I'd thought about making sausage patties before, and I just happened across a recipe one day. I had a package of ground pork in the freezer, so I decided to make Spiced Maple Sausage Patties for breakfast for one Sunday morning. I tried to make Hash Browns (#294) to go with them.
[This post contains affiliate links. I may make a commission for purchases made through links on this post.]
Before I get into the more involved process of making the sausage, let me tell you about the hash browns and where I went wrong with them. They did not turn out to my liking. It was from my 2000 Betty Crocker cookbook (affiliate link), and it should have been simple. The recipe took 4 cups of shredded potatoes, 2 tablespoons onion, salt, and pepper. I was supposed to shred the potatoes, rinse them, and pat them dry. Toss with onion, and spread in an oiled non-stick skillet and fry for a little while (10 or 15 minutes). Drizzle with oil, cut the potatoes into 4 wedges, and flip to cook the other side. Sounds simple, right?
I thought so too. However, I started by shredding potatoes on Saturday but I did not store them in water in the fridge. They were very discolored by the time I cooked them. Discoloring is only an issue with appearance, so I cooked them anyway. However, I still didn't rinse them and pat them dry. I just mixed them with the onion and put them in the pan. My pan is a little old and not very non-stick, so the hash browns came apart when I tried to flip them. While I was making them, I decided that I probably wouldn't have liked the hash browns very much anyway, even if they'd turned out well. I like my fried potatoes well done - browned edges are my favorite parts. There would have been a lot of non-crispy potatoes with these hash browns. I ended up adding lots of extra pepper and stirring around the potatoes to try to get them a little extra done. I might try a different hash browns recipe at some point - something a little more interesting, and that I cook in a different pan. I'll also be sure to rinse the potatoes if it calls for it (maybe it gets rid of excess starch?) and will store my pre-shredded potatoes in water.
*****
This sausage patties had to be prepared the night before you wanted to eat. I only had a pound of ground pork but the recipe called for 1.75 pounds, so I had to make 4/7s of the recipe. I chose a not-particularly-precise method of scaling down the recipe - I decided to put in half the seasoning, plus about another third of that half (a third more of what I'd already measured). I didn't mind if I had a little too much seasoning in the pork as long as all the spices were balanced.
After I thawed my pork, I realized that it was reduced-fat pork. I decided to make the recipe anyway. I ground a quarter of a large yellow onion since I didn't have small onions. I didn't have fresh herbs, but generally the way to substitute dried herbs for fresh is to use a teaspoon of dried herbs per tablespoon of fresh herbs. Thus, I used 1 teaspoon dried sage and a half teaspoon dried thyme for my half recipe of sausage. I mixed everything together and made 10 sausage patties, which I refrigerated overnight.
The next morning I heated a skillet and partially cooked them in 2 batches. I put them in the oven to finish cooking, as the recipe instructed.
These were pretty good. Although it was reduced-fat pork, the sausage was still plenty juicy, although perhaps not sausage-like because of that; they were more like sausage-flavored pork. It was not as spicy as what I normally buy in the store, and not nearly as salty. I didn't care too much for the flavor of the allspice, so I might leave that out if I make it again. The maple flavor was definitely there but not overwhelming. I wouldn't call this one of my favorite recipes, but I'm glad I gave it a try.
Leave a Reply