Italian Penne with Sardinian Sausage, Saffron and Fiore Sardo | Penne con Salsiccia Sarda, Zafferano e Fiore Sardo
Three Sardinian products carry this plate and none of them is shy. Salsiccia sarda is a fresh pork sausage seasoned with fennel seed and a good deal of black pepper, saffron from San Gavino Monreale is among the most concentrated grown in Europe, and Fiore Sardo is a raw sheep milk cheese smoked over wood before ageing. Put all three in one pan carelessly and they cancel each other out, so the recipe is really an exercise in deciding what goes in when.
Penne is the right vehicle for exactly the reason it is often the wrong one. This sauce is chunky rather than smooth: crumbled sausage, softened onion, a little tomato and a glossy saffron emulsion. A short ridged tube traps the pieces and holds the liquid film separately, so a forkful gives meat and sauce at once instead of bare pasta followed by a spoonful of everything else at the bottom of the bowl.
There is no cream anywhere in this dish and there should not be. What makes the sauce cling is starch from the pasta water and fat rendered out of the sausage, worked together in a wide pan, with grated Fiore Sardo folded in off the flame as the last binder.
Yield: 4 servings as a first course. Prep: 20 minutes. Cook: 35 minutes. Total: about 55 minutes. Difficulty: intermediate. Course: primo piatto. Region: Sardinia, the Campidano plain and the saffron villages of the Medio Campidano.
The Story
Saffron has been grown in Sardinia since at least the fourteenth century, and the three villages that still grow it, San Gavino Monreale, Turri and Villanovafranca, sit within a few kilometres of one another on the Campidano plain. The crocus is picked by hand at dawn in late October, each flower yielding three stigmas, and the island's whole annual production would fit in the back of a van. Sardinian saffron runs unusually high in crocin and safranal, which is why a very small pinch does the work here.
The sausage belongs to the same countryside. Salsiccia sarda is made from coarsely ground pork shoulder and belly, seasoned with salt, black pepper, wild fennel seed and sometimes a little garlic, then stuffed and left to dry for a few days. Eaten fresh it crumbles and browns beautifully; the same mixture left to cure for weeks becomes the hard sausage sold in every Sardinian market. Fennel and saffron are old companions on the island, and the combination long predates any restaurant that put it on a menu.
Fiore Sardo is the oldest of the three. It is made from raw Sarda sheep milk, shaped in carved wooden moulds that give it its name, and rubbed with salt before weeks in the smoke of a shepherd's hut. That smoke is preservation rather than decoration, and it leaves a cheese tasting of lanolin, hay and woodfire. Grated over a saffron sauce it does something Pecorino Romano cannot: it adds a bass note under the floral top of the spice instead of just adding salt.
Ingredients
For the pasta
Penne rigate, bronze die, 12 oz (340 g)
Coarse sea salt for the water, 2 tbsp (30 g)
Water, 5 quarts (4.7 l)
For the sausage base
Fresh salsiccia sarda, casings removed, 12 oz (340 g)
Extra virgin olive oil, 2 tbsp (30 ml)
Yellow onion, finely diced, 1 small, about 3 oz (85 g)
Dry white wine, Vermentino if possible, 1/2 cup (120 ml)
Peeled plum tomatoes, crushed by hand, 1/2 cup (120 g)
Bay leaf, 1
For the saffron infusion
Sardinian saffron threads, 1 generous pinch, about 0.2 g
Hot light chicken or vegetable stock, 1/4 cup (60 ml)
For finishing
Fiore Sardo, finely grated, 2 oz (55 g)
Reserved pasta cooking water, about 1 cup (240 ml)
Extra virgin olive oil, 1 tbsp (15 ml)
Wild fennel fronds or fennel seed, a small pinch
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Fine sea salt, only if the dish needs it at the end
Preparation
Blooming the saffron
Do this first, before anything touches heat. Crush the threads between your fingers into a small warm bowl, pour over the hot stock and leave it at least 20 minutes while you work. The liquid should turn deep orange, not pale yellow. Saffron is water soluble and slow, and threads dropped dry into a hot pan give colour without aroma.
Rendering the sausage
Pull the meat out of its casings and break it into rough pieces the size of a hazelnut, not a fine crumble. Warm the olive oil in a wide saute pan over medium high heat, add the sausage in one layer and leave it for 3 minutes. Turn the pieces and give them 2 or 3 minutes more, until browned and fond has formed on the base. That fond is the backbone of the sauce.
Softening the onion
Lower the heat to medium, lift the sausage out with a slotted spoon and set it aside. Add the diced onion to the fat left in the pan with a pinch of salt and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, stirring, until translucent and sweet but not coloured. The onion is here for body and a little sugar, not flavour of its own, and browning it would add a caramel note that fights the saffron.
Deglazing with wine
Pour in the white wine and raise the heat, scraping the base with a wooden spoon until every bit of fond has lifted. Reduce by about two thirds, roughly 3 minutes, and taste: the raw alcoholic edge must be gone. Wine that has not reduced far enough leaves a sharp note that saffron makes worse rather than better.
