Italian Intricacies

• Sweet Italian sausage is a pork mixture that's been blended with garlic and fennel, then formed into links. The same blend, with the addition of hot pepper flakes, is known as spicy or hot Italian sausage. Both hot and sweet Italian sausages are made with fresh meat, which means they need to be cooked thoroughly before you can serve them. To combine them with other ingredients, including apples, you can keep Italian sausages whole, or slice them into rounds or chunks. In addition, their casings can be slit, with the loose, browned sausage mixed into other ingredients.

Sweet Savories

• For a quick meal, saute sliced sweet Italian sausage with halved small apples, such as Lady apples. Once the sausage and apples have browned, they can be simmered in a white wine and white vinegar sauce. Taken out of its casings, sweet sausage and apples star in a poultry stuffing, along with bread, parsnips, onions and sage. A similar sausage, minus the apples, can be stuffed into hollowed apples, then baked.

Fiery Fruits

• Although dishes with Italian sausages and apples traditionally use sweet links rather than the hot variety, the choice largely depends on taste. Spicy Italian sausage plays well against apple dishes in which tartness and pungency are part of the charm, as with vinegar-spiked baked sausage, cabbage and apples. If you prefer to spice up most of your fruity meat dishes, hot Italian sausages can be substituted for sweet ones in almost any recipe, including sausage-apple dressing and roasted potato-sausage-apple dinners.

Continental Cousins

• If you like to pair fruits with cured meats, try sausages that hail from beyond Italy's borders. Apples and locally made sausages are frequent partners in German and Polish-style meals. Kielbasa, a pre-cooked Polish sausage, can be used for these type of meals, as can fresh bratwurst. Saute either type of sausage with apples and onions, perhaps with additional ingredients inspired by the region, such as mustard, caraway seeds, cabbage and beer.