A British cassoulet recipe

Words by Martyn Odell aka The Lagom Chef

Championing a no-waste food philosophy, Martyn Odell – aka The Lagom Chef – gives home cooks the knowledge and confidence to make delicious food from what you have in.

This is about to get me banned from France! Take a deep breath, Frenchies – your food is great, I’m just taking inspiration from it here. My old head chef Bob used to make an incredible cassoulet and even did a Spanish version. Is this a cassoulet? Sort of?

It just sounds better than sausage stew and isn’t too far off. It’s such a hearty dish that uses up whatever veg you’ve got lying around, is marginally healthier than other porky dinners with the addition of beans, can be done in the slow cooker and looks impressive when serving.

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Serves: 4 

Preparation time: 10 minutes 

Cook time: 60 minutes

Ingredients:

Olive oil

8 slices of smoked bacon

1 onion

2 carrots

4 celery sticks

4 garlic cloves

3 x 400g tins of whole plum tomatoes

Few sprigs of hard herbs (thyme, rosemary, bay leaves)

2 x 400g tins of haricot beans

8 sausages

For the garlic breadcrumbs:

Splash of olive oil

100g panko breadcrumbs (or make your own using the technique on page 60)

1 garlic clove

To garnish:

Fresh flat-leaf parsley

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WHY IT WORKS

Traditionally this is such a rich dish with all the fat, but I have scaled it back so you have an almost sweet acidity from the tomatoes and smoky goodness from the bacon.

Method

Heat a good glug of oil in a large saucepan on a medium heat. Dice the bacon, then add it to the pan and cook for a couple of minutes, until it’s nice and crispy.

Now dice the onion, carrots and celery (or whatever you have to hand), add them to the pan and cook for 3–5 minutes, until the veggies are nice and soft. Slice and add the garlic and gently cook for 1–2 minutes, until fragrant.

Chuck in the tomatoes and squish them to break them up, then add any hard herbs you have and your drained and rinsed beans. Lower the heat and simmer the sauce for 20–30 minutes to combine all the flavours. TASTE. Add a good pinch of salt and a good twist of black pepper and TASTE again. It should be glorious.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 220°C/200°C fan/gas 7.

Heat a splash of oil in a separate frying pan on a medium heat. Add the breadcrumbs, grate in the garlic and cook until the breadcrumbs are golden brown. TASTE, then season with a good pinch of salt and TASTE again. Take the pan off the heat and set aside.

Fry your sausages in a little oil just to get some nice colour on them. They will finish cooking all the way through in the sauce, so just focus on the colour here.

Pop the sausages into a large baking dish and cover with the sauce, then sprinkle over the breadcrumbs. Bake the whole thing in the preheated oven for 10–15 minutes, until the sauce is bubbling. Finely chop some fresh parsley and scatter over to garnish.

That’s it! Just be careful eating, as it will be ripping hot.