Tony's Gangster Sausage & Rigatoni 🍝

A favorite pasta-flavor pairing

Keeping this short and sweet today.

There is so much to be said about pasta shapes and pairing with sauces. The 100’s of pasta varieties that exist were all born out of a marriage in mind with a particular sauce. In many case the shape of the pasta came about as a way of maximizing the flavor of the sauce on the palate.

These are not “minor details” but we will revisit on a deep dive in the future.

Today is all about one of my favorite pasta dishes I’ve ever had to this day. It’s the kind of pasta that is full of big and bold flavors, with a sauce that is finished with the pasta in the pan.

We are using that delicious homemade Italian sausage from the last Substack drop. The flavors of Italian sausage, fennel, tomato, enriched sauce… and tossed with a pasta that is the perfect shape to hold some of the sauce… rigatoni. Specifically mezzi rigatoni.

The bold flavors with the perfect sized pasta, holding the enriched sauce make the perfect bite. It’s something Tony Soprano would obliterate before moving onto the Carne course of a traditional Italian feast.

There’s also a special ingredient I use that is optional but highly recommended.

I’ll be adding some notes before the recipe, as usual. This time on pasta cookery, finishing in a pan, emulsifying your sauce and dialing in your flavors to perfection

Lets cook! Tony’s Gangster Sausage & Rigatoni 🍝