Building the sauce
Return the sausage with its resting juices, add the crushed tomatoes and the bay leaf and simmer gently for 10 minutes. You want just enough tomato for a little acidity and a warmer colour, never enough to read as a tomato sauce. If it tightens too far, loosen it with a spoonful of stock, then remove the bay leaf and hold the pan just below a bubble.
Cooking the penne
Bring the 5 quarts of water to a rolling boil and add the coarse salt. Be careful here, because the sausage and the Fiore Sardo are both salty: salt the water properly but plan to add none afterwards. Cook the penne 2 minutes short of the box time, tasting rather than trusting the clock. Lift out a full cup of cooking water, then drain while the pasta still has a chalky core.
Adding the saffron and the pasta
Stir the saffron infusion into the sauce and give it 30 seconds, no more. Add the drained penne and a ladle of pasta water, raise the heat to medium and toss continuously for about 2 minutes, adding water in small amounts, until the liquid turns glossy and clings to the ridges. The saffron goes in late on purpose, because its aroma is volatile.
Finishing with the Fiore Sardo
Take the pan off the heat entirely and let it settle a few seconds. Rain in the grated Fiore Sardo while tossing hard, add the tablespoon of raw olive oil and keep tossing 20 seconds more until the sauce coats every piece. Grind in black pepper, add the fennel, and taste one whole piece of penne with its sauce before deciding whether it needs anything. It usually does not need salt.
Plating
Serve in shallow bowls warmed to about body temperature rather than hot. Saffron colour looks strongest against white porcelain, and a plain bowl does more here than any decorated one. Portion quickly, lifting the penne into a loose mound so the tubes stay open rather than packed flat.
Make sure the sausage is distributed through the pasta rather than sitting on top of it. Give the pan a final toss immediately before plating, because the meat sinks while the pan rests. Spoon whatever sauce remains over the mound.
Finish with a little extra grated Fiore Sardo, a grind of black pepper and a few fennel fronds if you have them. Resist adding parsley, which pulls the aroma somewhere green and generic, and resist a final drizzle of oil on the plate, since there is already enough rendered fat in the sauce to make the surface shine.
Professional Technique
The defining technique is timing the saffron. Crocin, the colour compound, survives heat easily; safranal, the aroma compound, does not. Infusing the threads in warm liquid for twenty minutes extracts both, and adding that infusion in the last minute delivers both to the plate. Dry threads thrown into a simmering pan at the start give an orange sauce that smells of almost nothing, which is why so many saffron dishes look right and taste flat.
The second is the two stage handling of the sausage. Browning it hard and removing it does two jobs: it builds fond and it stops the meat stewing during the simmer. Sausage left in the pan throughout goes grey, gives up its fat too early and turns dry. Taken out and returned, it keeps its crust and reabsorbs the sauce instead of leaking into it.
The third is the emulsion, which has to be built without cream. Starch from the pasta water, rendered pork fat and a small amount of olive oil are all the ingredients required, and vigorous tossing in a wide pan is the method. The Fiore Sardo is the final thickener and the reason it goes in off the heat: raw milk sheep cheese has a low melting point and a high fat content, and it splits into strings and an oily film if it meets a pan above roughly 175°F (80°C).
Texture and Moisture Control
The target is a sauce that coats without pooling and a penne that still resists at the centre. Dried pasta keeps absorbing liquid after it leaves the pan, so finish slightly looser than you want it at the table, by about a tablespoon of water per portion. Adding cheese to correct a thin sauce is a trap: it makes the dish saltier without binding it.
Fat balance goes wrong most often. Salsiccia sarda renders anywhere between 2 and 5 tablespoons depending on the butcher, and too much will refuse to emulsify and float as an orange slick. Pour off the excess after browning, leaving about 2 tablespoons for the onion. If the sauce still looks greasy, a splash of pasta water and thirty seconds of hard tossing usually brings it back.
Heat discipline matters at both ends. The simmer stays at a lazy bubble so the sausage stays tender and the tomato does not catch, the final toss is over medium heat, and the cheese goes in with the pan off the flame.
Professional Mise en Place
The sauce base can be made hours ahead and the last four minutes are the only live work. Set the station up so nothing has to be measured once the pasta is in the water.
Equipment and tools
Wide saute pan, 12 inches (30 cm), heavy based, with room to toss
Tall pot for the pasta and a ladle for the cooking water
Small bowl for the saffron infusion, warmed
Microplane or fine grater for the Fiore Sardo
Slotted spoon, wooden spoon, tongs
Prepared ahead
Sausage browned and the base built through the simmer, up to 1 day ahead
Onion diced and tomatoes crushed by hand, on the day
Saffron infused in hot stock, at least 20 minutes before service
Fiore Sardo grated on the day and kept covered and cold
Stock hot and within reach for loosening the base
Service setup
Pasta water at a rolling boil and salted before the base goes back on
Sauce base warm at a bare simmer, bay leaf already removed
Saffron infusion in its bowl beside the pan, not yet added
Grated cheese, pepper mill and finishing oil lined up at the pass
Bowls barely warm, never hot from a cupboard
Chef Tips
Buy saffron in threads and never in powder. Powder is routinely cut with turmeric or safflower and there is no way to tell by looking. Good threads are deep red with orange tips, and a crushed pinch should smell of hay and honey straight away.
