Are you looking for unique Thanksgiving sides to serve at your Thanksgiving dinner this year? This Turkey shaped pasta salad with sausage and peppers is the perfect non-traditional Thanksgiving side dish recipe to serve your family and friends on Turkey Day!

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Gobble! Gobble! Who’s ready to get on their Thanksgiving wobble?! You know what the Thanksgiving wobble is, don’t you? It’s the awkward way your body moves from the Thanksgiving table to the couch after you have stuffed your face silly with ALL THE FOOD.

I always end up doing the Thanksgiving wobble every year. I just can’t contain myself. It’s probably the only day of the year that I truly let loose and eat whatever my little heart desires…with zero guilt what-so-ever.

I do enjoy the turkey and spiral ham, but the main attractions for me at the Thanksgiving table are all of the delicious side dishes. I make it a point to try every single Thanksgiving side dish and always find myself going back for seconds of my favorites. Are you Team Sides of Team Turkey/Ham?

When making my Thanksgiving menu (click here for my free Thanksgiving Planner), I always try to have an array of side dishes to please everyone’s palette. We definitely enjoy our more traditional sides like potatoes (sweet potatoes and mashed cheesy potatoes), cranberry sauce, corn casserole, and of course stuffing. Every year, though, we try to add in one or two unique Thanksgiving side dishes to spice things up a bit.

Warning! Don’t try to reinvent the wheel for every single one of your side dishes on Thanksgiving. My mom and I tried to do this a few years back and our family didn’t dig it. They missed some of the tried and true recipes we made every year and quite frankly they were disappointed.

Lesson learned on our parts! And from that point forward, Thanksgiving dinner has consisted of our family’s favorite side dishes along with a tiny splash of some non-traditional recipes for good measure. Everyone is happy this way and all is right in the world of Thanksgiving here at the lake…

This year’s unique Thanksgiving side dish recipe was inspired by some turkey-shaped pasta I found while on one of my many trips to Homegoods. I have a thing for this kind of fun-shaped pasta and showcase them here on the blog often: Halloween, 4th of July, football season, Valentine’s Day. When I see a new variety of fun-shaped pasta, I automatically buy them. I can’t help myself!

I recently made a cold pasta salad recipe but I personally feel cold salads are more fitting for the summer months and not fall. I knew I wanted to create a warm pasta salad recipe because of this reason. The question then became, what kind of warm pasta salad did I want to make?

After staring at three beautiful bell peppers sitting in my vegetable bowl that were about to go bad, I finally had the “ah-ha” moment to create a sausage and pepper inspired pasta salad dish. We always put sausage in our stuffing every year so I tend to associate the flavor with Thanksgiving. Plus, my family loves eating sausage and peppers. It’s one of my husband’s all-time favorites actually!

Turkey Shaped Pasta Salad with Sausage

14 oz. turkey-shaped pasta (can substitute any pasta of your choosing), 1 cup beef broth (I like using the low sodium variety), 3 bell peppers (I used red, orange, and yellow), 1 small onion, 2 – 3 garlic cloves, 1 pound of sausage (you can use hot, sweet, breakfast, chicken, or any other sausage variety), 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon pepper, parmesan cheese 

Begin by boiling your water for your pasta. When it comes to a boil, carefully drop in your pasta and cook it according to the directions. Make sure to not overcook the pasta or it will literally turn to mush leaving the pasta shapes unrecognizable.

As soon as the pasta is cooked through, strain it, and run under cold water to stop the cooking process. If done properly, you’ll be left with these adorable turkey pasta shapes!

In a skillet over medium heat, begin browning your sausage.

While the sausage is browning, clean and chop up your three bell peppers and onion.

Once the sausage is completely browned, drain it on a plate lined with a paper towel. Leave some of the greases from the sausage behind in the pan to cook your peppers and onions in.

Place the skillet back on the stovetop and add your bell peppers and onion to it. While the bell peppers and onions are cooking, mince a couple of cloves of garlic.

After a few minutes of cooking your bell peppers and onions, add in your minced garlic cloves. Cook until all the vegetables are soft and the onions are translucent. This should take about another 5 minutes. 

Once the vegetables are cooked, add your sausage back to the skillet along with your beef broth and the salt and pepper. Give it all a stir and cook for an additional 2 – 3 minutes.

All that’s left to do is combine your cooked turkey-shaped pasta along with the sausage mixture together in a bowl. Generously sprinkle the sausage pasta salad with parmesan cheese. This not only adds flavor but works as a binding agent for the sausage and pepper side dish recipe. 

Feel free to add more parmesan cheese on top of each helping when serving your turkey-shaped pasta salad with sausage and peppers.

For the record, this recipe probably goes down as one of the most unique Thanksgiving side dishes I’ve created to date. I can’t wait to see the reaction of the rest of my family when I serve this for Thanksgiving dinner. You definitely want to add this recipe to your Thanksgiving feast this year, folks!

Want to remember this? Post this recipe for Turkey Shaped Pasta with Sausage to your favorite Pinterest board!

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