Sausage Sauce!

Ingredients

• 450g italian sausages
• 1 cup red wine
• 1/2 tin tomatoes (200g)
• 30ml/2 tbs double cream

Optional

• 450g good British sausages
• 1 large clove garlic
• 1 tsp fennel seeds
• 1/2 tsp chili flakes

Equipment

• medium saucepan
• spatula

Method

You really only need one (English size) sausage per person, if you want to adjust the recipe; two makes a very generous serving.

In a very little oil and a pan over a medium heat, crumble in the meat from the sausages (discard the skin). Fry and break up some more with the spatula until they are cooked through and you see little brown bits, then add the glass of wine; turn up the heat, scrape the bottom of the pan, and reduce the wine down until most of it has gone (a couple of tablespoonfuls remaining). Then add the tomatoes and continue to cook over medium heat for about ten minutes.

Before serving, add a splash of double cream, just enough that the sauce turns slightly pink. Correct the seasoning with salt and pepper.

Serve ideally with penne or rigatoni, depending on how chunky the sauce is.

Variation

If you don’t have access to good, genuine Italian sausages (anything from a British supermarket doesn’t count), there is an alternative.

You need some good quality British sausages, 1 large clove of garlic, ½ teaspoon chili powder or flakes, and (very important) 1 good teaspoon fennel seeds. Fry the sausage meat from the sausages instead of the Italian sausage, with the chili and fennel; 1 minute before you add the wine, add the finely chopped garlic. The wine is important, and you may want to add extra - just don’t swamp the sausage, and reduce it well down. You can use supermarket “italian” or “toulouse” sausages, but you will still need to add the extra ingredients.

If you can’t get good British sausages, and they need to be 80-90% meat, you can use good quality pork mince. But I’d be very careful.