I dropped my phone in boiling water while making this Ina Garten pasta. The dish was worth the drama.

Ina Garten's orecchiette pasta has broccoli rabe and two types of sausage. It's packed with flavor and reheats well, making it perfect for leftovers.

Mar 21, 2025 - 12:12

I dropped my phone in boiling water while making this Ina Garten pasta. The dish was worth the drama.

I recently made Ina Garten's sausage and broccoli rabe pasta.
NBC NewsWire / Contributor

I made Ina Garten's orecchiette pasta with sausage and broccoli rabe.
The delicious dish was easy to make and tasted even better as leftovers.
Even though I almost lost my phone to a pot of boiling water, the pasta was worth the drama.

Testing recipes has come with few perils in my five years as a food writer.

There was the time I got a wooden spoon stuck in my parents' blender while trying to make Reese Witherspoon's daily smoothie. I also accidentally painted my floor bright pink while attempting the Barefoot Contessa's signature cosmopolitans. But other than that, it's been smooth sailing.

So, I wasn't anticipating any problems when I recently made Ina Garten's orecchiette with sausage and broccoli rabe, which she calls "a whole dinner in one pot." Not on the list of ingredients? My phone, which fell into a boiling pot of pasta water as I tried to snap a pic.

Miraculously, the phone survived. Even better? The dish was delicious.

Here's how to make it.

Ina Garten's orecchiette pasta features two types of sausage and broccoli rabe.

Ingredients for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Ingredients for Ina Garten's orecchiette pasta.
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To make Garten's pasta at home, you'll need:

1 pound of dried orecchiette pasta
2 bunches of broccoli rabe (2 to 2.5 pound total)
½ pound of sweet Italian pork sausage
½ pound of hot Italian pork sausage
1 cup of freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus extra for serving
6 large garlic cloves, thinly sliced
2 14.5-ounce cans of crushed tomatoes, preferably San Marzano
⅓ cup of good olive oil
½ cup of dry red wine
¼ cup of tomato paste

I couldn't find sweet Italian pork sausage at my local supermarket, so I mixed spicy and mild Italian pork sausages instead, and the dish still turned out great.

First, I preheated the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and prepped the sausages.

Prepping sausage for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — I poked each sausage with a fork multiple times.
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I placed the sausages on a sheet pan and pricked each one with a fork multiple times, per Garten's instructions.

Once the oven was ready, I placed my sheet pan inside and set a timer for 15 minutes. Garten says you should roast the sausages until they're just cooked through. She also recommends turning them once as they roast, which I did at the seven-minute mark.

While my sausages were cooking, I added the olive oil to my Dutch oven.

Adding olive oil to pot for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Adding olive oil to the Dutch oven.
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Garten recommends heating the olive oil over medium heat.

I took my sausages out of the oven, sliced each link into ½-inch pieces, and threw them into the pot.

Adding sausage to pot for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Adding the sausage slices to the Dutch oven.
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I sautéed the slices for about five minutes, stirring frequently until the meat had browned.

After cooking the sausages for five minutes, I added the garlic.

Adding garlic to sausage for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Adding the garlic to the sausages.
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I cooked everything together for an extra minute.

Then, it was time to add the tomatoes and wine.

Adding wine to pot for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Adding red wine to the sauce.
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I crushed each San Marzano tomato with my hand over the pot, throwing in the leftover chunks and juice from each can. Then, I added the red wine and tomato paste, as well as 2 teaspoons of salt and 1 teaspoon of pepper for seasoning.

I turned the heat to low so the sauce could simmer while I prepped my pasta.

Tomato sauce in pot for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Simmering the sauce.
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The sauce had turned a vivid bright red and already looked so delicious.

I filled a large pot with water and placed it over the stove, bringing it to a boil before adding the pasta.

Boiling pasta for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — Garten says to cook the pasta for exactly nine minutes.
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Garten recommends seasoning the water with 1 tablespoon of salt.

I set a timer for exactly nine minutes and prepped the broccoli as my pasta cooked.

Chopped broccoli rabe for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — My trimmed and chopped broccoli rabe.
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Garten recommends trimming the broccoli rabe to "just below the leaves" and discarding the stems. Then, cut the leafy part of the broccoli rabe crosswise into 2-inch pieces.

Once the pasta was ready, I added the broccoli rabe to my pot. Garten says you should cook them together for an additional two to three minutes until the pasta is al dente and the broccoli is "crisp-tender."

As the pasta and broccoli cooked together, I tried to snap a picture — and accidentally dropped my phone into the boiling hot water.

I'm embarrassed to admit that my first instinct was to immediately reach into the water and grab the phone. But only my thumb managed to get in before my friend Kristen, who had been calmly sipping wine behind me just seconds earlier, thankfully interjected.

"ANNETA, NOT WITH YOUR HANDS," she screamed. "SCOOP IT! SCOOP IT!"

I grabbed the nearby slotted pasta spoon and scooped the phone out, throwing it on a towel as my thumb pulsed with heat. Somehow, it was still working.

The show had to go on, so I drained the pasta and broccoli rabe in a colander.

Draining pasta for Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — The pasta and broccoli rabe in the colander.
Anneta Konstantinides/Business Insider

Per Garten's instructions, I reserved half the pasta water before draining the pot.

My phone, albeit extremely hot to the touch, was somehow still able to take pictures.

Then, I added the pasta and broccoli to the pot with the sausage and tomato sauce.

Ina Garten's sausage orecchiette — My pasta was ready.
Anneta Konstantinides/Business Insider

I turned off the heat and stirred in the Parmesan cheese, adding a teaspoon of salt for seasoning. Per Garten's advice, I also added a splash of the pasta water.

"You don't want it to be soupy, but you want it to be really moist," she said in an episode of "Barefoot Contessa" while demonstrating the recipe.

It was time to dig in! And Garten's sausage pasta was worth the drama.

This Barefoot Contessa pasta has so many flavors, and they all work beautifully together.

Mixing the two flavors of sausages added depth and savoriness, while the broccoli rabe brought pops of color and freshness. It's a hearty and garlicky dish with a lovely red sauce that instantly warms you up. My friend Kristen was also a fan.

"The orecchiette was perfect for scooping up delightful, balanced bites of spicy and sweet, with a robust finish from the red wine," she told me when I asked for her review.

Garten says this is a great pasta to make on the weekends because it "reheats beautifully for a quick midweek meal." I can attest that the leftovers still tasted absolutely delicious, with the pasta soaking up even more of the sauce's flavors.

This will definitely rank high on my ongoing list of the best Barefoot Contessa pasta recipes, and there will be plenty more to come — hopefully with less drama.

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