Earlier this week I had a total recipe fail and I was a bit discouraged since I haven’t had much time in the kitchen lately, but then I took a step back and realized I needed to get back to my roots. Simple recipes, with simple ingredients, and lots of flavor. So I decided to take advantage of a sale on Italian sausage (one of my favorite “short cut” ingredients) and whip up this incredibly filling Italian Sausage and White Bean Skillet.
Automatic Seasoning with Sausage
One of the reasons I love working with Italian sausage is because it’s packed with all the herbs and spices that you would normally add one by one to a recipe. So when I start a dish with Italian sausage, I rarely have to season it with anything later. The sausage does all the work for me. Yay!
To retain all the flavor from the sausage, I did not drain the fat from the skillet, but rather used it as a sort of sauce or dressing to coat the white beans and spinach with flavor. I added some freshly cracked pepper and that’s it. I used hot Italian sausage because that’s what was on sale, but you can use mild or sweet varieties as well.
How to Serve Italian Sausage and White Bean Skillet
This Italian sausage and White Bean Skillet is so extremely versatile that I wanted to give you a few variations. I decided to go with a “one skillet” and low-er carb version because those recipes seem to be quite popular lately, but you can lower the cost and stretch this meal out by replacing some of the sausage, beans, or spinach with 8oz. of cooked pasta, preferably orecchiette, which is a flat, disk-like shape. If you can’t find spinach for a low price like I did (thank you, Aldi!!), you can cut the amount of spinach in half and still have a great dish, or use frozen chopped spinach.
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Italian Sausage and White Bean Skillet
Servings 4 about 1.5 cups eachIngredients
- 1 lb. Italian sausage (hot, mild, or sweet) ($3.49)
- 1 Tbsp olive oil ($0.13)
- 2 15oz. cans cannellini beans* ($1.10)
- 8 oz. spinach ($1.49)
- Freshly cracked black pepper ($0.05)
Instructions
- Remove the casing from the sausage and add the sausage to a large deep skillet, or wide bottomed soup pot, along with the olive oil. Sauté the sausage over medium heat, breaking it into pieces as you go, until the sausage is cooked through, brown, and crispy on the edges (about 10 minutes).
- While the sausage is cooking, rinse and drain the cannellini beans. Once the sausage is brown and crispy, add the beans and some freshly cracked pepper to the skillet. Gently stir the beans into the sausage to coat them in the fat, and allow them to heat through.
- As the beans are heating through, roughly chop the spinach. Add the spinach to the skillet or pot in batches, gently stirring it into the sausage and beans until it wilts down. Once the spinach is mostly wilted, turn the heat off. Taste the mixture and add salt if needed (this will depend on the salt content of your sausage and beans). Serve hot.
See how we calculate recipe costs here.
Equipment
Notes
Nutrition
Have you tried this recipe?Mention @budgetbytes or tag #budgetbytes on Instagram!How to Make Sausage and White Bean Skillet – Step by Step Photos
This recipe started with this awesome sale on Italian sausage. This whole package, which is actually slightly larger than 1 lb. was only $3.49. This recipe is very flexible and forgiving, so you can use a little less, a little more, or exactly 1 lb. Italian sausage, and it can be hot, mild, or sweet.
Remove the casing from the sausage and then add the sausage to a large deep skillet, or a wide-bottomed pot with 1 Tbsp olive oil. Sauté the sausage over medium heat, breaking it into pieces as it cooks, until the sausage pieces are brown and crispy. Don’t stop when it’s simply cooked through, keep going until the moisture evaporates and the edges start to sizzle in the oil and turn brown.
While the sausage is cooking, rinse and drain two 15oz. cans of cannellini beans. Cannellini beans are better than navy beans or great northern beans because they are larger, hold up better, and have a great creamy flavor. The smaller beans that tend to break down are better suited for soups and things where you’ll want them to break down and help thicken the mixture.
Once the sausage is crispy, add the drained beans and gently stir to combine. Add some freshly cracked pepper and allow the beans to heat through with the sausage.
