Rigatoni, sausage, brown butter, mint, and feta

I just got Chris Santos' SHARE cookbook and love it. I love his Beauty & Essex restaurant in NYC, despite the fact that I'm not it's target market [black-hat-wearing Instagram girls]. The food is amazing though, and this recipe was inspired by a recipe in his book. Pick it up here: link.

Serves 2

120 g (2 cups) rigatoni
250 g (1/2 lb) sausage, casings removed.
5 g (1 clove) garlic, minced
50 g (3 T) butter
25 g (3 T) tomato paste
5 g (3 T) parsley, minced
5 g (3 T) mint, minced
50 g (1/2 c) feta, crumbled

Cook pasta according to package directions till al dente. Drain and reserve some water, about 1 cup. Normally I would NOT advise this, and instead just transfer from the cooking water to another pan, but I don't have a TON of extra sauté pans lying around, so for this recipe, I'm draining and reserving some water.

In a separate saucepan, brown the sausage over medium heat. Transfer the sausage to a sieve situated over a bowl to drain the fat. Clean the pan.

In a separate pan, brown the butter. Reserve. (To brown butter, just put the butter in a pan over medium heat. It'll make big bubbles, then small bubbles. Then it'll start to smell nutty. Turn off the heat before it burns.)

Transfer the rigatoni to a pan over medium-high heat and brown it. I used the original pasta pan, but use whatever you'd like. Once it's browned, add the garlic, cook for a minute, stirring the whole time—you do NOT want the garlic to burn. Add tomato paste, EVOO [optionally flavored with oregano, and crushed red pepper], some of the reserved pasta water, feta cheese, reserved brown butter, mint, and parsley. Stir to combine.

Transfer to a serving bowl.