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Everyone has their favorite way of making spaghetti sauce. Ours is incredibly easy and crazy good, especially considering how easy it is to make.
There’s no special formula or hours of simmering. You just cook some chopped onions and garlic, brown some Italian sausage, and add some puréed canned tomatoes.
My parents and I have been making spaghetti this way for years. They first heard about it on a Martha Stewart show, where Martha had picked it up from a chef in New York City.
The beauty of this spaghetti recipe is that it is very easy to make and you don’t have to add any seasoning to achieve wonderful flavor. The sauce gets all of its seasoning from two Italian sausages—one sweet, one spicy.
EASY Italian Sausage Spaghetti Recipe
This spaghetti recipe is light on the sauce, which is more typical of how spaghetti is actually served in Italy. If you would like more sauce, you may want to thin it with water, or add more canned tomatoes to the sauce.
Make the sauce and the spaghetti simultaneously. The sauce should be done in the time it takes to heat the pasta water and cook the spaghetti.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 1 yellow onion, finely chopped (about 1 1/2 to 2 cups)
- 2 cloves garlic, minced (about 2 teaspoons)
- 4 ounces (110 g) Italian sweet sausage (or one 7 to 8 inch link)
- 4 ounces (110 g) Italian hot and spicy sausage (or one 7 to 8 inch link)
- 1 large (28 oz, 794 g) can of whole peeled tomatoes
- 1 pound (16 oz, 450 g) spaghetti pasta
- Salt
- Freshly grated Parmesan cheese
Method
1 Sauté onions and garlic: Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a large skillet on medium or medium heat. Add the chopped onion and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the minced garlic and cook a minute more.
2 Put pasta water on to boil: While the onions are cooking, put a large pot of salted water on to boil for the pasta (4 quarts water, 2 Tbsp salt).
3 Brown the sausage: Remove the cooked onion and garlic from the pan and set aside. Remove the sausage meat from the casings (if your sausage is in links) and add to the pan, breaking up the meat with your fingers as you add it to the pan. Cook on medium to medium high heat until lightly browned.
4 Add tomatoes, onions, garlic: Lightly purée the whole peeled canned tomatoes (and juices) in a blender, and add to the skillet with the sausage meat. Add the cooked onions and garlic. Heat to a bare simmer.
5 Boil the spaghetti pasta: Once the pasta water has come to a rolling boil, add the spaghetti pasta. Allow the water to return to a rolling boil. Cook, uncovered, with a vigorous boil, for as long as the directions on the pasta package say, usually about 10-12 minutes. When pasta is al dente (cooked but still a little firm), remove the pot from the heat. Drain the pasta and place it in a serving bowl.
Serve immediately. Toss with the sauce and garnish with grated Parmesan cheese.
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Elise Bauer is the founder of Simply Recipes. Elise launched Simply Recipes in 2003 as a way to keep track of her family's recipes, and along the way grew it into one of the most popular cooking websites in the world. Elise is dedicated to helping home cooks be successful in the kitchen. Elise is a graduate of Stanford University, and lives in Sacramento, California.
EASY Italian Sausage Spaghetti
Delicious! And so easy, I used diced Italian spiced tomatoes I didn’t purée them
So simple but so good! Added some white wine after the sausage was cooked and before adding the tomatoes.
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very good recipe …thanks a lot
i thought this was outstanding! Easy to make, limited ingredients and full of flavor. I have always used ground beef for sauce and decided to try the mild and hot sausage. I was very pleased with this recipe and how tasty it was. I added mushrooms and fresh basil and simmered about 30 minutes. I cook all the time, consider myself a pretty good cook and i hardly ever right a review for a recipe. Will definitely make this again.
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After I put the onions and garlic back in so I simmer the sauce for 35 mins? Or just as long as it takes to cook the pasta.
Hi Nancy, good question! I’ve clarified in the recipe. You make the sauce and cook the spaghetti at the same time. The sauce should be done in the time it takes to heat the water and cook the spaghetti. Once you add the tomato to the sausage and onions, all you have to do it heat it. You can simmer it a little if you need to wait for the spaghetti to finish cooking.