Slow Cooker Sausage Casserole

This classic slow cooker sausage casserole recipe makes the perfect comfort food, succulent traditional sausages and bacon with vegetables in thick, rich, dark, savoury gravy for a truly satisfying dinner.

Slow cooker sausage casserole

Rich, warming and savoury, this is a truly traditional slow cooked casserole with all those wonderful deep, savoury flavours, made so very easy in the slow cooker.

See also

• If you prefer a tomato based dish, try this easy sausage casserole.
• Air fryer sausages come out perfectly every time without making a mess of the stove.
• Slow cooker beef curry is rich, savoury and effortlessly delicious

With sausage and bacon (because two pork products are better than one, right?), tender onions and carrots, and succulent mushrooms, this is the food that really speaks of home, a real joy to come home to.

What’s more, it needs very little input from you. Nothing beats letting the slow cooker take the strain when you have too much to do.

This star of a recipe is great for batch cooking and freezing too, so you can plan ahead for more cosy evenings with the comforting of dinners.

Why make slow cooker sausage casserole

• savoury, warming and comforting

• easy to make

• hands off recipe

• great for batch cooking

Slow cooker sausage casserole ingredients

• Sausages – traditional pork sausages with a high meat content

• Bacon – buy as lardons or cut up rashers, smoked or unsmoked to taste

• Onions – brown or red

• Carrot

• Mushrooms – I prefer chestnut mushrooms to white button mushrooms, as they have more flavour and more vitamin D.

• Stock – I have used a beef concentrated jelly type. You can use chicken stock or the more unusual pork stock, but the casserole will not be as rich and dark.

• Tomato paste (puree) – This is not a tomato based casserole but little enriches the gravy without giving a tomato flavour.

• Garlic

• Seasoning – sea salt, freshly ground black pepper and some woody herbs. I used oregano and thyme but you could use marjoram or whatever you prefer. You could also use a spoon of my Italian seasoning, or Greek seasoning instead.

• Soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, red wine vinegar or Worcestershire sauce – an extra layer of flavour in the gravy, choose your favourite

• Cornflour (optional, not shown) – to thicken the gravy and give it a lovely shiny gloss

• Chutney or onion marmalade (optional, not shown) – extra flavour and a touch of sweetness

How to make slow cooker sausage casserole – step by step

Before you start, read my step-by-step instructions, with photos, hints and tips so you can make this slow cooker sausage recipe perfectly every time.

Scroll down for the recipe card with quantities and more tips at the bottom of the page.

Step One – Start by preparing the vegetables. Peel and roughly chop the onions and garlic. Peel and chop the carrot into chunks about 1.5 cm, and wipe, trim and slice mushrooms.

Step Two – Put a glug of oil in a pan and fry the onions over a medium heat until they are translucent, fragrant and becoming golden at the edges. This should take about 5 minutes.

Then add the seasoning and the garlic and cook for another 2 minutes.

Step Three – Transfer the cooked onion mix to the slow cooker crock, along with the mushrooms and carrots. Don’t wash the pan yet.

Step Four – Pour over the stock (you can see that my stock pot had not dissolved fully when I took this photo but this does not matter as it dissolves during cooking). Add the tomato paste together with the wine, soy sauce, balsamic or Worcestershire sauce (whichever you prefer). Give it all a stir.

Step Five – Prick the sausages to make sure they will not burst while cooking. Fry them in the pan you used for the onion, adding a little more oil if needed and cook until browned.

The sausages do not need to be cooked through, buy you want them to colour.

If using lardons, add these at the same time as the sausages. If using bacon rashers, cut it into small pieces and add to the pan about half way through cooking the sausages.

Step Six – Use a pair of tongs to transfer the browned sausages on top of the vegetable mixture in the slow cooker. Use a slotted spoon to scoop out the lardons/bacon, leaving the fat in the pan. and scatter over the sausages.

Put the lid on the slow cooker and cook for 4 hours on high, or on low for 6 hours.

If I am at home, I like to start the cooking on high for an hour and then turn the slow cooker down.

Step Seven – If you like a thicker gravy, put two teaspoons of cornflour in a small bowl, add a few spoons of gravy from the casserole and stir to make a thin paste. Add this back to the slow cooker and stir through.

Leave for 10 minutes to thicken and repeat if needed.

I also sometimes leave the lid ajar for the last hour of cooking to reduce the liquid further.

Step Eight – Finally, add a generous knob of butter, allowing it to melt into the casserole. Stir through before serving. This really enriches the casserole and elevates it to something more special.

Serving suggestion

Serve with crusty bread or potatoes and green vegetables.

Variations

• Use different types of sausage

• Use chopped chorizo in placed of the lardons, or add some nduja with the sausages.

• Add a couple of sticks of celery when frying the onion, or if you are feeling really lazy use frozen sofritto mix to save chopping the onion and carrot.

• Add a can of drained white beans (or your favourite beans) at the end of cooking.

• For a more substantial one-pot meal, add some chopped potato or other extra root vegetables with the sausauges.

Storage

Fridge – Cook your sausage casserole and then keep in the fridge in an airtight box for up to 4 days. Reheat in a saucepan or in the microwave until piping hot.

I prefer not to reheat in plastic tubs, so I transfer my sausage casserole to a Pyrex type jug with a handle.

Freezer – Once cool, you can transfer your sausage casserole to stackable airtight boxes and freeze. Keep for up to three months. I use plastic takeaway trays for the freezer because they are the perfect size for a stew/casserole for 2, are dishwasher friendly and stack so neatly.

Defrost your easy sausage casserole overnight in the fridge or on the kitchen counter for a couple of hours. Do not reheat more than once.

Hints and tips

• Don’t forget to prick the sausages before cooking, as you don’t want your bangers going bang!

• I find cooking tongs invaluable for moving sausages to the casserole pot.

FAQs

More recipes for hearty meals

• Leftover lamb stew – rich and delicious, just like Granny made

• Easy savoury mince – for cottage pies and so much more

• Southern spiced pork steaks – nice and spicy