turn the pan every minute or so.) Cool to room temp and refrigerate at this point like I did this past week. You can prepare up to three days in advance. To serve heat in a large sauté pan spread out thin so it will heat quickly, or heat on a platter in a microwave.