I’m lucky enough to be able to buy this 8oz. bag of fresh spinach for $1.49, but if you can’t get a deal like this you can either reduce the spinach by half, or use frozen spinach in its place. The only downside to using the frozen spinach is that the texture and appearance will not be as good. Instead of being tender, the frozen spinach will be a bit more stringy. Actually frozen broccoli florets (chopped into small pieces) would also be pretty awesome with this.
Roughly chop the spinach and add it to the skillet in batches, stirring it just until it wilts down, and then adding the next batch.
Once all the spinach has been added and it is mostly wilted (you want it to still have a little body, not totally cooked down), give everything a taste and add salt or pepper if needed. My skillet was so extremely flavorful, even without adding anything else. It’s amazing! The amount of seasoning needed at the end will likely depend on the salt and spice content of your sausage and beans, so it may vary from brand to brand.
Dinner doesn’t get easier than this. :)
This was so delish, I am cooking beans now and making the recipe tonite for the second time in a couple of weeks using our homemade sausage. Will try adding some feta per some suggestions. The one thing that surprised me was the cost of the ingredients as posted! I’m in Canada so maybe the prices are a lot different here, but there is no way I would find those prices anywhere near the posted ones. Double the price of everything! Mind you, our Cdn $ is only worth about .70c US.
Thanks for the great recipe!
We don’t eat pork so I used beef kielbasa. This dish was a winner.
You can easily turn this into a soup. add a few cups of stock and a can of diced tomatoes. I always add some diced onion when cooking my sausage.
I substituted kale for spinach, added a diced sweet potato, dried cranberries, and a dollop of plain yogurt. It was very pretty and delicious. It’s an extremely versatile recipe. It’s a keeper!!
Absolutely delicious! Way back when, this was one of the first recipes from this blog that I made, and one of my first forays into real cooking. Made it again for old times sake, and (since I’ve been eating frozen spinach for weeks) used arugula instead. Made it even better, if possible!
Cubed, steamed sweet potato is so good in this dish!
I have never commented on a recipe before but I was so into this I just had to share. Was this is the perfect dinner recipe or what?? It took less than 15 mins to make, was super filling and oh, did I mention freakin’ delicious?! I used hot turkey sausage (my fave) and I was actually super sad that I was so full that I couldn’t go for round 2. I bought a fresh loaf of crusty wheat bread to go along with it – absolute perfection. This made enough for lunch the next day but I will be doubling the recipe next time so I can make it last way longer :)
We swapped regular sausage for beyond meat sausage and it worked really well for a vegetarian weeknight dish!
Just tried this using Boerewors, heavy on spice and flavour.
Great that its such a simple combo; greens beans proteins
Before I made this, I was unsure how I was going to feel about it, because I wasn’t sure if I liked cannellini beans, and I thought it wouldn’t be filling enough… I was thinking about adding some gluten free penne. Boy, was I wrong on both accounts. This dish was not only extremely filling (there is no way you need to add more starch!), but SO flavorful and simple. And apparently I love cannellini beans, or at least like this I do! Very highly recommend this recipe! Easy and quick to make, delicious, and cheap – what’s not to love??
I add lemon juice to cut the heaviness of the dish. Otherwise it is a favorite of mine! Very simple and hearty.
Great tip Terra!
Love this recipe. I do add a couple things I feel are missing. I add a white onion to the sausage and some pecorino romano at the end. The salty pecorino is perfect in it.
Turned out great! I cooked up a big batch of dried white beans I need to get through, now this recipe is going into my regular rotation. I served it with penne, I needed a little olive oil for extra fat for the noodles and it was delicious.
I madey own Italian sausage with ground turkey and spices, and added 12oz cooked bowtie pasta and parmesan cheese at the end. So delicious, and will be in my regular rotation now Thank you for this easy, delicious recipe!
I love this recipe! I don’t eat pork so I make it with vegan sausage. At the end I add a little lemon juice and feta cheese.
Brilliant mid week dinner! Didn’t have Italian sausage at the shop so just used regular and added fennel, oregano, basil and garlic. Also added chilli flakes for a bit of extra kick. So tasty.
We love this recipe. We add Fire Roasted Garlic diced tomatoes and sometimes serve over rice. I noticed a lot of comments about acidity. Hope this helps may try adding some Feta cheese