Hot sausage and sweet corn pasta
Corn cut straight from the cob, and hot sauce stirred in at the very end.
At a Glance
Story
Cut corn off the cob into a wide bowl rather than a board and it stays in the bowl. Stand the cob upright, run a knife down in long strips, then scrape the bare cob hard with the back of the blade. That second pass releases the milky starch inside the cob, which thickens the sauce and is the entire reason fresh corn beats frozen here.
Ingredients
- 6 oz lumaca rigata or other short ridged pasta
- 10 oz hot Italian sausagecasings removed
- 2 ears cornkernels cut off
- 2 scallionsthinly sliced, whites and greens kept apart
- 1 jalapeñoseeded and finely chopped
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 2 tbsp crème fraîche
- 1 tbsp hot sauce
- olive oilsalt, pepper
Method
The smoky poblano sausage the original ships is not a thing you can buy. Hot Italian sausage with a teaspoon of smoked paprika stirred through gets close enough that nobody will run a comparison.
- Salted water on to boil. Cut the corn as above. Slice the scallions and chop the jalapeño, washing your hands properly afterwards.
- Pasta into the water, 8 to 10 minutes to al dente. Reserve 1 cup of the cooking water before draining. You will want most of it.
- Meanwhile, brown the sausage in a wide pan over medium high, broken up, 3 to 4 minutes, undisturbed at first.
- Scallion whites, corn and as much jalapeño as you fancy. 3 to 4 minutes, until everything softens and the kitchen smells like August.
- Tomato paste and smoked paprika. Stir constantly 1 to 2 minutes until the paste darkens and stops smelling raw.
- Pasta in with half the reserved water. Over medium high, tossed hard, 1 to 2 minutes, adding more water as needed until it is glossy rather than wet.
- Off the heat, the crème fraîche and the hot sauce. Taste. Add more hot sauce. Taste again.
Scallion greens over the top, and eat it out of the pan if the mood takes you.
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