Breakfast Porky
As noted in my recipe for Italian Meatballs, I love sausage. It’s such a great base for a variety of other dishes.In this case, I’m making little breakfast porkies, or … patties. I’m a bit peculiar, I suppose. I make stacks of little meat patties like this, freeze them, then pan sear and use in a million different ways. One of my own personal favorites is to take a square of my focaccia bread, split it in two, rub butter all over it and toast in the oven. While it toasts, I’ll take this exact breakfast porky, sear it in a pan with a ridiculous amount of butter, and cook until it’s cooked through and golden. Then, I’ll pull out my bread, set the two slices on a plate, place my porky in the center of one slice, then drop a few eggs into the still hot pan, coated with pork fat and butter. A bit of salt, scramble, scramble, scramble, then I’ll pour this mess of sloppy egg noogin’s all over my porky, sit and pretend I can eat this thing like a sandwich.Now that I’m sitting to write the recipe, I’m not sure why I decided to change up my standard routine and fry the porky in a pan with some bacon slices, instead. Once the porky was browned, I stacked it atop a fresh, lightly seasoned tomato slice, a few leaves of butter lettuce, put the bacon on top, then quickly fried an egg in the bacon fat. I slid that onto the top of my stack and took a picture!To be fair, the tomato stacked porky was incredibly delicious, pretty to look at, and was an undeniably tasty way to start the day. However, it’s not really a true representation of what I actually usually make... a massive bed of messy eggs and porky.Maybe I’m embarrassed? Maybe I don’t want people to see my overcooked eggs and porky with glistening fat splattered all about? Maybe I just thought a tomato was more pretty?Sometimes, I wonder what I’m doing …What am I doing? Does anyone know?!*ahem*Breakfast porkies are lightly-flavored, breakfast sausages, perfect for any kind of breakfast need you need fulfilled. Whip these up with a stack of Silver-Dollar Pancakes and drizzle your favorite sugar-free pancake syrup all over the top. Eat them plain! Another weird concoction I make with them is… I like to break these up in a pan, browning it into seasoned ground meat. I’ll whisk together some eggs with a bit of heavy cream and parmesan cheese, add to the browned meat and scramble until cooked through and scrumptious. I’ll pour this mess onto a plate. It makes for a deeply nutrient dense dinner. It’s absolutely atrocious to look at, but boy does it go down smooth, while I channel surf!I think what I’m trying to say is … these are wonderfully delicious, flexible, easy to make, and fantastic to freeze. They cook up quick and can be taken a variety of ways, some more photogenic than others …Whip up a batch and tell me what you do with them. I’m curious!
Servings: 16 6 oz (168g) servings
Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp butter
- 1 large white onion peeled and finely diced
- 8 cloves garlic minced
- 5 lbs. ground pork (70/30 lean to fat is best)
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh sage leaves
- 2 Tbsp sugar replacement
- 1 tsp molasses or yacón syrup
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Heat a large sauté pan over medium heat.
- Add the butter to the pan and swirl it around. Add the onions and garlic to the pan along with a bit of salt and pepper. Stir to coat with the oil butter seasoning. Cook until the onions soften and become translucent, about 5 minutes.
- Once the onions are soft and translucent, transfer them to a plate or baking tray and place in the refrigerator, to chill.
- Combine the chilled onion mixture, ground pork, sage, sweetener, and molasses or yacón syrup in a large bowl. If you want to spice it up, add a bit of black pepper. I personally like this mixture a bit on the sweet and peppery side. Mix the ingredients together, thoroughly.
- Portion your meat into a variety of uses, whether it is bricks, patties, and/or meatballs. This recipe is focused on breakfast patties, so the suggestion is to take all or a portion of the bulk breakfast porky and form it into individual, similarly sized patties. I use a kitchen scale for this, lined with plastic wrap. I weigh out 6 oz. (168g) portions, then place on a parchment lined baking tray. Then, I make a second pass and form little, round discs.
- From there, you can individually wrap each disc in plastic wrap. Or, if you’ve got a family of 4, for example, you can cut little squares of parchment paper and place a small square of parchment between each porky, then wrap little bundles of four, in plastic wrap. Freeze!
- I like to take these out, then night before, and place in the refrigerator to slowly defrost, overnight. The next morning … I whip up a big batch of porky extravaganza!