How to Make Rustic Roasted Potatoes With Game Sausages


A Cosy Winter Dish

Rustic Roasted Potatoes With Game Sausages recipe

Rustic roasted potatoes with game sausages or traditionally prepared meats are a regular dish in any Romanian restaurant, especially in Transylvania.

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I grew up in the magnificent city of Brașov, surrounded by mountains. The ski resort was only fifteen minutes away, so I would go up to the slops even without the intention to practise winter sports, but only for a hearty meal at one of the restaurants that would offer traditional foods. And take my word, there is no better, tastier and delicious food than the traditional Romanian!


I had this dish with small and big game, from pheasant and quail to wild boar, venison or deer, typical game around Transylvania’s forests.


Of course, the restaurants’ chefs would cook game meat in a country fashion, and make a big fuss about how they present the dishes. Even a beef salad would look totally unexpected as Romanians are incredibly fussy customers! Because we know what we want and how we want it and quality must always prevail, especially when we pay for it! Not that restaurants are expensive in Romania!


You will find this country listed at the top of the best and cheapest travel destinations in many travel guides. But don’t be mistaken; cheap does not mean low expectations! It’s just the way the country’s economy works, for the time being.

rustic restaurant in the mountains
Rustic restaurant in Poiana Brașov Ski Resort. If the restaurant looks like this, imagine what the food they serve looks and tastes like!

Back to my rustic potatoes, I had some smoked deer sausages in the freezer, and this gave me the idea to re-create a taste that I missed since travel was practically non-existent in the past year.


Just the thought of enjoying a meal I crave and can’t wait to travel to Romania to enjoy was enough motivation to get me cooking a traditional country dish.


Ironically, my sausages were an Austrian export from yet another European country with a famous alpine culinary tradition.

However, I live in the UK and recently read an article saying that British woodlands recorded a deer invasion.


There was no demand for venison with an intermittent lockdown in the past year and restaurants were forced to close.
As an effect, the deer population boomed and reached new records, the total number being at the highest it’s been in the past thousand years!


Imagine that! Not since Alfred the Great’s time have so many deer roamed freely through the British woodland!
My mind would always go way beyond. Imagine time-travel works. What would a proper Saxon lost in time through quantic physics and electromagnetic waves say about us? A population in millions, going to the butcher to buy meat that only requires a bow and arrow to hunt and a big fire to cook! Pretty twisted!


I wonder if Amazon sells bows and arrows? But then I would need a licence to hunt. Nah! I feel guilty if I have to kill a fly!


Most certainly, I would not look a deer in the eye and see sausages! I would not eat it!
When I have it delivered to the door in plastic packaging, it does not look like a murder happened to satisfy a gourmet whim. I can enjoy them in my rustic roasted potatoes and game sausages dish!


Our humble Saxon would be puzzled beyond imagination!

Ingredients for Rustic Roasted Potatoes With Game Sausages

ingredients for rustic potatoes with game sausages

As the title suggests, the main ingredients in this recipe would be potatoes and game sausages – I had smoked deer sausages available. If you chose something else, make sure you follow the cooking instructions on the packaging.
A large onion
A few garlic cloves
A sweet pointed pepper (I only used it to give this dish some colour)
A glass of wine (to use in the actual cooking process; I’m not implying that you cannot enjoy one while cooking, too!)
Half a glass of extra virgin olive oil
Spices: black pepper, paprika, rock salt
Herbs: thyme and rosemary

Method

Wash and boil the potatoes for about 20 minutes. When ready cool, peel and cut the potatoes into equal wedges and place them in a large bowl.


Add spices and herbs and mix until they are nicely coated.


Place the potatoes into a roasting tray, sprinkle wine and oil and bake for about 30 minutes.


Add the sausages at the end, as they don’t need more than 5-10 minutes of cooking time if they are smoked. Watch they don’t burn! Charred meat (or any other food) contains a high amount of acrylamide which is connected with different types of cancer; best avoid it at all costs!


When ready, serve with sour cream if you wish or with freshly cut dill.


Rustic roasted potatoes with game sausages go well with a winter pickle salad if it happens to be at hand, or with a tomato salad. And a bottle of red!
Bon appetite!

roasted rustic potatoes with game sausages

Rustic Roasted Potatoes With Game Sausages

Rustic Roasted Potatoes With Sausages is a delicious dish for a cosy winter dinner, a favourite on ski resorts menus in mountainous Romania and not only!
5 from 42 votes
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Potato boiling 20 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 15 minutes
Course Main Course
Cuisine Romanian
Servings 4 people

Ingredients
  

  • 6 pcs deer sausage
  • 6 pcs potatoes white or red, large
  • 1 pcs onion large
  • 5 cloves garlic
  • 1 pcs sweet pointed pepper optional
  • 4 tbsp olive oil extra virgin
  • 1 glass white wine
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp ground black pepper
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 1 tsp thyme dry
  • 1 tbsp dried rosemary
  • 1 tbsp freshly chopped dill
  • 3 tbsp sour cream optional

