Saturday, January 1, 2011

Otechino con Lenticchie, Pork Sausage with Lentils

The other day I was looking at some of the blogs I follow and came upon a photo of a dish that looked really good. The recipe was from ...ti cucino cosi... and yes it was in Italian. There's no need to fear Google Translate is here!

This recipe is very similar to Panecotta minus the escarole. The original recipe uses Cotechino, which is a fresh sausage made with pork, fatback and pork rind and comes from Modena, Italy. I used a pork sausage with Provolone and Red Pepper. The recipe also called for 150 grams of Lentils. So I was able to use my new digital kitchen scale! Thank you Chris!

Photo shows too many lentils!

This is my version of the recipe.

Otechino con Lenticchie (Pork Sausage with Lentils)

Ingredients
150 gr Lentils (1 cup)
2 cups water
1 potato, boiled
80 gr bread, soaked in milk (about 4 slices of Italian bread)
1/2 lb. pork sausage
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 tablespoon Parmesan

Method
Cook the lentils in water until the water is all absorbed and lentils are cooked, allow to cool. (This took about 18 minutes). (The original recipe called for a pinch of a salt in the water when cooking the lentils but every blog that I read about lentils said the salt would make them tough, so I omitted it).
Boil the potatoes. Cook the sausage.
Saute the finely chopped onion in oil.
Place the sliced sausage, onions and potatoes and mash well with a fork. Add the lentils.
Add the slices of bread that have soaked in a little milk and mix everything together.
Put the mixture into a greased (I use Pam cooking spray) Pyrex baking dish and sprinkle with grated Parmesan cheese.
Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.
Serve warm.

Along with this we had a salad and used Paul Newman's Lighten Up Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing.

Happy New Year's Day!

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