Bored of your normal beef ragu, this variation is always a crowd pleaser.

The balance of herby sausage, sweet peppers and tomatoes is amazing. It’s easily my favourite pasta dish.
I like to serve it with rigatoni and garlic bread or focaccia. Also try it in a baguette, topped with melted cheese.
The sausages are the key, you need a European style sausage, my preferred combination is chorizo and Sicilian, but Toulouse works as well. The main thing is not to use a British sausage, because the fat content is too high for this dish.
Finally you can up the flavours and increase the veggies in you diet by adding roast veg.
Ingredients
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 onion
- 2 peppers (red & green)
- Handful of basil (stalks and leaves)
- 1 pack chorizo style sausages
- 1 pack scilian style sausages
(Or other continental style sausages) - 2 tins tomato
- 2 tsp oregano
- Splash of red wine
Kit
- Chefs knife
- Filleting knife
- Veg chopping board
- Raw meat chopping board
- Sauté pan or stock pot
Prep – 15 mins
- Peel and chop the onion and garlic, put on plate
- Chop peppers (discarding the centre)
- place pepper on chopping board stalk down
- Slice down just inside the width of the flesh
- Chop into rough chucks
- Add to the onion and garlic
- Pick basil leaves from stalks and put to one side
- Finely chop the basil stalks and add to the garlic, onions & peppers
- Skin the sausages
- Using a sharp knife cut down the length of the sausage
- Using your fingers hold down one side of the skin and with your free hand or the knife push the sausage meat out.
- I tend to skin 6 sausages at a time, chop them up and the put on a plate
Cooking
- Heat the pan on a medium heat
- Add oil
(If you are unsure whether the oil is hot enough add a small piece of onion and wait until it starts to sizzle) - Add the garlic, peppers and basil stalks to the pan
- Stir occasionally
- After around 5 minutes they should have softened.
- Turn up the heat to high, add the sausages and mix well
- The sausages need around 10 minutes, every few minutes give the pan a stir, making sure you free all the sausage meat
(The aim is nicely browned sausage meat and the majority of the juice has evaporated off) - Once most of the juice has gone turn the heat back down to medium and add the wine.
- Once the sizzling has stopped add the oregano and tomatoes and bring to a simmer.
- Turn down the heat so it is just bubbling and leave for 30 minutes.
- At this point you can add roasted veg
- After 15 mins put your pasta on
- When the pasta is done, drain and add to the sauce.
- Switch the heat of and leave for 3-5 mins. Set the table, crack open a beer etc.
- Serve