Recipe: Farro with Italian Sausage

I'm not much of an experimenter when it comes to food. I'm not very good at making up recipes, in fact, I often laugh and wonder if there are actually anymore "original" recipes out there, what with all of the technology we have access to. HOWEVER, today, I made a dinner, free from a recipe, experimenting with a few things. It turned out so good. So here we go! We'll see if the remaining family members like it. 

Last week my hubby came home from Costco with some vegetarian sausages for a BBQ much to my oldest daughters chagrin..is that the word I'm looking for? Anyways, it was for her friends, all of whom are "carnivores". She was happy though, when she discovered that, yes, dad did buy some beef hotdogs too. Anyways, I had a few leftovers and thought I'd try them in a new recipe today. While my family (mom's side) is Italian, I have never liked Italian sausage. I don't care for the fennel seeds, so, honestly I only ate a little bit, but it was good.

Ingredients:

2 Links Italian Vegetarian Sausage (or other sausage of choice)
1 c. Farro
4 c. water
1 Tbs. coconut oil
1 zucchini
1/4 c. onion
2 Roma Tomatoes diced
1/4 c. olive oil
juice of 1/2 a lemon (or whole if you want more lemon flavor)
Italian seasoning to taste
salt and pepper to taste
fresh parsley
shaved parmesan

Instructions:

1. Place water in a saucepan along with a little salt. Bring to a boil and add Farro. Boil for 15 minutes or until Farro is plump and chewy. Remove from heat and drain. Place in a serving bowl.

2. In a nonstick skillet, melt coconut oil. On med-low, saute onion until soft and transluscent. Add zucchini and cook until crisp tender. Add tomato and cook a bit longer. Remove from pan and add to Farro.

3. Remove casing from sauage and cut in to cubes. I cut mine in half lengthwise and then in half. Saute in pan until the pieces begin to brown. I was looking for a little bit of a crisp layer to them without over cooking. This gives it a bit more of a meat like texture. Remove from pan and add to farro and vegetables.

4. Combine Olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper and italian seasoning. Pour over mixture. Stir well. Add some chopped fresh parsley and shaved parmesan at the end. The sausages had a lot of flavor so I didn't want to over flavor the rest of the dish. 

This was simple and yummy!




With Joy UNquenchable,