Instructions
 

  • Wash and boil the potatoes for about 20 minutes. Use a large pan and make sure the water covers the potatoes.
  • Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/gas mark 6.
  • When the potatoes are ready, cool them under cold water, peel and cut them into wedges. Place into a large bowl.
    potatoes in roasting tray
  • Chop or slice the onion (rings, halves or quarters, as you please), the poited pepper and the garlic cloves; add to the potatoes.
  • Sprinkle all the spices, the wine and olive oil and mix well using a spatula until all the wedges are nicely coated.
  • Place the wedges into a roasting tray and bake for 30 minutes.
  • Cut the sausages into pieces.
  • When the wedges are nearly ready, remove the tray from oven and add the sausages.
    rustic potatoes with game sausages in yellow dish
  • Bake for another 10-15 minutes. Watch that the sausages don't burn.
  • Serve warm with an assorted winter salad. Sprinkle with freshly cut dill and sour cream (optionally).
    pickle salad

Notes

Use a fork to check if the potatoes are boiled.
Try to cut them in equal wedges and occasionally stir while cooking to allow uniform roasting.
For extra crispiness, you can bring the tray under the grill for the last five minutes, but keep an eye on the potatoes.  At high cooking temperature, the sugars and amino acids from the starchy foods react, producing acrylamide – a carcinogen that should not find the way into our bodies! 
The best side for this dish is an assorted pickle salad: cabbage, watermelon, cauliflower, carrots, beetroot. I make my own pickles every autumn, and they are ready just before Christmas. I will upload a recipe/method soon, hopefully!
If not available, a cabbage,  tomato and dill salad or even a simple tomato and onion salad would work well, too!
Enjoy!
Keyword game sausages, Roasted potatoes, winter dinner

A Cosy Winter Dish


The World Is An Oyster

Working as a journalist during university was pretty exciting. But landing a cruise ship job barely a year in my new graduate career was something else! Overnight, I moved from an already exhilarating job to an even better one. One that would allow me to wake up every morning in a different country. What more can a twenty-something wish for? The fact that I was fluent in a few languages helped. It made it easier to obtain the position I was seeking at the Shore Excursions department. Apart from dispatching tours in the morning and selling tickets in the evening, I would spend nearly every day on different trips. I did this a few years, spending half a year onboard and about two months at home. I enjoyed it immensely. I met fascinating people from all over the Globe and collected memories to last me a lifetime. Not to mention that I received a salary for seeing all those magnificent places the Earth has to offer! In an ideal world, everybody should live as they want. For me, that would translate into travel, then travel some more and keep travelling!

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69 Responses

  1. nancy says:

    5 stars
    great simple dish with crispy potatoes.

  2. nancy says:

    5 stars
    easy one pan side dish

  3. 5 stars
    You are funny! I never thought that a bow and arrow needed a license but it makes sense. I would faint if I had to kill my own dinner, starvation here I come… Back to your recipe, fantastic. Love sausage and potatoes and love to try it your way.

  4. Kayla DiMaggio says:

    5 stars
    Delicious dinner! Total hit with the family!

  5. Natalie says:

    5 stars
    Absolutely delicious. Who doesn’t love good old baked potatoes? Yum! I’m trying this out for sure.

  6. Dawn says:

    5 stars
    I forgot the 5 stars before in my previous comment! This roasted potato with game sausage definitely gets a 5 star here from us.

  7. Dawn says:

    5 stars
    This rustic potatoes with the game sausage is easy to make and so delicious! We don’t always have access to deer meat, but our neighbor knew somebody who went out hunting so he was able to get us some. It tastes great with eggs too – we decided to have eggs instead of a salad with it.

  8. Cayla says:

    5 stars
    Love this recipe! I make potatoes very often, so saving this one!

  9. GABRIELA HERRERA says:

    5 stars
    As if I needed another way to eat potatoes, LOL, my husband and I go thru 10 pounds of potatoes a week. Thank you so much for this recipe.

  10. Cindy L says:

    5 stars
    Potatoes and sausages are the perfect hardy meal for the cold fall and winter weather here in Canada!

  11. Susan says:

    5 stars
    What a delightful combination of flavors! Must try!

  12. 5 stars
    Yum! These potatoes were so delicious! I totally got the rustic feeling and it was so hearty!

  13. Jamie says:

    5 stars
    A favorite in our house!

  14. Jessica Formicola says:

    5 stars
    My hubby hunts a lot, so we always have deer sausage on hand. Can’t wait to use it to make these potatoes!

  15. Leslie says:

    5 stars
    Love this recipe!

  16. Brianna says:

    5 stars
    This is my kind of comfort food!

