We Americans don’t cook nearly enough sausage bakes. In Britain, those glorious one-pan meals of vegetables topped with browned sausages are standard weeknight fare — easy to throw together, endlessly variable and as cozy and warming as supper should be.
Here, in the United States, we are more likely to roast a chicken over those same vegetables, but that takes twice as long. As for sausages, frying or broiling is our go-to, but while they get the job done quickly, they won’t give you a full dinner.
This recipe embraces the British model, baking vegetables and sausages together for a simple yet satisfying winter meal.
I start with halved potatoes and wedges of red cabbage seasoned with sturdy branches of rosemary and thyme and lightly crushed caraway and coriander seeds. Next, there’s a blanket of thinly sliced onions to soften, brown and practically melt into the vegetables beneath it, followed by a generous coating of grated Parmesan for complexity and richness. Lastly, there’s the crowning layer of sausages, which turn crisp and coppery on top but stay juicy and tender underneath.
Halved potatoes and red cabbage wedges are arranged along the bottom of a baking dish.CreditAndrew Scrivani for The New York Times
Although it’s not widely done in Britain, I halve the sausages lengthwise and brush them with mustard before nestling them into the potatoes and cabbage. The cut surface allows the pork juices and fat to render out freely, seasoning all the vegetables underneath like an instant sauce.
My usual instinct for preparing this kind of dinner is to pull out a rimmed sheet pan, but in this case, a 9-by-13-inch baking pan or a small roasting pan is a wiser choice. A smaller pan brings all the ingredients closer, so the sausage juices can better mingle with the ingredients. The increased depth is also an asset, allowing for some steaming, which helps cook the study potatoes and cabbage. If you have a metal pan, you’ll get the maximum amount of browning on the potatoes. But I’ve also made this in a ceramic dish, and there were still golden spots.
You can make this with any kind of meaty sausages: spicy turkey or lamb, chicken or duck, classic pork bratwurst, chorizo or hot Italian links. For a dish as unfussy as a sausage bake, using what you’ve got is part of the appeal.
