Pepperoni and Olive Penne Pasta

This hot pepperoni and olive penne pasta has few ingredients but many ways to build on to increase flavor. Add regular pizza toppings such as sausage, bacon, spinach or mushrooms to make it your own or stick with nice and easy.

Today we’ll be making an easy, hot pepperoni and olive pasta meal. There’s plenty of ways to add to it using regular pizza toppings such as sausage, bacon, mushrooms, spinach and fresh basil.  I usually add in mushrooms and spinach but stick with what suits you. The pasta can be as easy or as complicated as you want it to be!

If you’re a fan of supreme or pepperoni pizza, you will love this pasta. I’ve done a casserole version of this before with pizza pasta casserole, but here’s a much easier version that doesn’t require an oven. So today I’ve included a base recipe for which to build on with many, many suggested ways to add things in.

Let’s get started.

I’ve used both black olives and kalamata olives in the past so feel free to experiment and see which one you prefer. The black olives will feel more at home with those used to supreme pizza but the kalamatas have a bit more bite and feels more authentic.

Feel free to substitute the petite diced tomatoes with fire roasted or regular chopped tomatoes. The recipe is forgiving as long as you have some kind of tomatoes to add some bulk to the sauce. And if you want to add even more depth of flavor to the pasta sauce, I suggest using the seasonings from this red pepper marinara sauce. Use whatever you have in your pantry with that recipe as a guide on how to build on the sauce. For example, I used beef bouillon cubes to add more beefy flavor, sugar to balance out the tartness from the tomatoes, Worcestershire sauce to add more depth and onion powder/garlic powder/red pepper flakes for some kick the last few times I made this.

And that’s it! Enjoy and happy cooking!

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