This easy homemade maple breakfast sausage recipe is so simple to make, perfect for meal prepping, and it’s freezer friendly! These DIY maple sausages are gluten free, low carb, paleo and only use a few ingredients including ground pork and spices, and only a few minutes time. You can oven bake them or cook them up in a skillet, and they come out delicious every time!
Homemade Maple Breakfast Sausage Ingredients
For this recipe you’ll need 2 pounds of plain ground pork, 1/3 cup of 100% maple syrup, and a few spices. The spices that will be mixed into the ground pork include thyme, sage, fennel, garlic powder, paprika, onion powder, salt and pepper. For the homemade maple breakfast sausages you can also add in red pepper chili flakes, but it does add a kick of spice, so do this to your taste.
How to Make Homemade Maple Breakfast Sausages
To prep the maple breakfast sausages, you’ll first combine your spices and seasonings in a small dish. Then in a large mixing bowl, add the ground pork, spices and maple syrup. Using your hands you will mix the ground pork with the spices and syrup really well until it’s all equally incorporated together.
Once everything is combined, you’ll form the pork mixture into very flat patties that are 2 to 3 ounces each. You do want to make sure they are pretty thin and flat, or they will bubble up in the center while cooking, much like burgers or other types of patties do.
Baking in the Oven
If you’re baking these homemade maple breakfast sausages in the oven, you’ll preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Then line a full size baking sheet (or two) with parchment paper or foil. Place the sausages down in neat rows of 3 to 4 until there are 12 to 16 on the baking sheet.
If you only do one baking sheet at a time, you will need to replicate this process twice once the first pan is done baking. Bake your sausages for 15 minutes. You can flip them halfway through if you’d like, but I generally don’t add that extra step. If you want them a bit more crisp, add 5 minutes to the baking time.
Cooking in a Skillet
To cook these sausages in a skillet, first heat up a large skillet. If you’re not using a cast iron or nonstick skillet option, you may want to add 1 tablespoon of oil to the pan to coat it. Ground pork typically has enough fat that releases during cooking to not need any extra oil, though.
Add 4-5 of the sausages into the hot skillet, or as many will easily fit without crowding them. Let them cook for 4 minutes without disturbing them, and then flip. Cook the breakfast sausages for an additional 3-4 minutes on the other side, or until they’re cooked through. Repeat this process until all of the sausages are cooked.
Substitutions
Proteins
If you want to make these maple breakfast sausages with a lean protein, you can do a combination of 1 pound of ground pork and 1 pound of ground turkey. Or, you could do a combination of ground chicken and ground turkey. If you use poultry for both pounds, be aware it will change the color that these sausages become when cooked so they will not appear as the photos here do due to the lesser fat content in the leaner meat.
Spices:
You can make many different substitutions or additions to the seasonings in these breakfast sausages. A few options including adding a teaspoon of cinnamon, using an Italian seasoning instead to make these more of an Italian sausage mixture. Or you can increase the spice level by increasing the amount of red pepper chili flakes and fennel.
Maple Breakfast Sausage Freezing Instructions
These sausages are so easy to freeze and make a really great recipe for stocking the freezer for quick meals later. To freeze, let the sausages cool completely first. Then you can either lay them out on the baking sheet and place them in the freezer for about 20 to 30 minutes to let the sausages mostly harden. Then you can remove them from the baking sheet and put them in a bag or freezer safe container.
The other option for freezing if you don’t want to wait for them to harden first in the freezer is to stack the cooked and cooled sausages with a square of parchment paper or tin foil between each sausage. Then you can place the stacks of sausages in bags or containers and just remove as needed when you’re wanting to eat them!
Other Breakfast Sausage Recipes You’ll Love:
- Homemade Chicken and Apple Sausages
- Homemade Breakfast Sausage
- Sheet Pan Sausage, Potatoes & Peppers
- Pear and Rosemary Breakfast Sausage
- Mediterranean Sausage Hash
Homemade Maple Breakfast Sausages
This easy homemade maple breakfast sausage recipe is so simple to make, perfect for meal prepping, and it’s freezer friendly! These DIY maple sausages are gluten free, low carb, paleo and only use a few ingredients including ground pork and spices, and only a few minutes time. You can oven bake them or cook them up in a skillet, and they come out delicious every time!
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: Serves 6
- Category: Breakfast
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Gluten Free
Ingredients
- 2 pounds ground pork
- 1/3 cup 100% pure maple syrup
- 1 tablespoon garlic powder
- 1 tablespoon fennel seeds
- 1.5 teaspoons salt
- 1.5 teaspoon rubbed sage
- 1.5 teaspoons dried thyme
- 1.5 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1 teaspoon red pepper chili flakes, or to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. and line a full size baking sheet with parchment paper
- Combine all of the ingredients together in a large mixing bowl until the maple syrup and spices are well combined with the ground pork
- Use your hands to form patties with the pork mixture, in about 2 to 3 ounce patties that are very thin (about the thickness of a pinky finger). Making them very flat ensures that the middle doesn’t bulge up while baking
- Arrange the sausages in rows on the baking sheet (use two baking sheets if needed or repeat this process twice to bake all of the sausages), and bake for 15 minutes
- For a crisper, more well done sausage, bake an additional 5 minutes
Notes
Stovetop Instructions:
- Heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Arrange 4-5 sausages in the hot skillet, or as many as you can without overcrowding
- Cook for 4-5 minutes, undisturbed, and then flip the sausages. Cook for an additional 4 minutes, or until sausages are cooked through. Repeat until all of the sausages have been cooked
Note: If you’re using 2 pounds of ground pork, you will not need any cooking oil to the pan because the ground pork will release plenty of grease, but you may want to heat 1 tablespoon of oil in your skillet first if you’re using a turkey or chicken mixture to prevent sticking
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David says
I jacked up the sage to 1 Tablespoon and used Korean red chili flakes (I don’t like the seeds in the traditional). This is the best pork sausage recipe I have found online. Make sure you mix everything well
Brandon says
Super good, simple and clean. Exactly what I was looking for.
Thank you
paleobailey says
You’re welcome! Thank you for giving them a try – so glad you enjoyed!
Juli says
Perfect for meal prep. Delicious!