Turkey Sausage + Homemade Bread

We sure do love some Brinner in the McDaniel house! In fact, we almost served brinner at our wedding reception. We are firm believers that breakfast foods are delicious at anytime of day. If Brinner isn't your thing, by all means, devour this meal for breakfast or brunch!

Don't be intimidated by making your own sausage. This isn't complicated at all. No making your own casings or using a meat grinder, these sausage patties are more like mini burger patties. They are also Daniel Plan approved! So if you pair it with Ezekiel bread instead of this bread loaf I included, it would be a clean meal!

You can find the original turkey sausage recipe here and the bread loaf recipe here.

Turkey Sausage

You can definitely use fresh herbs instead of dry. I'm gonna try that next time since I used up my sage on this run.

1 lb Ground Turkey
2 tbsp Finely Minced Red Onion
2 tsp Finely Minced Sage
1/2 tsp Finely Minced Thyme
3 tbsps EVOO
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Black Pepper

Use your standing mixer, combine the turkey, red onion, sage, thyme, 1 tbsp of the EVOO, salt, and pepper.
Form the mixture into 8 patties.
Heat the remaining 2 tbsp of EVOO in a non-stick skillet over medium heat. Cook the patties 3 to 4 minutes on each side. Transfer to plate lined with paper towel to absorb some extra grease.

Whip up an omelet or some scrambled eggs and pair with the bread I'm gonna tell you about next!

Homemade Bread Loaf

Yep! You're eyes aren't deceiving you! That's all it takes to make bread!

I neglected to take a pretty picture before slicing into the bread! Oops!

3 Cups Bread Flour or All-Purpose Flour
1 packet or 2 1/4 tsp Instant Yeast
1 1/2 tsp Salt
1 1/2 cup water

Combine flour, yeast and salt in your standing mixer
Add water and mix. Dough will be shaggy
Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise for 4 hours at room temperature
When 4 hours have passed, place your dutch oven in your oven and preheat to 450
Lightly oil a work surface and place dough on it. Turn it over on itself once or twice then cover with plastic wrap and let rise another 30 minutes while the oven preheats
When dough is ready carefully (with hot pad holders!) remove the dutch oven then place the bread dough inside.
Cover and bake for 20-30 minutes then remove the lid and bake another 10 minutes.
Remove from oven and let cool a little, but not too much because it sure is good warm!

SUGAR SIDE NOTE: So many bread recipes call for sugar! I was astounded at that information while on the hunt for the perfect homemade bread. Throw in an egg and some sugar and in my opinion, that's just cake! I was excited for this recipe because it tastes so good without heaping sugar into it. If you start reading labels on the foods you eat, you'll be surprised to realize that sugar is in everything. And I do mean everything. Even foods you wouldn't have expected to include it. You may think you've eliminated sugar from your diet by not eating sweets and while that definitely will cut down on sugar intake, sugar is probably hiding in plenty of your ordinary food too. It has all kinds of "nicknames": sucrose, high-fructose corn syrup, cane sugar or evaporated cane sugar, cane syrup, dextrose, etc. You can see a scary list of sugar's 56 different names here. All that to say, we do our very best to not eat foods with added sugar on the regular. (When I'm making tailgate foods for Saturdays, the rules don't apply!) And white bread, even the kind I make at home with unbleached flour, isn't great for you. But it's at least free of the nasty preservatives and added sugars that store bought bread includes.

So look out for all that sugar, cause it's hurting us, and happy baking!