Orecchiette with Sausage and Broccoli

An essential Italian recipe to add to your rotation

Orecchiette with Sausage and Broccoli is an essential recipe that anyone who enjoys cooking Italian food should have in their toolbox. This recipe is from the Puglia region of Italy (the heel of the boot) which we visited in 2012. Orecchiette is a signature semolina pasta (no eggs) from this region. So too is the abundance of vegetables grown in this unique region surrounded on three sides by warm seas.

The authentic version of this dish is made with broccoli rabe (in Italian – rapini). It can be hard to find, so I frequently substitute baby broccoli. If you can find rapini, definitely use it because the slightly bitter taste balances well with the creaminess of the cheese. All broccoli is somewhat bitter, which is why most kids don’t like it, but if you like Brussels sprouts, you’ll love rapini!

Puglia is a magical area of Italy with diverse places ranging from gritty port towns to beautiful beach towns, to inland white-washed hill towns surrounded by red rocky soil. This rocky soil, which is nearly impossible to plow, led to the planting of olive trees and the building of the legendary stone conical Trulli houses. The olive trees of Puglia are world-famous. We visited an olive tree farm where some of the trees were 2000 years old. The owner boasted that his trees were older than Christ.

…..read more at OurItalianTable.com ❤️