Ground turkey and ground pork mixed with sage and maple syrup to create this delicious lightened up homemade maple breakfast sausage recipe.
A month or so ago I made a homemade breakfast sausage recipe from a cookbook I reviewed. It was simple, delicious, and beyond easy to make. Last week, I decided to tweak it a bit and create a lightened up version using ½ ground turkey.
OMG. Seriously, why oh why do I wait so long to prepare certain recipes? Let me back up a bit….like to about 4 + years ago with this freezer breakfast burrito recipe. My entire family worships these burritos and begs me to make them all the time. They are good and I’ll admit I love having them available in the freezer. The only problem is I can NEVER find a high quality breakfast sausage to use. Not to mention a lower fat high quality turkey sausage variety. I still make these burritos, because they’re better than drive thru burritos, but every time I put these on the meal plan I search for high quality breakfast sausage with no luck.
Well I don’t need to search anymore because making my own lightened up breakfast sausage is just as easy as purchasing a log of processed sausage from the store. I know this makes me very excited too!!
How to Make Turkey Breakfast Sausage
All I need is 1lb ground pork, 1 lb ground turkey, 1 tablespoon ground sage, pure maple syrup, and some salt and pepper. That’s it! And since I control the ingredients I use all organic ingredients. This makes me very happy. You could use all turkey if you like but I like the flavor of pork in breakfast sausage so I used 1/2 and 1/2.
I absolutely love maple syrup in my breakfast sausage but you can certainly leave it out if you don’t.
To prepare the sausage mix together the ground meats and seasonings in a bowl. Unfortunately, it’s best to use your hands for this. I know, gross. But its the best way. Keep in mind that ground turkey is mushy so have paper towels close by.
After the the ingredients are combined you can use it in any recipe that calls for ground breakfast sausage or form into patties. Whatever you want to do with it. This recipe calls for 2 lbs of ground meat and most recipes call for 1 lb of breakfast sausage so keep that in mind as you decide how to use it.
I used 1/2 of it in a new quinoa breakfast bowl recipe (that will be posted soon) and then I prepared the rest into sausage breakfast patties. I cooked the patties in a pan sprayed with cooking spray. Once the patties were made I froze them for future meals. Think Jimmy Dean “heat and serve” breakfast patties but WAAAAAAAYYYYY healthier and better.
Figuring out the nutritional information was a little difficult because it depends on how you use the sausage. I ended up figuring out the nutritional information using 30 patties. It comes to 96 calories, 7 grams fat, 1 gram carbs, 0 grams fiber, 1 gram sugar, and 7 grams protein.
Homemade Turkey Breakfast Sausage
Ingredients
- 1 lb ground turkey
- 1 lb ground pork
- 1 tablespoon ground sage
- 1 ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon pepper
- 2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
Instructions
- Place ground turkey and ground pork into a medium to large bowl.
- In a small bowl mix together the sage, salt, and pepper. Sprinkle season all over the meat. Add in the pure maple syrup and mix together until all the ingredients are combined.
- Use as you would ground breakfast sausage. You can form into patties and cook in a pan. Mix with scrambled eggs. Or use in a breakfast burrito.
Paulette says
I have made more than a few versions of this. Always great! Not hard at all! So easy to customize to the flavors that your family prefers. Thanks!
As for freezing raw, they cook just fine. Yes heat a tiny bit of your favorite oil in a pan. they thaw and cook quickly if you don’t make them too thick. If you want crumbles precook for ease. Sausage will keep for a few months before starting to get a bit dried out.
Lesly says
If you freeze raw, how would you cook them from frozen? In a pan with cooking spray or a little coconut oil? Or pull it out to thaw the night before (which I always forget to do, haha!)?
This looks so great, can’t wait to make it!!!
Tammy Kresge says
You can do all of the above.