Once in a while, Mom tells my brothers they can cook whatever they want for supper. Then they prance around in delight and run off to the freezer for a few packages of our pasture-raised pork sausages.
Their choice is no surprise. Pork sausages are one of the most simple and versatile meats to cook. You can toss them, frozen, into a frying pan, and before long a tempting aroma wafts up from the sizzling sausages in promise of a satisfying meal. When my brothers cook, they serve a big pile of the fried sausages as is, with salsa.
Mom does the same now and then—because sausages made of pasture-raised pork are so tasty they don’t need much to dress them up.
But they’re also wonderful to use for dressing up other dishes.
Simple sausage meal ideas
Sometimes if we need a quick meal, we dig all the random veggies out of the fridge, chop them up and throw them in a pot with some potatoes and meat broth. Then we fry a pound or so of sausages (you would need less if you aren’t a family of ten like we are!) and slice them up into the soup. Presto—a frugal meal that tastes wonderful!
When we have cooked sausages left over from dinner—which doesn’t seem to happen very often—they come in handy for breakfast the next morning. Everyone likes to find savoury sausage morsels and green peppers in their scrambled eggs or breakfast casserole.
Summer is coming—and what is summer without a cookout over the grill or open fire? Recently some of my siblings and I were invited at short notice to our friends’ house with the rest of our youth group for the evening. They told us there would be a bonfire and we could bring meat to cook on sticks or on the grill.
Frozen sausages to the rescue again!
I wasn’t sure how long it would take to cook them from frozen over an open fire, so I partially cooked some of them in a frying pan before we left. We roasted some of these sausages over the fire with sticks. They turned out so smokey and juicy.
It was a hot fire, so we put the rest on the grill, instead of using sticks and roasting ourselves in the process. Those were great too, and even though I thought we had brought more than we would need, we ate them all.
Favorite sausage recipe
For me, pork sausages conjure up memories of savory meals at my grandparents’ table. Grandma often served sausages with creamed potatoes—a traditional meal in our culture.
Today I want to share with you a recipe that also pairs sausages and potatoes in a simple, satisfying meal. Add a simple vegetable or salad on the side and you have a royal meal that should satisfy the hardest workers and the pickiest eaters in your family!
Rustic Sausage and Potatoes
serves 6
8 large baking potatoes (approx. 1,650 g of potatoes), scrubbed and cut into wedges
1 pack Bountywoods Farm pasture-raised pork sausages
3/4 cup chopped onion
1 tsp salt
1/3 tsp black pepper
1\2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried rosemary
1/2 tsp paprika
1/8 to 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (depending on how much kick you like)
Preheat the oven to 350ºF (175ºC).
Place sausages in a large ovenproof Dutch oven or heavy pot on medium heat. Brown the sausages for 3-5 minutes per side. Remove from the pot, cut them into chunks, and set aside. Add the onions to the sausage drippings in the pot and saute until transparent. Add the potatoes, turn up the heat to medium high. Cook for about five minutes, stirring to keep the potatoes from sticking.
Add the sausages back into the pot. Add the seasonings and stir well. Cover and bake for approximately one hour or until the potatoes are tender. Then dish up and dig in!
Tips:
If you don’t have an oven-proof pot, you can use a skillet for the first part of the recipe and transfer everything to a casserole dish or roasting pan when it’s time for it to go into the oven.
For a slightly different twist, use our Mild Italian or Donair sausages instead of plain Salt and Pepper.