BEGIN TYPING YOUR SEARCH ABOVE AND PRESS RETURN TO SEARCH. PRESS ESC TO CANCEL

Weeknight Sausage and Broccoli Bowls

Weeknights are really all about a quick recipe, aren’t they? One way I’ve been trying to distinguish between the weekdays and weekends during quarantine (’cause they all just run together, eh?) is by not cooking too many project recipes during the week. I’ve always saved fancier, more complicated dishes for entertaining people or for just the two of us on the weekends.

So now, during quarantine, I’m finding it even more important to have some quick meals on hand. Seriously, even having this blog, I’ve never, ever cooked this much in my entire life. (PS we order pizza every Friday from a different local pizza shop each week, trying to support our local businesses as much as we can!)

These broccoli sausage bowls are a standard in my weekly rotation, and ingredients I always have on hand because you can do so, so much with them! You could even take these ingredients and plop some pasta in the dish and toss it with pesto or just butter and garlic! You could throw some broth on top of it and call it soup, too.

I love serving these bowls with ricotta, I love the creaminess it brings to the dish and sort of elevates it a little (like, half a notch?). Then, I top it with some crispy panko crumbles for extra crunch and a squeeze of lemon for brightness. We need a little brightness now!

The crunchy topping is totally optional, especially if you don’t have panko crumbs hanging around. It’s highly recommended though! Really recommend it for any dish you want to dress up a little bit.

I served these bowls with chive scallion garlic knots this week – recipe for those coming soon! You can serve over pasta, with a side of garlic bread or just plain bread, or these bowls can just be as themselves!

The recipe is intended for frozen broccoli (hey quarantine), but in the notes you’ll find instructions for how to make these bowls with fresh broccoli. And I promise, the recipe looks scarier than it is. The ingredients are very simple, and you don’t need to have any special skills to get through the recipe, there’s just three parts to it:

  • Cooking the sausage
  • Roasting the broccoli (while the sausage and panko crumb topping cooks)
  • Panko crumb topping

Weeknight Sausage Bowls

The perfect, quick, easy weeknight meal when you don’t know what to cook and just want to get dinner on the table.
Prep Time 5 mins
Cook Time 25 mins
Total Time 30 mins
Servings 4 people

Ingredients
  

  • 1 lb ground sausage
  • 1 tbsp butter or olive oil for the pan
  • 5 cloves of garlic, minced

For Broccoli

  • 1 lb frozen broccoli you can use fresh, see recipe notes
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 lemon, zested and juiced
  • 1 tsp garlic powder
  • 1 tsp Italian seasoning, optional if you don’t have it you can leave it out!
  • 1/2 tsp red chili flake, optional
  • salt, pepper to taste

Crispy Panko Crumbs

  • 1/4-1/2 c panko crumbs
  • 1/2 tbsp butter, or more – see notes in recipe
  • 2 tsp Italian seasoning, or a combination of garlic, oregano, whatever else you like!
  • salt, pepper to taste

For Serving – optional

  • 1 c ricotta, divided for 4 dishes optional
  • zest of 1 small lemon
  • parsley
  • 1/4 c parmesan cheese

Instructions
 

  • Preheat the oven to 450. Place a baking sheet for the broccoli in the oven while the oven heats up (an empty baking sheet).
  • Once the oven is preheated, toss frozen broccoli with olive oil, lemon zest, lemon juice, garlic powder, Italian seasoning and red chili flake if using, salt and pepper. 
    You do not want to defrost the broccoli, so I keep it frozen until the oven is ready or close to ready.
  • Remove the baking sheet from the oven and carefully line with foil/parchment/silpat and spray with cooking spray. 
  • Add broccoli to the baking sheet in a single layer. 
  • Bake for 18-25 minutes or until the broccoli reaches desired crispness. (You can also broil the broccoli at the end of the roast for extra crispness, but watch very closely checking at 1 minute increments (at least).)
  • While the broccoli is roasting, we are going to make the sausage!
  • Heat the butter or oil over medium heat.
  • Place the sausage in the pan and allow it to crisp on the bottom to get nice and brown before breaking it up. 
  • Once the sausage is browned, break it up. If the bottom of the pan is getting a little brown, add a tbsp of water at a time, taking care not to flood the pan and make it watery – you want to continue to caramelize the sausage bits and not give it so much extra moisture that it becomes soggy. 
  • Once there is just a little bit of pink, add the garlic and sautee until fragrant. Remove from the heat, set aside. 
  • In a small pan, melt the butter for the panko topping.
  • Once the butter is melted, add panko and seasoning, carefully toasting over medium low heat until golden brown. 
  • Once golden, immediately remove from the heat. 
  • When the broccoli is finished, toss gently with the cooked sausage. 
  • To assemble: add a dollop of ricotta to the bottom of each dish with salt and pepper. Add the broccoli and sausage mixture to the plates, topping with the panko crumb and parmesan cheese.
    Garnish with salt, pepper, lemon zest, etc.

Notes

Okay, for the panko crumbs. Start with a little butter – you might need more, but start with the lower amount so that you don’t make them too soggy. It’s easier to add butter than take it away! If they do end up too soggy, you just add more panko crumbs to the pan.
If you are making these bowls with fresh broccoli, you can skip heating the pan in the oven while it preheats. OR you can sautee the broccoli and its seasonings in the pan with the sausage (it comes together much faster that way!).
To make the recipe with sauteed fresh broccoli:
Cook the sausage until only a little pink remains. Add more butter or olive oil to the pan, add the broccoli and seasonings to the pan. Sautee until broccoli is cooked through and nicely browned. 
If the pan gets too dry on the bottom and very brown, you can add a tbsp of water or more butter, taking care to not create too much moisture in the pan (it will make everything soggy instead of caramelizing). 
Too much moisture looks like a bit of soupey-ness on the bottom of the pan. You want just enough water or extra butter to keep the sausage and broccoli moving and not completely sticking to the bottom. Kind of a deglazing the pan situation!

Leave a comment

Please be polite. We appreciate that. Your email address will not be published and required fields are marked

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.