An easy gratin casserole made with sausage, bean, greens, and topped with cheese is a healthy, inexpensive, and delicious real food recipe.
When I discovered ramekins, my cooking world was rocked. Actually, what I mean is when I discovered that you could use ramekins for all the recipes I always baked in one baking dish, not just for the chocolate lava cakes that I originally bought them for.
I think casseroles have gotten a bad rap lately, but mixing meat (or not), beans, cheese, vegetables, and more is a great way to make easy, whole food weeknight dinners – that are delicious. The one problem with casseroles, I think, is that they just aren’t very nice looking, especially when it’s time to serve it. Berry crisps, casseroles, pasta, they all sort of end up looking like an unappetizing lump on your plate.
Enter the humble, cheap ramekin. Put anything in a ramekin, whether it’s an egg dish, a chicken pot pie, or cheese-crust ham pie, and it all of a sudden becomes “company” food. It looks good and never fails to make family and friends feel special, and yet takes no more time than putting it in a large dish.
Sausage, Bean, Greens Gratin
A gratin is simply any dish that has been topped with a browned crust of cheese or breadcrumbs. Just think about the versatility of this idea – you can combine any number of foods, divide it up between ramekins and top with cheese and/or breadcrumbs. Set the ramekins on a cookie sheet, bake, and you’ve got a healthy, special looking meal – done in about 30 minutes, no less.
For this recipe, you’ll combine a spicy sausage, cooked white beans from the freezer, and leafy kale with canned tomatoes and spices. These are loose parameters, though, since the sausage can be any kind you like, the beans whatever you have on hand, your preferred greens, and favorite cheese. No matter how you make it, though, sausage, bean, and greens gratin is both flavorful and healthy – and always fabulous served with Easy Artisan Bread.

And besides “gratin” sounds so much better than just “casserole,” don’t you think?
PrintSausage, Bean and Greens Gratin

- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 45 mins
- Yield: 6 servings
Ingredients
- 1 lb. bulk Italian sausage (spicy, turkey, chicken, pork – your choice)*
- 1 med. onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 c. cooked white beans (= 2 cans) – or any bean you have
- 1 14-oz. can diced tomatoes
- 1/3 c. water or chicken broth
- 1/2 tsp. dried basil
- 1/2 tsp. dried oregano
- 1/2 tsp. dried thyme
- Cayenne pepper to taste (omit if using spicy sausage)
- salt and pepper to taste
- 3 c. chopped greens: kale, spinach or chard
- 1-1/2 c. grated cheese: mozzarella, fontina, cheddar, parmesan or your choice
Instructions
- Brown sausage in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and garlic and cook until onion is softened.
- Add beans, water or broth, tomatoes, and spices. Bring to a boil, lower heat and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 15 minutes. If it seems dry, add more water/broth at this point and taste for seasoning with salt and pepper.
- Turn heat up to medium and add greens. If using spinach, cook only until the spinach wilts; if kale or chard, cook until tender – about 5 to 10 minutes.
- Preheat broiler. Divide the mixture between 6 one-cup ramekins and top each with about 1/4-cup of cheese.
- Place the ramekins on a cookie sheet and broil a few inches from the heat until the cheese is melted and browned.
- Serve immediately with bread to sop up all the lovely juices.
Notes
*This is easy to make meatless, by the way- just leave out the sausage and cook the onion in butter or olive oil before proceeding with the recipe. It will probably only make 4 servings unless you add more beans, though.
Note: this recipe was originally published in 2012 and has been updated with pinnable image, new formatting and printable recipe.
Other easy real food dinners you may like:
Baked White Fish with Parmesan-Herb Crust (20 minute meal)
One Pot Italian Pasta with Sausage & Spinach
Spiced Lemon Skillet Chicken with Kale and Garbanzo Beans
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Hi Jami,
My husband and I have enjoyed this recipe so much that I’ve added it to our weekly meal list! That’s right, we eat it once a week. Well actually, we get three meals out of it so we have it for dinner one night and then reheat the leftovers for a couple of lunches! It’s that delicious and it’s SO easy to make! Thank you!
Yay! It’s definitely one of those humble dishes that surprises you with how good it is. Enjoy!
Hi Jami,
We made this tonight, accompanied with roasted asparagus and whole wheat ciabatta (somewhat similar to your easy artisan bread) and it was wonderful! Everyone loved the gratin, so delicious, thank you!
-Jon
SO nice to hear, Jon! I love simple recipes like this that don’t seem that special when looking at the ingredients, but the flavor is just SO good. Too bad many others just pass by it without trying (notice the lack of comments…). You and I know the secret, huh? π
Well, I’ll work on letting the secret out π
One thing I liked about this meal was how we took just a pound of meat and shared the dish around a table of 6 adults and still had leftovers! It’s not vegetarian but it’s a great way to limit the amount of meat in the meal and still get that full flavor that comes from the sausage.
This sounds wonderful! I can’t wait to try it. I just recently tried kale for the first time in a Minestrone Soup recipe found on Martha Stewart’s website. The whole family loved it and so I have been looking for other recipes with kale. I have never tried growing kale and didn’t realize you could grow it in the middle of winter. We too live in Oregon (Salem) and I will definitely put it in my garden this year. Thanks for the heads up!