I recently saw this recipe on one of the many cooking blogs I follow on a daily basis; Christine’s Cuisine. She has some amazing recipes on her blog! If you haven’t visited her blog before you should—you won’t be disappointed!!! I’m not going to lie. I was a little skeptical about this dish at first–the fact that the pasta had no sauce I knew was not going to bode well with my husband; however, I wanted to give it a try. The night I made this dish my brother and dad joined us for dinner too, so I figured all of the men would either hate it or love it. To my satisfaction they all LOVED it! I honestly feel that the bread crumbs make this dish. Don’t substitute them–make the ones that the recipe calls for, and be liberal about them–don’t skimp! They are delicious and are the perfect finish to this dish! I also want to note that if you can’t find the orecchiette in your local grocery store you can use a small shell pasta. I ended up finding the orecchiette at Whole Foods Market for $1.99 for whole wheat orecchiette at boot! My local grocery store wanted to charge me $6 for plain white orecchiette pasta! Whole Foods is definitely the way to go and best of all the guys never realized they were eating whole wheat pasta!
Prep: 10 minutes
Total: 30 minutes
Serves: 4
Ingredients:
- 4 slices stale white bread, roughly chopped
- salt and pepper, to taste
- ½ tsp. garlic powder
- ½ tsp. dried basil
- ½ tsp. dried oregano
- 3 Tbsp. olive oil
- 2 stalks of broccoli (or broccoli rabe), trimmed and cut into pieces
- 1 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil,
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 3 sweet Italian sausages, casings removed
- Pinch red pepper flakes
- 2 cups orecchiette pasta
- Salt & pepper, to taste
- parmesan cheese, for serving
Directions:
Christine–Whole Foods can be so dangerous. When I visit I make sure I stay on track and try not to buy too many off the wall products I don't need!
Paige–thanks for stopping by! You won't be disappointed by this dish! It was awesome!!!
Hey girl! I finally got a chance to look at your blog…very impressive!!! Keep up the good work…and I'm definitely going to make this Orecchiette with Italian sausage, broccoli and bread crumbs it sounds amazing!
Paige 🙂
You are right about the breadcrumbs! Glad you loved the dish. I wish we had a Whole Foods around here! I've been to them when I've traveled and they are amazing.