I love the combination of Italian sausage and fennel for a pasta sauce; it's rich, hearty and the fennel gives it a bit of texture and a good punch of flavor. I'm pretty I was first introduced to using fennel in pasta by Rachael Ray (one of her bazillion pasta episodes, but no complaints here!).
I like fennel a lot (I prefer it cooked more than raw), but it has a slight licorice taste, so some may not be as enthralled (but, try it before writing it off as nature's deranged version of Good & Plenty). I thought this pasta dish would make a tasty workweek supper that I could submit to Presto Pasta Nights! I missed last week's roundup, so was determined to make it this time around. This week, it's hosted by Ruth of Once Upon A Feast.
Best of all, I made enough sauce for lunch tomorrow and another dinner later this week. And with just half a pound of sausage!
7 comments:
I love fennel too, in fact I often use it to replace celery in tuna or chicken salad. Today I went grocery shopping and actually left the teeny weeny fennel bulb at the counter. It was the size of a lemon and cost $2.89!
But I will be making your dish soon. Thanks for sharing with Presto Pasta Nights.
This sounds wonderful and it certainly is beautiful to look at.
I think fennel is one of those things where people either love or hate it. Also cilantro.
Ruth: Don't know why, but never thought about the many possibilities for substituting celery with fennel! I'd love to try a chicken salad sandwich with fennel.
Mary: Thanks for your nice words, your dessert tagliatelle sounds quite intriguing and lovely!
Leslie: True and a lot of people have never had fresh fennel.
mmm how I miss Italian sausage!! looks really nice!
Hi Kat! Despite Japan's love affair with Italian food, I guess Italian sausage is difficult to find?
yes, maybe I don't know what they call it here, though I have seen sausages with lemon and herbs in them.
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