Sunday Hack: Sausage & Spinach Spaghetti

Sunday is supposed to be a lazy day for me — no or little cooking. We go out, enjoy each other’s company and don’t worry about the dishes afterwards. Nothing wrong with that. Except last Sunday my husband was on-call. To avoid being interrupted mid-meal at a restaurant (trust me, it happened to me before, I don’t recommend it), no matter how close to the house it is, I had to improvise to put a dinner together.  Nothing was defrosted in advance, and the fridge contents didn’t impress with variety.

Upon close inspection, found: one box of spaghetti, a few rings of snack sausage, a box of decent looking baby spinach, and some cheese. And thus the dinner commenced. And it turned out to be so good that it was deemed blog-worthy. Moreover, it gave birth to the new recipe category: HACKS.

Sausage & Spinach Spaghetti

Yields 6 hefty or 8 honest servings

• 1 lbs spaghetti, cooked according to instructions al dente and drained
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large yellow onion, I used Vidalia, finely chopped
• 3 large garlic cloves, slivered
• salt, freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 1 lbs snack sausage (kielbasa type), I used Conecuh Original Smoked, which is our local Alabama sausage or excellent flavor, sliced across into 1/2″ thick rounds
• 1 lbs baby spinach, rinsed and drained well.
• 1 cup or more of your favorite grated cheese, I used a Parmesan and Asiago mix

Bring water to a boil in a large pot, add a few tbsp of olive oil and a couple of teaspoons of salt. Add spaghetti, and cook according to instructions, typically from 9 to 13 minutes.

While spaghetti is cooking, prepare the rest of the dish:

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onions and garlic and saute, stirring occasionally, until golden and softened, about 5-7 minutes.

Add sausage rounds, and cook for a few minutes, until sausage doesn’t appear pink (if it was).

Add spinach, salt and pepper to taste, and shaking or tossing the spinach a few times, let it completely wilt and darken in color. It will take 2-3 minutes or so. If your spinach is not very juicy, add a tbsp or so of pasta water to the skillet and let the steam wilt the spinach. Give everything a good stir a few more times, and let juices evaporate almost completely.

Drain pasta, and return it to the pot. Add the sausage and spinach mix to the pasta. Add a few tbsp of olive oil, fresh pepper to taste, and grated cheese. Stir well and serve immediately.