Sausage Rigatoni

Last month, we headed to Savannah for a one day trip.  (It was 8 hours of driving but it was totally worth it.)  We started our day in Savannah by touring Armstrong State University.  (It is still hard to me to wrap my head around the fact that I have a child who will be going off to college in a little over a year.)  We left Armstrong and headed to the soccer field where my daughter's travel team played a great game.

After the game, we headed to downtown Savannah and River Street.  We walked up and down the historic cobblestone street, popping in and out of interesting shops as we went along.

Of course, we didn't want to miss the candy shops either.





Before we left Savannah, we stopped by the Crab Shack on Tybee Island for a much needed dinner.  We ordered the sampler platter for four - shrimp, dungess crab, snow crab, crawfish, mussels, corn, potatoes and sausage.  It was HUGE. 

The highlight of the meal? - a hole in the middle of the table with a garbage can underneath to catch all of the trash.  (A concept that the kids thought we should institute at home.)  We ate a lot of the platter but we had quite a bit of the sausage left and being one who never wants to waste food, I packed it up and brought it home with us. 

My daughter was especially fond of the sausage so I came up with a recipe with her in mind that was loosely based on a Johnsonville Italian Sausage Rigatoni recipe from an ad in my Taste of Home magazine.

Sausage Rigatoni
1 pound Mild Sausage, cooked
8 ounces rigatoni pasta
1/2 large red pepper, diced
1 Tablespoon parsley
1 Tablespoon oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 26 ounce jar pasta sauce

Cook noodles according to package directions.

Heat olive oil in skillet.  Add garlic and cook 1 minute.

Add red pepper and cook until softened.

Add pasta sauce and simmer until thickened slightly.

Remove casing from sausage and add to sauce along with noodles.

 Serve in pasta bowls.  Sprinkle with fresh parsley.

I made this pasta dish at 2:30 in the afternoon.  (Doesn't everyone cook dinner in the middle of the day?)  I put it in the refrigerator and we each pulled out our portion and heated it up during our various dinner shifts.  It was really good and nobody even noticed that it was leftovers!

Ciao!