Dateline: March 22, 2021 Sheetpan Merguez Redux

Another nap ate into prep time for dinner, I think it is now a nasty habit which is playing havoc with my sleeping at night.

What was in the freezer -- ah, merguez sausage, done.  Veggies in fridge, done.  Ok sheetpan dinner coming up.

I used for the veggies, brussel sprouts, baby peppers, red cabbage, green cabbage, collards, carrots, butternut squash, broccolini, and onions.  Chop into reasonable pieces, coat in olive oil, salt, and pepper and top with frozen sausages and throw into a 350°F oven for 45 minutes.  At 30 minutes, turn the sausages over to brown on the other side and set the table.

Fresh out of the oven

plateful of goodness

These sheetpan dinners are getting more frequent, perhaps because I am taking long naps in the afternoon.  Just saying, it's a possibility, but not causal.

Dateline: March 7, 2021 Sheet pan #7 Merguez over Vegetables

We had a zoom that could run a little long, so I had to put dinner on the table easily and something that would cook while we talked....Sheet Pan!

I took the homemade merguez out of the freezer and chopped up some random clean out the veg draw veggies.  I created a paste to mix in the veggies by using preserved lemon, garlic, smoked paprika and olive oil.  Mashed it up good and slathered it all over the tray.  I placed the sausages on top along with some canned tomatoes and put it in the oven.  After 1/2 hour, I added to drained and rinsed cans of chickpeas, turned the sausages over and put it back into the oven for another 1/2 hour.

Seasoning Paste

5 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped

1 preserved lemon, finely chopped

2 - 3 t smoked paprika

olive oil

black pepper to taste

1.   Mix the garlic, lemon, paprika, and pepper together and chop some more to incorporate the flavors.  Add enough oil to make it somewhat spreadable and slather all in and around the veggies before adding the sausages.

chick peas and another 1/2 hr

ready for the oven

I finished off the dish with a sprinkling of chopped parsley... like a little black dress and pearls.

I have really fallen in love with adding tomatoes to the sheet pan dinners.  They get kind of jammy and the flavor is really intensified.

Dateline: January 4, 2021 Homemade Merguez with Vegetable Stew

I made some sausages, brats and merguez, the other day and after eating vindaloo for 2 days, we needed a break  So out of the freezer came the merguez and I raided the fridge for suitable vegetation for a morrocan stew-ish kind of thing.

I browned the sausages and after browning them, I sweated some onions and garlic.  

Sausages

sweating the onions

Once that had softened, I added some stock and wine to deglaze the pan.  Next went in quite an interesting array of veggies, some orange bell peppers,  string beans, broccoli, preserved mandarin, collards, and cabbage.  

start of the veggie melange

veggies in Instant pot

I used the instant pot because it would be easy and quick.  And, only 1 pan to clean!

I seasoned the stew with harissa and sumac as both of those were in the sausages along with salt and pepper.  

The final dish was pretty darn good, not necessarily InstaGram worthy, but pleasing to the eye and the palatet.