Sausages and Onion Gravy in a Slow Cooker
A very simple but delicious recipe for Sausages and Onion Gravy, a British classic. Top tasting food using simple ingredients.
We cooked this meal in our Tesco scss12 3 litre slow cooker and it worked well. A slightly smaller slow cooker would be fine and up to 5 litres would also work well. If your slow cooker is larger than 5 litres then scale the ingredients up by 50% or more. This recipe freezes well (with fresh sausages but not already frozen ones), simply allow them to defrost for a couple of hours before thoroughly reheating.
8 chunky Cumberland sausages
2 medium onions
1 sweet pepper (red, green, yellow or orange)
2 tablespoons of flour (plain or self raising)
1 level tablespoon of tomato concentrate
2 teaspoons of Muscavado sugar (see Advice section below)
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil
2 bay leaves
450ml / just under ¾ pint of very hot vegetable stock (2 stock cubes)
PREPARATION TIME: 10 minutesCut the sausages into bite sized chunks (about 3cm / 1in long) with a sharp knife.
Slice the onions thinly then roughly chop.
Cut the sweet pepper in half, remove the stalk, pith and pips then cut into small chunks.
The main ingredients for this recipe are sausages so buy the best you can. Other than the onion gravy we have added no herbs, relying entirely on the seasoning in the sausages. We suggest chunky Cumberland sausages for this recipe but any good quality pork sausage will be a good choice. Cumberland sausages tend to be well seasoned which is our key reason for choosing them.
The recipe calls for cutting the sausages into large bite sized chunks but you can leave the sausages whole if you want. Cutting them into chunks tends to release more of their flavour into the onion gravy.
The addition of sugar to the recipe (Muscavado sugar) may seem a bit unusual but it truly adds lots of flavour which is well matched to the spices released by the sausages. If you are a bit wary of the sugar in this recipe then add only half the suggested amount and see how it tastes for you.
We have cooked many sausage based stews and casseroles and it's often the case that, on their own, they taste over-salted. The salt clearly comes from the sausages and to a smaller degree the stock. So take our advice and when you cook mashed potato or rice to go with this delicious meal, add no salt at all. That way the whole meal balances out as far as salt is concerned.
Set your slow cooker to high and pour in the hot stock, then add the tomato concentrate, chopped sweet peppers and bay leaves. Sprinkle the flour over the surface of the ingredients and stir well until everything is mixed together.
Start adding ingredients to slow cooker
Add the onions and oil to a frying pan on a medium heat and fry for five minutes stirring the ingredients every minute or so.
Now sprinkle the sugar into the frying pan over the onions and fry for eight to ten more minutes, stirring frequently, until they start to brown. Add the onions to the slow cooker.
Frying onions
Place the sausages in the frying pan, turn up the heat slightly and fry them for five minutes, turning frequently, until the skin is well browned.
Add the contents of the frying pan, sausages and oil, and stir it all well. Cook on a high heat for one hour then turn the heat to low and cook for five to six more hours. Serve with a fresh vegetable and mash for the classic meal.
Frying sausages