If you cannot find fresh salsiccia sarda, use a coarse Italian sausage with fennel seed and add a quarter teaspoon of crushed fennel and a good deal more black pepper. Avoid anything sweet or heavily paprika spiced, which will drag the dish towards Spain and away from the saffron.
Fiore Sardo varies enormously with age. A young one at three months is mild and melts easily; a mature one at eight months is hard, intensely smoky and much saltier. Taste yours before you weigh it, and if it is old, use closer to 1 1/2 oz (40 g) and finish with a little extra at the table.
Make the base a day ahead if you can. The fennel and pepper in the sausage need time to move into the tomato and onion. Add the saffron only at service, never to a base you are storing.
Common Mistakes
Adding saffron threads dry to the pan. Without a proper infusion the colour releases but the aroma does not, and you get an orange sauce that tastes of nothing in particular. Twenty minutes in warm stock changes the whole dish.
Leaving the sausage in for the whole simmer. Meat that browns and then stews gives up its fat early, goes grey and turns dry and grainy. Brown it hard, lift it out, and return it once the base is built.
Grating the Fiore Sardo into a hot pan. Raw sheep milk cheese has a low melting point and splits into strings and an oily film above roughly 175°F (80°C). Take the pan right off the heat and let it settle before the cheese goes in.
Salting the sauce at the end. Between the sausage, the cheese and the pasta water there is usually more than enough salt, and it concentrates as the sauce tightens. Taste a whole piece of coated penne first.
Using too much tomato. Half a cup is a seasoning, not a base. More turns the plate into an ordinary sausage and tomato pasta, buries the saffron under acidity and makes the smoked cheese read as an odd addition.
Boiling after the saffron goes in. Safranal is volatile and thirty seconds at a bubble is already the limit. Stir the infusion in, add the pasta and finish over moderate heat.
Wine Pairing
Cannonau di Sardegna DOC: The island red and the natural partner for a pork and pecorino plate. Its soft tannin and warm red fruit meet the rendered fat without drying the palate, and the dried herb note Sardinians call macchia runs alongside the fennel in the sausage. Choose a young unoaked bottling, served at around 61°F (16°C).
Campidano di Terralba DOC: Made from Bovale on the same plain where the saffron grows, and geographically the exact match. Lighter and more angular than Cannonau, with brighter acidity and a faintly peppery finish that picks up the pepper in the meat. Choose it when you want the wine to refresh rather than add weight.
Nuragus di Cagliari DOC: The everyday white of the Campidano and the most local white here. High acidity, modest alcohol and quiet green apple fruit make it a cleaner rather than a partner, cutting the pork fat without adding a competing aroma. This is what the dish is drunk with in the villages where the saffron is picked.
Vermentino di Gallura DOCG: From granite soils at the other end of the island, and the white with enough structure for smoked sheep cheese. Its saline bite and firm citrus line cut the fat, while the bitter almond finish sits comfortably beside the Fiore Sardo. Use the same bottle for the deglazing and the glass.
Alghero DOC: A useful bridge if the table is split, since the denomination covers both crisp Torbato whites and supple reds from the northwest coast. The Torbato has a stony, faintly herbal quality that flatters saffron without chasing it, and enough weight for the fat of the finished sauce.
Storage & Reheating
The sauce base, made through the simmer and without saffron or cheese, keeps in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 3 days and freezes for up to 3 months. Freeze it flat, thaw it overnight and rewarm it gently with a spoonful of stock. Make the saffron infusion fresh each time, since one held overnight keeps its colour but loses most of its aroma.
Dressed pasta is best eaten straight away. Leftovers should be cooled within an hour, refrigerated in a shallow airtight container and eaten within 2 days. Do not freeze the finished dish: the penne turns mealy on thawing and the cheese emulsion separates into fat and solids that cannot be brought back together.
To reheat, use a wide pan over low heat with 2 tablespoons of water per portion and stir gently for 2 to 3 minutes until the sauce loosens and the pasta is warm through. Finish with a little fresh grated cheese off the heat to rebuild the gloss. Avoid the microwave, which boils the sauce in spots and splits the emulsion.
Nutrition
Per serving, based on 4 first course portions:
Calories: 720 kcal
Total Fat: 34 g
Saturated Fat: 13 g
Trans Fat: 0 g
Unsaturated Fat: 19 g
Cholesterol: 85 mg
Sodium: 1020 mg
Total Carbohydrates: 70 g
Fiber: 4 g
Total Sugars: 5 g
Added Sugars: 0 g
Protein: 32 g
Lactose: 0.4 g
Principal micronutrients: calcium, phosphorus, zinc, selenium, vitamin B12, thiamine
These figures are estimates. Most of the salt in the pasta water is discarded, and both the sodium and the fat depend heavily on the butcher's sausage and on how much rendered fat is poured off after browning.
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