This vibrant Orecchiette, Sausage, and Broccoli Pasta is deeply savory and ultra satisfying without feeling heavy. This pasta dinner is made without heavy cream and minimal amounts of butter. Instead, the sauce is created mainly with chicken broth and olive oil. We’ve loaded in plenty of broccoli and finish the dish with a good dose of Parmesan cheese — the whole family is going to love this one!

How do you pronounce Orecchiette in Italian?

“oh-reck-ee-ET-tay” (Here’s a video to hear the proper Orecchiette pronunciation)

Overhead image of Orecchiette, Sausage, and Broccoli Pasta

Orecchiette with Sausage

Sausage and pasta are a match made in heaven — I’ll take the two together whenever I have the option!

Usually when we combine sausage and pasta, it’s in a decadent and heavy cream sauce. Delicious? Absolutely! But certainly more of an indulgent dinner. (Hello, my fave comfort meals: Sausage Rigatoni, Creamy Sausage Pasta, and Summer Pasta!)

This dish is a lighter, weeknight meal type of option–for when you’re craving comfort food, but a little bit less. There is no cream or milk in this dish; instead the saucy base is made up of browned bits from the sausage (loads of flavor here), chicken broth, olive oil, and a touch of butter for good measure. This dish feels refreshingly light, especially if you add a squeeze of lemon! Truly, it makes the best sauce for orecchiette pasta — it clings perfectly to every nook and cranny!

Quick Tip

Looking for other Orecchiette recipes? We use this pasta shape in this Autumn Crunch Pasta Salad which is a reader favorite!

Orecchiette Pasta Recipe Ingredients

This dish is fairly minimalist and doesn’t require a whole lot of ingredients. Below is a quick breakdown of a few ingredients worth mentioning:

Italian sausage: The better the sausage, the better this dish tastes! Look for sausages where you can see marbling of fat as opposed to sausages that are a uniform color.
- Depending on personal preference, use mild or spicy sausage — either works and both are delicious. Make sure to remove the casings before cooking.
- Make sure you’re using Italian sausage, not breakfast sausages. The spice blend is quite different!
- For more heat (and flavor) use spicy sausage. If you’re sensitive to spice, use a mild or sweet sausage instead. If some of your guests want more spice and others don’t, serve red pepper flakes on the side!
Parmesan cheese: For the perfect melt and to ensure the measurement is accurate (so the dish isn’t too salty), use a block of Parmesan cheese and grate it on the small holes of your cheese grater. Measure and add!
Broccoli: Frozen broccoli tends to get a bit mushy and doesn’t taste the best in this dish. Save frozen for broccoli soup and use fresh here!

Variations

How To Make This Orecchiette Pasta Dish Your Own!

Orecchiette with broccoli rabe: For a fancier feel, replace the regular broccoli with broccoli rabe. (Fun fact: did you know the two aren’t actually related?! Broccoli is in the cabbage family and broccoli rabe is related to turnips.) Broccoli rabe has longer and thinner stalks than regular broccoli. It’s very common in Italian cuisine and is typically sautéed with olive oil (eaten raw it can be quite bitter).
Orecchiette with sausage and spinach: If you’d like to add some extra greens, add 3 cups coarsely chopped baby spinach when you stir in the cooked pasta. As you toss the pasta in the sauce, the spinach will quickly wilt down.
Vegetarian orecchiette pasta: If you want to prepare this dish without sausage, it will be lacking quite a bit of flavor (and saltiness). Sausage is a key flavor element, so I’d recommend making this Broccoli Pasta instead and swapping out pasta types. You’ll also want to replace the chicken broth with vegetable broth.