There is nothing more frustrating than coming home from a long, hard day at work and immediately being bombarded by your family asking about dinner. I usually try to plan ahead and have several days' worth of meals ready to cook, but every once in a while, something comes up and I need to come up with a plan on the fly. The easiest thing to do is open up the pantry, see what's there, and then check the fridge for the fresh ingredients going bad or expiring the soonest. Once you have all that information on hand, I typically end up saying "to hell with it" and ordering takeout, because it has just been one of those days. You ever been there? Well, today's recipe is designed to avoid that despair and be a quick and easy weeknight dinner that requires zero planning and uses up those veggies! Italian Sausage and Peppers Sheet Pan Dinner is a delicious, yet simple, preparation of bell peppers, onions, and sausages with just a few seasonings making a tasty meal for all to enjoy in less than 45 minutes! If that sounds like a plan to you then you know the drill....Let's Get Cooking!
Prep work for this quick dinner is fairly straightforward. Grab a variety of different colored bell peppers and slice them lengthwise into 1/4-inch wide strips. Obviously use what you already have on hand, but remember that the red and orange peppers are typically a bit sweeter than green so having a mixture of the three makes for a better final flavor profile. You don't have to be super exact with your knife skills, just try to keep everything about the same size so that when cooked they finish evenly instead of half being charred and half still raw.
We are going to repeat this process with our onions as well. Once again, it isn't completely necessary, but using a mixture of yellow and red onions adds another level of flavor so hopefully you keep both in your pantry and can stick with the program, eh? Onions are cheap and last for weeks if kept in a cool dark environment so I highly suggest just keeping them stocked at home at all times. Besides, they get cooked into just about every meal so they are not like other fresh ingredients that are better off bought when needed. Oh, and pro tip while we are discussing onion storage. Never store onions and potatoes together as the onions will speed up potatoes' natural "ripening" process due to natural off-gassing and vice-versa, the extra moisture from potatoes is not good for onions.
That wraps up all the prep work for this simple dinner so go ahead and preheat your oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit at this point. Pull out a sheet tray and line it with a piece of parchment paper. If your parchment paper keeps wanting to roll back up on itself, just crumble it all into a ball like a piece of trash then straighten it back out. Magic science stuff happens, and this allows the paper to lay flat and no longer roll up on itself. Cool huh? Anyway, dump your bell peppers and onions onto the paper and spread them out. Give everything a nice few squirts or drizzles of olive oil followed by some granulated garlic, salt, and pepper. Mix all that around until everything is evenly coated before spreading it back out into a single even layer.
Layer the Italian Sausages over the bed of veggies next. You certainly don't have to align anything or have them in order, just as long as they rest on top of the veggies. Speaking of which, any sausage could work for this recipe as well. Once again, use what you have on hand and move along to the next step!
Slide the tray into your preheated oven and bake at 425 degrees for about 15 minutes. After the initial 15 minutes, remove the tray and give all the veggies a stir as well as turn over the sausages. Return the tray to oven for an additional 15 minutes or so until the sausages are fully cooked and the veggies have just begun to char slightly at the edges.
Look at that delicious dinner we just created from scratch in less than 45 minutes! Not bad for a quick weeknight, last minute meal, eh? I personally love to just enjoy the sausage and peppers and onions as is, but you could certainly serve this up with some buns and make hoagies or even with a small side serving of pasta noodles. It's quite versatile, yet still very mild and kid-friendly, so even though we didn't put much thought or effort into this one everyone is sure to be satisfied and full at the end of the meal. Whether you stick to this basic idea or take it off-the-wall and swap out various ingredients and seasonings, this Italian Sausage and Peppers Sheet Pan Dinner is a go-to quick meal when you need it most! As long as you get in the kitchen and try something along these lines, you are sure to make everyone happy....Just Keep Cooking!
ITALIAN SAUSAGE AND PEPPERS SHEET PAN DINNER
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