RECIPE AT THE TOP #1: sausage anchovy pasta sauce 🍝
RECIPE AT THE TOP #1: sausage anchovy pasta sauce 🍝
just a quick post for a quick recipe — no pictures, just cook.
Yes! Here is the recipe: AT THE TOP OF THE PAGE. Blurb comes after - what a concept 🤯
SAUSAGE ANCHOVY PASTA SAUCE
Ingredients
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 ½ heads garlic, minced
1-2T EVOO
*2 pounds italian sausage
3.35 oz jar anchovy filets (or ~15 filets total)
12 oz tomato paste
2 tsp dried thyme
**1 tsp dried rosemary (crushed)
***2T dried oregano
¼ tsp crushed red pepper
approx. 3 cups water, enough to thin to your liking
salt + pepper, to taste
optional, but highly recommended:
pre-sautéed vegetables (remember these??)
Directions
in a dutch oven over medium heat, add EVOO to coat the bottom (somewhere between 1-2T) and let the oil heat up until it starts to shimmer
add the onion, let sweat and lightly brown
add garlic and cook until fragrant
add the sausage, brown and break up the meat into a mix of small crumbles and bite-size pieces. adjust heat to medium low.
add the anchovy filets, stir to combine
add the tomato paste, thyme, rosemary, and oregano. stir to combine
slowly add the water and let the tomato lift off anything that has deeply browned or burned onto the pan
if using the pre-sautéed vegetables, add to the sauce and stir until combined
in the past, I’ve used up to 4 frozen cubes of pre-sautéed vegetables, so about ⅓-½ cup
season with salt + pepper to taste
save in jars for later or serve over cooked pasta with grated parmesan, add a meatball if you’re feeling it
if you halve this recipe, it makes a good amount for a pound of cooked pasta — pour drained pasta directly into dutch oven and stir to coat
Notes:
tsp = teaspoon ; T = Tablespoon
EVOO = extra-virgin olive oil
*if using italian sausage links, remove the casing before adding to the Dutch Oven
**no one likes being poked in the mouth with dried rosemary - crush to a finer texture with a mortar + pestle or grind with a handheld coffee/spice grinder
***or ¼ cup fresh - my oregano plants have always been unstoppable, so I’ve been using fresh to try and defeat the boss this year
The umami qualities of the anchovies are what makes this sauce almost addictive. These little salty savory fishies are the perfect punch to counter the sweet and acid coming from the tomatoes. Umami is the fifth taste - it’s what makes you salivate, and baby does this pasta sauce have you coming back for more. The way that the sauce sticks to the pasta is also extremely satisfying. The flavors are so condensed, but they make themselves heard in waves, creating different scenes with different casts. And I think the common denominator in each scene is the anchovy. 🐟
Now, you definitely don’t have to go as hard on the anchovies as I did in this recipe, but I like to make sure the whole jar gets used in a reasonable amount of time - all at once lol. If you’re not up for using the suggested amount, you can probably get away with halving that and getting a similar result. You’ll need to use a little more salt at the end. And you can save those extra anchovies for a future Caesar dressing or two.
Some might shudder at the lack of fresher/more intact canned tomatoes in a red pasta sauce. I understand, but sometimes you just don’t have the time or forethought for a sauce to sit and simmer on the stove all day. I also find it generally difficult to balance the watery quality of canned tomatoes with the water that eventually sweats out of all the other vegetables that I like to use in my red sauces — onions, mushrooms, zucchini, peppers. Too watery, and the sauce doesn’t stick to the pasta very easily. Tomato paste is such a good binder, so it’s often used alongside canned tomatoes in most red sauce recipes. But when you’re in a pinch, like when you’re just over it and can’t imagine how you would ever leave your house to go get the things that you need to make a stupid recipe, but you have this tomato paste sitting in your pantry? (This very situation is how this recipe was born from my brain, can you tell?)
Just cheat and use the tomato paste. Water it down. Bulk it up with meat, vegetables, onion, garlic, (anchovies 😘) and the appropriate herbs? Baby, you’ve got a stew going.
All of this is to say that this is a great pantry recipe — the shelf-stable ingredients are shelf-stable but they’re not Twinkie-shelf-stable. (More on this in a future issue about my favorite pantry staples.) And it comes together in about 45 minutes! Or less! I’m not really sure because everyone moves at their own pace! Try it out and tell me how long it took you!
From the bottom of my heart, thank you for being here.
❤️ Sarah
P.S. I will be moving to a half paid/half free subscription model in the coming weeks. For my paying subscribers — thank you for your support! For my free subscribers — there will still be lots of good content coming your way, I promise! I need to stand up for the work that goes into this newsletter, no one’s time and efforts are free.
So for my next 10 paid subscribers, I will do a virtual pantry consultation — you tell me what is in your pantry/fridge/freezer, I tell you 5 recipes you can make with minimal grocery supplementation. Like you might need some garlic 🧄 And an onion 🧅
I can’t wait to help you in your kitchens!