Maple Mustard Glazed Bratwurst with Fall vegetables is an easy make ahead sheet pan supper that will become a frequent flyer in your meal rotation.
To be fair, I'm sure there are many significant others who are not dependent on someone else to prepare their meals for them and insist they eat at a table, and not over the sink. I'm sure that if I weren't such a kitchen control freak, eventually The Boy would cook something delicious and eat it like a human. I'm a very busy person, but I enjoy cooking for others, and I've probably spoiled him a bit. But, then again, when I met him, all he had in his refrigerator was cold pizza, beer, and a mysterious pot of beans with a wooden spoon in it. So... maybe we were perfectly matched.
Unlike kielbasa, bratwurst is usually purchased raw. It's important to note that if you were to just put raw sausage on this sheet pan supper, you might end up with delicious looking sausages that were still raw in the middle. That's bad 😕 That's why we will be parboiling them. Parboiling is really just cooking the sausages in a liquid until they are cooked on the inside, but not browned. The liquid you use allows you to infuse lots of delicious flavor into your bratwurst in the process. Traditionally bratwurst is cooked in beer, but we will be using apple juice along with other aromatic herbs and spices. It gives the sausages a great depth of flavor and avoids the use of alcohol which, for many reasons, some cooks prefer to avoid.
This is a great meal to make ahead. I usually prep everything the night before, cover it with plastic wrap, and place it in the refrigerator, ready to go for the next day. A sticky note on top has cooking instructions and that's it! Heat and eat! No need to eat cold food over the sink. A quick and easy meal you'll want to eat on plate, at a table, like a human.
Sheet Pan favorites
Maple Mustard Glazed Bratwurst
Ingredients
- 1 lb fresh bratwurst (I use Johnsonville Brats and sing the jingle. You do you.)
Parboiling Ingredients
- About 2 cups of apple juice
- 2 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 2 smashed garlic cloves. Just lay the garlic clove on your cutting board, place the side of your knife over it, and give it a smash.
- 1 sprig rosemary
Maple Mustard Glaze
- 3 tablespoon REAL maple syrup. Please, oh please, don't use "pancake syrup." That's just colored and flavored corn syrup.
- 3 tablespoon whole grain mustard. The kind with the whole mustard seeds.
- 3 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 2 finely minced garlic cloves
- 2 teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary
- 1 teaspoon dijon mustard
Those Fall Vegetables
- 1 lb baby red potatoes, quartered
- 1 lb sweet potatoes, cut in 1 inch cube-ish pieces (potatoes are roundish, it's hard to get all cubes. Relax. It's fine-ish)
- 2 cup brussels sprouts, halved
Instructions
- Pour your apple juice into a medium saucepan. Add in the rest of your parboiling ingredients. Bring to a boil. Add in your sausages. If the liquid doesn't cover the sausages you can add a little more apple juice and bring it back to a boil. Lower the temperature to medium, or a good simmer, and let the sausages cook for 10 minutes. Remove them from the liquid and let them cool while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
- Now we will start our mise en place. As you might remember from my other recipes, mise en place is just a fancy French Chef term for getting all your ingredients together and prepared for the actual cooking process. Put all your maple mustard ingredients together in a bowl and mix well. Pretty easy so far, right?
- Cut all your vegetables. Wow. It sounds so French and fancy, but this mise en place thing is sure easy. I find the best way to figure out if you have enough, and not too many, vegetables is to cut them and actually place them on the (non-stick spray coated) sheet pan right away. This way you can see if you have enough, without overcrowding them. If they are too clumped together they will essentially just steam, instead of getting that roasted caramelization you know you want. You also want to leave room for your sausages to nestle in between them.
- Place all the vegetables in a large bowl and pour all but about one tablespoon of the maple mustard glaze over everything. Give the vegetables a good toss, making sure all of them are evenly coated. Pour them out onto the sheet tray. I recommend turning the brussels sprouts and the red potatoes over so that their cut edges are against the pan. Yummy brown bits will result and that's always good! Put the sausages in the bowl with the last bit of the glaze and roll them around like dogs in a pile of leaves. Nestle the sausages in with the vegetables. Sprinkle everything with a pinch of salt and a small pinch of black pepper. Now you're ready to bake or cover and refrigerate for later.
- Bake at 425° for about 30 minutes, or until the sausages are nicely browned and the potatoes are cooked through. So easy and delicious! Best eaten on a plate and not over the sink. I'm talking to The Boy. If you are preparing this ahead, take it out of the refrigerator about 30 minutes before cooking. As with any meat, you don't want to cook it cold right from the fridge. This will cause uneven cooking as the outside will cook faster than the inside, which stays cold longer. Trust me, room temperature meat is the way to go. It's food safe. Really! Look it up! See? All food safe and delicious.
The nutritional and caloric information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It does not assert or suggest that readers should or should not count calories, and should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s or doctor’s counseling.
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