Here’s a quick, weeknight friendly dinner to try out now that it’s fall and the oven is back in commission. This salad has a very complex taste for how few ingredients it combines and it is tasty with both fingerling and colorful mini potatoes.

The recipes this one is adapted from call for a lot more sausage and shallots. I’ve made this several times and tweaked the recipe with each iteration until I finally found a balance I liked with enough sausage to be filling but not too heavy and just a small amount of shallots, enough to add a little bit of sweetness. 1/2 sausage link per person is plenty for lunch or brunch and can be increased to 3/4 of a link for dinner (and the remaining sausage can be used as a pizza topping!) I use just one shallot per person, and I peel and slice it before I roast it so it can caramelize and crisp in the pan. I try to keep as much of the basal stem in tact as I can when I separate it from the roots so the shallot layers stay together when I slice it. I keep the shallots in for the same amount of time as the potatoes because I like them extra crispy. If they look too crispy for you, they can be removed before the final stir, as noted in the instructions.

The only decision I’m still on the fence about is how small to cut the sausage before roasting. Cutting them into 1″ pieces yields pieces large enough to slice into that stay tender inside whereas cutting them into 1/2″ pieces produces crispier and bite-sized pieces that can be more evenly distributed in the salad. For the salad in these pictures, the sausage is cut into 1/2″ pieces and I used 1/2 sausage link per person.

Low-sodium sausage and potato roast salad with arugula and shallots

Adapted from Justin Chapple of Food & Wine’s ‘Sausage-and-Potato Pan Roast
’ and Deb Perelman of Smitten Kitchen’s ‘Sausage and potato roast with arugula‘

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 1 link raw pork bratwurst sausage (0.24 lb/110 g), cut into smaller 1/2″ or 1″ pieces, for lunch or 1 1/2 links sausage for dinner
• 2 teaspoons (10 ml) and 2 tablespoons (30 ml) olive oil, divided
• 1 lb (450 g) fingerling or mini potatoes, rinsed and cut into 3/4″ pieces
• 2 medium shallots (100 g), peeled and cut into 6ths
• 1/4 teaspoon (1 ml) red pepper flakes, or more to taste
• freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 2.5 oz (70 g) baby arugula
• 2 to 4 teaspoons (10 ml-20 ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice, to taste

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425°F.
2. Combine the sausage pieces in a small bag with 2 teaspoons of the olive oil and some freshly ground pepper. Set aside in the fridge.
3. Spread out the potato and shallot pieces onto a rimmed cookie sheet. Combine with the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil, red pepper flakes, and freshly ground pepper and stir until the potatoes are covered. Roast for 15 minutes, at which point the potatoes should be slightly browned.
4. Stir the potatoes and shallots to ensure even cooking, and then stir in the sausage. Cook for 10 minutes. At this point, the shallots should be slightly caramelized and can be removed to prevent further crisping.
5. Stir the potatoes (and shallots, if they haven’t been removed) and turn over the sausage pieces. Cook for another 7-12 minutes, until the potatoes are tender and the sausage is cooked through.
6. Place the arugula in a large bowl. Empty the contents of the pan into the bowl, including any cooking oil that can be scraped from the pan. Combine, along with 1 teaspoon of the lemon juice. Taste, and then add more lemon juice in 1 teaspoon increments to adjust to your taste.
7. Divide and plate the salad. Serve right away.

Tips

Sources of sodium

• Sausage
• Shallot

Approximate sodium intake per serving for lunch (1/2 sausage link): 346 mg

• 340 mg from the sausage, which has 680 mg per 1 link (82 g)
• 6 mg from the shallot, which has 12 mg per 3.5 oz (100 g)

Approximate sodium intake per serving for dinner (3/4 sausage link): 516 mg

• 510 mg from the sausage, which has 680 mg per 1 link (82 g)
• 6 mg from the shallot, which has 12 mg per 3.5 oz (100 g)

• These values are calculated from the nutritional labels of the ingredients I used

Modifications

• Reduce the sodium

  Opt for 1/2 link of sausage per person or try to find sausage that has a lower sodium content.

• Increase the sodium

  If we weren’t worried about our sodium intake, we would add some sea salt to the potatoes when combining them with the oil and other spices. Topping the salad with some flaky salt right before serving would also be lovely.

• Make it vegan

  The only non-vegan ingredient here is the sausage, use your favorite vegan sausage instead!

• Other sausage

  We prefer pork bratwurst sausage (we did a taste test!), but sweet Italian sausage or your favorite chicken sausage would also work.

• Other potatoes

  We make this recipe with colorful fingerling or mini potatoes but you could also use a mix of red, yukon gold, russet, or fingerling potatoes.

• Shallots, unpeeled

  Both recipes this one is based on recommend using up to 2.5 shallots per person, and using them unpeeled and halved rather than peeled and cut into smaller pieces. We found that more than one shallot per person adds too much sweetness to the dish, especially if the shallots are halved because they are so big. I would not roast the shallots unpeeled because I wouldn’t want to have to bother with peeling a hot shallot while the potatoes cool or, worse, end up with shallot peel in my salad. Plus the shallots are really nice when they caramelize.

Handy tools

Nonstick rimmed cookie sheets

I use this cookie pan set. The sheets are made of heavy gauge carbon steel and they’re really non-stick, easy to clean, thick and sturdy. They will continue to look new for a long time if you’re good to them.

Did you make this?

• If you recreate this recipe, I’d love to know! Leave a comment here and tag @alickofsalt on social media.