Penne with Spicy Vodka Tomato Cream Sauce

Lately I have been searching for recipes that will allow me to use up different items in my fridge before they go bad.  I had a package of Mild Italian Sausage links that I had NO idea what to do with.  So I turned again to my trusty All Recipes app on my phone and found this recipe. 

Penne with Spicy Vodka and Tomato Cream Sauce

Ingredients:

1 lb. uncooked penne pasta

1/4 c. extra virgin olive oil

4 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 t. crushed red pepper flakes

1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes

3/4 t. salt

2 T. vodka

1/2 c. heavy whipping cream

1/4 c. chopped fresh parsley

2 (3.5 oz) links sweet Italian sausage

Directions:

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil.  Add pasta and cook for 8-10 min or until al dente; drain.
In a large skillet, heat oil over moderate heat.  Remove casing from sausage and add to skillet.  Cook; breaking up the meat, until brown.  Add garlic and red pepper and cook, stirring until garlic is golden brown.
Add tomatoes and salt; bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 15 min.
Add vodka and cream and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to low and add pasta.  Toss for 1 minute.  Stir in fresh parsley and serve.

In my test kitchen:

I love reading other people's reviews of a dish!  I found lots of helpful suggestions for this one.  One person said he was a pasta snob and preferred a pasta in this dish that "snuggled the sauce."  This made me laugh!  But I decided to switch out the penne for a pasta called Campanelle.  It looked snuggly enough for me.  I really like meat so I added an extra link of sausage and also was careful not to break it up too much so there were nice big chunks of meat in it.

I didn't have vodka on hand and didn't want to buy any but I had white wine so I used about 4 T of that instead.  I thought it still enhanced the flavors of this dish really well. 

Red pepper is quite strong.  Seth kept telling me his tongue hurt.  So I will reduce this dramatically next time so it is more kid friendly.

And I took some advice from others on ways to make this dish a little healthier.  I added raw spinach to the dish when I added the white wine and I substituted half and half mixed with 1t. of cornstarch for the whipping cream.  And I finally sprinkled some shredded parmesan on the pasta right before serving.

~Happy Cooking!