Sheet Pan Italian Sausage and Roasted Veggies

By srumbel

This Sheet Pan Italian Sausage and Veggies is my latest version and makes use of the wonderful (and plentiful at this time of year) asparagus. Woot Woot for asparagus! One of my favorites. I also opted for Italian Chicken Sausage that is fully cooked. Since it just needs to be heated through, this particular recipe can be made in about 30 minutes…another bonus.
from jamiecooksitup.net

Ingredients

• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 yellow bell pepper
• 1 red onion
• 3 C asparagus, chopped
• 1 head of garlic (about 6-7 cloves)
• 1 (10 ounce) package grape tomatoes
• 4 Tb olive oil (divided)
• 1 (12 ounce) package thin spaghetti noodles or angel hair pasta
• 12-24 ounces Italian Chicken Sausage (fully cooked)
• 1/4 C Italian Salad Dressing
• 1/2 C Parmesan cheese

Preparation

Step 1

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
2. Line two large baking sheets with tin foil. Don't skip this step, unless you want to slave over the sink scrubbing roasted tomato juice from the pans for at least 59 hours or so. ?
3. Chop into even pieces, 1 red bell pepper, 1 yellow bell pepper, 1 red onion and 3 C of asparagus. Make sure to cut the tough ends off of the asparagus and discard them. Toss all of the veggies onto the pans.
4. Peel an entire head of garlic. Chop each clove once or twice. You want the garlic to remain in pretty big chunks. If you cut them too small they end up getting super dark, causing them to taste bitter. Also, the smaller you cut the garlic, the more potent the flavor will become. For this dish, we want it to be pretty mild. Mild and wonderful. Thank you for reading through this entire garlic tangent. ? Add the garlic chunks to the pans.
5. Toss 1 (10 ounce) package of grape tomatoes evenly over the pans.
6. Drizzle each pan with about 2 Tb of olive oil and a generous amount of salt and pepper. Toss them (I just use my fingers here) so the oil and seasoning gets distributed evenly.
7. Place them in the oven to roast (for 10-15 minutes).
8. Boil yourself a nice pot of water and cook a (12 ounce) package of thin spaghetti noodles or angel hair pasta according to package directions.
9. Grab some good quality Italian Chicken Sausage (fully cooked). I believe I got this package at Sam's Club.
This is a 36 ounce package, but I only ended up using half of it for this recipe. Use as much or as little as you like, depending on your own personal preference. I like a higher ratio of veggies, so I opted to just use 6 individual sausages.
10. Chop the sausage into 1/2 inch rounds.
11. When the veggies are crisp tender and the skin on the tomatoes has ruptured, remove the pans from the oven and add the sausage. Using a spatula, toss everything together, so the sausage gets some of the tomato juice and delicious flavor of the veggies.
12. Toss the pans back in the oven and roast for an additional 10 minutes, or until the sausage is heated through and slightly browned.
13. Place the hot cooked pasta and sausage/veggie mixture in a large bowl.
14. Pour 1/4 C of Italian Salad Dressing and 1/2 C Parmesan cheese over the top.
15. Toss it all together, give it a taste and add more dressing and cheese to your liking. It won't need much, truly. The flavor of the roasted veggies and the sausage is plenty.
Serve and Enjoy!

Yield: 6 servings