conchiglie with sausage and broccoli rabe

We've been getting some real crappy weather down here in the A. Cold, rainy, bitter, gloomy. Not very fall like in Georgia at all. Of course, these frosty days make for a perfect occasion to eat a hot, aromatic bowl of good pho (why is BuHi so far away), stew or soup. Something that'll really warm you down and make you want to buy one of those cult-like Snuggies.

Here's the thing: BuHi is an hour (without Atlanta traffic *laugh*) away, stews take awhile to prepare and soups just aren't filling for me. So I decided to go with a fast, filling and comforting food - pasta.

I've had Giada's Everyday Italian cookbook for awhile now and I like most of her recipes. I mean her show compared to "Semi-Insane" (watch this link, gotta love AB) is definitely, absolutely, 100% more watchable. This recipe had been bookmarked for awhile now and it was finally time to stop procrastinating.

You can substitute the sausage for chicken or turkey sausage because let's face it, some can-I-substitute-this-for-that blogger will probably ask this if I don't state this now. I actually think chicken sausage would work pretty well with this recipe because it's a sauceless pasta. Feel free to experiment and you can change the pasta as well. I didn't have orecchiette on hand so I used conchiglie instead. Both work perfectly fine.

Conchiglie with Sausage and Broccoli Rabe

Adapted from Giada De Laurentiis, Serves 4

Ingredients:

- 2 bunches of broccoli rabe, stems trimmed, cut into quarters

- 1lb conchiglie pasta

- about 1lb hot italian sausage, out of their casings

- 3 garlic cloves, minced

- 1 shallot, fine dice

- 0.5 tablespoon crushed red pepper flakes

- 0.25 cup fresh, grated Parmesan

1) Bring a pot of water to boil. Salt the water and blanch the broccoli rabe for a minute until bright green. Remove the broccoli rabe from the hot water using a slotted spoon and cool in cold water. Do NOT pour out the boiling water and work in batches to blanch the rabe if needed. Bring the water back to a boil and do steps 2 and 3 together.

2) In a separate hot pan, add a couple tablespoons of olive oil. Add the shallots and sausages and break the sausages apart as they cook. Cook until no longer pink over medium heat for about 10 minutes.

3) Add olive oil to the boiling water and cook the pasta until 1 minute from al dente. The time will vary depending on the pasta used. It was about 10 minutes to al dente for me so 9 minutes cooking time.

4) After cooking the sausages for about 8 minutes, add in the minced garlic and red pepper flakes. Saute with the sausage until fragrant - about a minute. Add in the reserved broccoli rabe and stir to mix together well.

5) Drain the almost al dente pasta from the cooking water and reserve a cup of pasta water to use if needed.

6) Add the pasta to the pan with the sausage/broccoli rabe and stir to incorporate. Add pasta water a little bit at at time as needed.

7) Add in the grated Parmesan, stir and serve immediately.