  17. Oscar says:

    5 stars
    This looks delicious. Saving this recipe

  18. Rob says:

    5 stars
    This looks delicious! Can’t wait to try it!

  19. Bernice says:

    5 stars
    Super comforting dish…and an easy idea for those busy fall nights.

  20. Ramona says:

    5 stars
    This was absolutely delicious. Thank you for sharing!

  21. Angela says:

    5 stars
    Delicious meal. I love the seasoning used.

  22. Toni says:

    5 stars
    This is such an amazing meal! My family loved it!

  23. Pam says:

    5 stars
    Perfectly roasted potatoes are my weakness!

  24. Sue says:

    5 stars
    First of all, I Love potatoes so this recipe is made to order for me! Second, I love the way your mind works. I can almost see the Saxon with his bow and arrow. LOL

  25. Emily says:

    5 stars
    This dish sounds amazing! I’m pinning this for later, I know my brother will have some fresh game meat soon!!

  26. Kyleigh says:

    5 stars
    This was absolutely delicious! I love the flavor!

  27. Liz says:

    5 stars
    I really like the combo of seasonings in this dish!

  28. Amanda Dixon says:

    5 stars
    This was delicious! It was so hearty and quick and easy to put together for a convenient weeknight dinner.

  29. Kristina says:

    5 stars
    This was different from what we are used to eating and everyone really enjoyed it.

  30. anna says:

    5 stars
    Just reading this recipe and looking at the photos made me hungry!

  31. Thanks for the recipe. This looks amazing. These will be perfect for the ball game today. Thank you.

  32. 5 stars
    I live in a community where deer hunting is a big sport this time of the year. I would rather use deer meat than beef and I often do if I have it available. I’m sure this is a very tasty recipe and I would love to try it soon.

  33. Jasmine says:

    5 stars
    Yummy ! !can’t wait to try it.

  34. Karin says:

    Yum! My husband will devour this!

  35. Afroz says:

    This is a such a perfect accompaniment for my winter BBQ. It such easy and simple recipe.

  36. Linda says:

    This looks like perfect fireside food! A heaping bowl, next to the fire, with a glass of wine or hearty beer! We have a local family farm market that I visit every week — I don’t think they have game sausage, but I know they’ll have something that will work!

  37. Carrie Ann says:

    This looks like such a delicious and cozy meal for a cold winter day! I can’t wait to give this recipe a try 🙂 The winter salad you’ve paired with it sounds fantastic, too. I’ll check back to see if you’ve posted the recipe!

  38. Samantha says:

    5 stars
    Such a cozy meal! Definitely will be trying this out!

  39. Arya says:

    5 stars
    Looks delicious! Can’t wait to try it! 🙂

  40. I love potatoes everything. This combination sounds delish, the perfect recipe for cold winter nights. Thanks for sharing!

  41. Gabriela Herrera says:

    5 stars
    OK you must be a mind reader because I recently gave up potatoes for no particular reason. It is just that my family goes thru atleast 20 pounds a month and I thought this can’t be right. This looks so delicious Im gonna have to but potatoes soon.

  42. 5 stars
    I love the combination of sausage and potatoes! The spices and flavors you added to this dish sound perfect. Thank you for sharing this recipe!

  43. Scout says:

    I love potatoes! This dish looks perfect for cold weather and reminds me of our time in Eastern Europe. I’d like to give it a try someday.

  44. Wendie says:

    This dish looks AMAZING! I pinned it also so I can make it when we have a succesful hunting season!! So tasty looking – thank you for sharing.

  45. Meg says:

    This looks so yummy!! Definitely trying this out.

  46. Colette says:

    5 stars
    I love reading your stories! I have a good friend from Romania, and she makes the best food ever! Romanians are such cool people 😉.
    Maybe you need to get yourself a bow and arrows and help fin out the deer population a little bit 😂😜
    This recipe looks amazing! I love potatoes and sausages, so it’s the perfect combinations 🥰

  47. Jeannie says:

    5 stars
    I can skip the meat and enjoy the potatoes, a good recipe to share with friends. thank you for sharing

  48. Leah says:

    This sounds like the perfect comfort dish. I am all about potatoes, however they are prepared. And that’s so interesting about the deer population but makes sense!

  49. Kalin says:

    These potatoes look so great with the sausages! What a perfect filling meal for this time of year

  50. 5 stars
    This looks so comforting and delicious for the cold winter nights we are currently having. I may have to try this tomorrow as a side dish to roast chicken.

  51. Ghanashyam K says:

    5 stars
    I love any dish with potatoes, and this looks simple enough. Will definitely try!

  52. 5 stars
    This looks like a wonderful rustic meal perfect for colder weather. Nothing beats a good potato and sausage dish!

  53. 5 stars
    You got me at potatoes! Love this very easy recipe and cannot wait to make it for my family.

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