Breakfast or Dinner Vegetarian Sausage


As a child, one of my favourite meals (they were all my favourite) was sausages, potatoes and green peas.  I loved the spicy flavour of the beef sausage and never seemed to have enough of them on my plate.  I gladly ate any sausages left on my sister's plate. Sometimes mom would scrape the drippings off the pan and dribble a little over the potatoes.  Oh, how tasty that was! 

Even though I loved the taste of the sausages I never served them very often to the family.  I think all the fat threw me off and I thought it wiser to leave the fatty sausages for just very occasional meals.  Of course all that changed when we became vegetarians.  Then I wanted sausages all the time!  But I had given up the dead carcases and had to move on.  But the memory of the taste of the spicy sausage still remained even after nearly 20 years of vegetarianism.   I tried many fake veggie sausages but, I tell you, I don't know who tastes those things before they package them.  They didn't taste remotely like a sausage of my youth. 

And then a couple of years ago I came across a meatless oatmeal sausage that was going around the internet blogs and YouTube.  I was fascinated by the process of turning the oatmeal into a well flavoured and meaty facsimile of the real thing.  Anyway, that's what all the reviews said.  I make vegetarian "meat" patties with oatmeal all the time but they don't have this texture so I decided to try the recipe and just as everyone said, they were very sausage-like except something was missing in the spices.  So I made them several more times, doing a little research on sausage spices and came up with a mixture that was very pleasing to my taste buds. 

I also added ground walnuts to add more protein.  You could use pecans as well or any nut that you have on hand.  The minced onion is also optional but will add a little more texture to the mix.  Don't be put off by the long list of herbs and spices.  That's what gives them such a lovely, spicy, sausagey flavour.

I haven't given any credit for the original recipe as I could not trace it down.  It is said to be an adaption of a World War II ration recipe but I could not find any first source references to back up those claims.  There is a veggie sausage in Wales that's been around for several hundred years, known as the Glamorgan Sausage, a mixture of bread crumbs, cheese and onions which does not resemble this recipe at all so I don't know where this one originated.   

Wherever the method came from I'm glad I found it.  Every time I make these sausages I'm almost as surprised with the flavour and texture as I was the first time I ate them.  Try them and I'm sure you'll be as pleasantly surprised as I was and still am. 

You can make these sausages into little breakfast patties or into larger cylindrical dinner sausages. 


Breakfast or Dinner Sausage
2 cups uncooked oatmeal
½ cup walnuts, ground fine
¼ cup minced onion, optional
1 teaspoon basil
½ teaspoon ground sage
½ teaspoon allspice
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon red (cayenne) pepper
¼  teaspoon black pepper
½ teaspoon garlic powder
½ teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 eggs OR 4 egg whites OR 2 egg whites + 1 egg

Oil for frying
2-3 cups vegetable or beef-style vegetarian bouillon

Mix all ingredients, except the vegetable bouillon and oil for frying, and form into patties or long sausage shapes. Do not pack the mixture too tightly but tight enough to hold together.  Brown patties or sausages on all sides in a small amount of oil. 

Add enough vegetable bouillon to the frying pan to cover the patties and bring to a boil. Or alternately, you can use a separate saucepan to simmer the sausages. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.

Remove patties/sausages from the liquid, drain, and re-fry before serving.

If you are not going to use the sausage immediately store the simmered sausage in the refrigerator until ready to use.  Re-fry the sausage before using.  

Makes 12-18 sausages depending on the shape and size you make. 


Before you begin mixing everything together, grind the nuts to a medium fine meal.

 Mix all the ingredients except the frying oil and the vegetable bouillon.

Form into dinner sausages or smaller breakfast patties.  Don't squeeze the mixture too tight, but make sure they are well formed. Fry in a little oil until they are browned on all sides.

While the sausages are browning bring the bouillon to a simmer.  Place the fried sausages into the simmering broth.  Cover and let simmer for 20 minutes.  Save the broth.  It's delicious and will make a great gravy base.  When the sausages are simmered remove them from the broth and refry to serve immediately.  If you are not ready to use the sausages, refrigerate until ready to use.  They may also be frozen at this stage.


Add a little more oil in the pan and fry the sausages for another few minutes until all sides are refried.  I prepared six sausages for our dinner.  These were fried shortly after they had simmered.  

For a hearty breakfast, serve with your favourite eggs and toast.

Serve for dinner with mashed potatoes and your favourite vegetable.

Toothsome veggie sausages for your next dinner or breakfast.


Comments

  1. I just finished eating the last one and they are really delicious!

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  2. Just made them, with the little difference, I added some Indian spices.
    Even though I was a little scepticall at first, these are damn awesome. Nice texture, great taste.
    Thank you for that great recipe.

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    Replies
    1. I'm glad you enjoyed these. The recipe is quite adaptable to the addition of any herbs or spices that you may wish to use. Glad you made these your own. That's what cooking is all about.

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  3. The best vegetarian sausage recipe I have ever made!!!

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    Replies
    1. Glad you found them so good. Time for me to make another batch.

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  4. Have you tried these with aquafaba, flax egg or other vegan egg substitute?

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    Replies
    1. No, only made them with eggs.

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    2. I just made mine with flax egg, 2 tbsp ground flax and 6 tbsp water, mixed together and left to thicken.

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  5. This recipe is wonderful! I just made them tonight and the spices and texture are perfect! Thank you so much for sharing!

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  6. How do they not fall apart while simmering? I gotta try this but scared to waste the ingredients.

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    Replies
    1. Once you have fried them they are quite sturdy and don't fall apart when simmering. You will have a few little pieces that fall off but they basically stay together. Make sure you simmer them gently and not a rapid boil.

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  7. These look amazing, I’m excited to give them a go. I’m WFPB and avoid oil, so I’d swap out the egg for a flax egg and hope they’d be just as good at holding but I’m wondering if you’ve ever baked instead of fried? I’d like to try them in an air fryer. Thoughts pls and thank you ☺️

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    1. I've never tried them with flax egg or baked but if you do please let me and everyone else know how they turned out. Thanks.

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  8. I made these today and was pleasantly surprised by the result. I will definitely give it another go and change up the spices. I used flax seed and water instead of egg (18g ground flax and 6TB water) and added 50g of finely chopped FROZEN onion. I added one clove of fresh garlic. I used tamari instead of soy.
    In terms of preparation, I ground the walnuts on their own and mixed the dry ingredients together first, then the onion and tamari, then added everything back to the processor and pulsed until well combined, then added the flax seed eggs, and again pulsed until combined only.
    Formed into 11 patties, fried as directed, then added 1.5 cups of water with 1/4 tsp salt right in the non stick skillet, brought to boil, reduced heat, covered, then after 10 minutes turned them over, and simmered 10 minutes more at which time all of the water had evaporated.
    Removed from pan, washed it and then returned to pan and fried in coconut oil.
    Thank you for the recipe. What an interesting idea

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    Replies
    1. Glad you were able to make the recipe work with the flax seed eggs.

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  9. Hi there - just came across this recipe, looks great. But I’m wondering what is the purpose of boiling the sausages ? Thx

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