One Pot Pasta With Italian Sausage and Broccoli

Cook Italian sausage, pasta and broccoli together in a big pot and finish it off with cheese to make a delicious creamy one pan meal. It’s a great way to get dinner on the table in a hurry with a minimum number of dirty dishes.

One pot pasta recipes are perfect busy night meals. This recipe takes the rich flavor of Italian sausage and turns it into a fabulous well rounded dinner. The broccoli and pasta cook right in the same pot you used to brown the sausage, so there’s basically no mess to clean up.

Of course a sprinkling of cheese ties it all together at the end. It’s a balanced meal and there’s only one pot to clean when you’re done!

We always have a variety of pork in the freezer. I love knowing I can whip up a tasty meal the whole family is going to love without a trip to the store.

Using sausage as a building block for a recipe is such an easy way to add big flavor with almost no work. There are already layers of flavor built into the meat, so it is a great shortcut to a tasty meal.

That’s why dishes like cheesy kielbasa and pasta casserole work so well. There is already so much flavor in the kielbasa, it’s hard to go wrong from there.

If I am being honest, Italian sausage is one of my all time favorite meats. I just love the way the flavors of garlic and fennel mix with the ground pork.

Plus it is part of what makes some of our favorite recipes like lasagna and Chicago style pizza what they are. It also adds the savory balance in recipes like sausage, acorn squash and kale sheet pan dinner and summer veggie and sausage sheet pan supper.

So having a pound of sausage ready helps ensure you can have a flavorful meal ready even on the busiest night. It’s the unsung hero of the weeknight dinner menu.

Turning Italian Sausage Into a One Pan Meal

Of course, we are going to need more than the sausage in the pot if we are going to make a meal of it. So, it’s time to add some liquid.

I like using chicken stock for an added layer of flavor. However, you can certainly use just water in a pinch. As we discussed earlier, that sausage is going to give you a big head start in the flavor department so you won’t be missing anything.

Now add your broccoli and pasta. For even more fiber, feel free to use a whole grain pasta.

Once that mixture comes to a boil, cover it and let it simmer until the liquid is mostly absorbed. The pasta should be al dente at this point.

If the pasta hasn’t reached your desired doneness when the liquid is absorbed, add a little more liquid until it’s cooked perfectly. Now stir in a little milk and Parmesan cheese and dinner is done.

It really is just that easy. By now the yummy scents will have filled the house and everyone will be ready to dig in. You might not even need to ring the dinner bell!