Smoked Sausage, mushroom, and Kale Alfredo

This week I made a delicious pasta dish, Smoked Sausage, Mushroom and Kale Alfredo. This was an easy dish to make, and the smoked sausage added a nice earthy smoked flavor to the Alfredo that paired really nicely with the mushrooms and kale.

I started with the three main ingredients, fully cooked smoked sausage (I chose a nice Angus beef variety), mushrooms, and kale. I cleaned and quartered the mushrooms, cut the sausage into coins then cut those in quarters, then cleaned and tore up the kale in to bite sized pieces, removing the stem. Meanwhile I was also began heating up water in a large pan to cook my pasta.

In a large skillet I drizzled a small amount of olive oil, and melted a third of a stick of butter over medium high heat, and began by sauteing the mushrooms (they take the longest), I also added a clove of minced garlic to the mushrooms as well as a little thyme.  I also added the pasta to the boiling water to get it cooking, I wanted to use orecchiette pasta, but our grocery store doesn't carry it so I used another sturdy looking pasta, you could also use a penne pasta.  When the mushrooms were cooked down, and looking cooked through and browned, I added the smoked sausage, and cooked that until it began to lightly brown and heat through. Lastly, I added the kale, I wanted to steam it down, so I added a ladle of the pasta water into the skillet to help steam it down. I continued cooking until the kale was softened, but not overcooked, and the sausage was browned to my liking.

Then is was time to make the alfredo sauce, which is very easy.  I added a cup of heavy cream right into the skillet with the mushrooms, kale and sausage. Then gave it a stir to incorporate everything, then I added a cup of shredded parmesan cheese, and stirred until the cheese was completely melted into the sauce. I added fresh ground sea salt and pepper to taste.

Then drain the pasta and add it right into the skillet with everything else, and toss until everything is combined (I have a nice large skillet, if yours is too small you could always toss it together in a bowl or large pan). Then serve it up. I also topped this with a very light sprinkling of shredded parmesan.

This was a perfect mid-week meal, everyone loved it, and this recipe made a lot, we had enough for lunch the next day. I served the pasta with a nice bunch of grapes for lunch and it was just as good as the night before.

I will definitely be serving this meal again, as well as experimenting with other veggie and meat combos!

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. Please make sure and stop by Meal Planning Monday Recipe Link-Up tomorrow morning and share your recipe posts. :)