More for the Peasants – Sausages and French Lentils

There were many times during my childhood that we were not entirely cashed up. My Mama was a single mother but regardless of the funds situation she was always very aware of our nutrition and food. I was one of those ‘celery and cream cheese in the lunch box’ kids and although now I see it’s given me the tools to make better food choices as an adult, I was super jealous of the fun packs of Twisties other kids had. No one ever wants to swap celery and cream cheese. Now I give Dexter healthy snacks and lentils…….the apple does not fall far from the tree, it seems!

Lentils featured pretty highly on our family table, and I was always super embarrassed when Mum busted out Lentil Bolognaise for my friends. There are many tales of our school buddies coming for dinner and furrowing their brows at the plate and asking ‘What the hell is that?’. I guess not every family ate stinking lentil Bolognaise.

That said, now I have a very healthy respect for the musical fruit and we eat lentils quite regularly. They’re low fat, low GI and an awesome source protein…..not to mention versatile and tasty. I do not, however, mess with Bolognaise. Some things are sacrosanct. When you’re cooking lentils, don’t salt them until they’re tender and cooked. If you salt too early they turn into hard little bullets, and no one wants to eat bullets!

We love a sausage in my house, and the secret is a fine quality one from a good butcher. If you find a good sausage maker, hang onto them for dear life. The difference between a good sausage and an ordinary sausage is so very vast. I love a pork and fennel sauso with this meal but on this occasion I’ve used a good Italian sausage.

Yeild – 2 adult and 2 toddler serves

You will need – 

• as many sausages as everyone wants
• 1 cup Du Puy lentils (or just green or brown if that what you have)
• 1 small onion, finely diced
• 2 celery stalk, finely diced
• 1 large carrot, finely diced
• 1.5 cups stock
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 handfuls parsley, chopped
• a glug of good olive oil