Sausage and Mash
Sausage and mash is a British staple! It is affordable, filling and enjoyable, so it often appears on our dinner tables. By adding veg to your sausages and potatoes you create a balanced meal, so we’ve brought together some simple side ideas to increase the veg in your regular bangers & mash.
Sausage and mash is a British staple! It is affordable, filling and enjoyable, so it often appears on our dinner tables. By adding veg to your sausages and potatoes you create a balanced meal, so we’ve brought together some simple side ideas to increase the veg in your regular bangers & mash.
Why is sausage & mash so great?
Although we should be careful how much processed meat or processed alternatives we eat, having sausage (or veggie sausage) and mash occasionally could be a great way to take a family favourite and improve the recipe through small steps. Mash is a great vehicle for some extra veg, and with a smaller portion of meat and some added veg, becomes a balanced meal that will fill you up, too.
If your family are big sausage and mash fans, a focus on smaller, better quality portions of meat where possible, while adding a little more veg in or alongside the mash, could actually make a marked improvement in the meal and take it to a new, healthier level.
This is a process – this page is a simple guide to how to move up from maybe 1 veg on the plate to 2, to slowly increase the veg on the plate. You can add more variety by trying a new side and introducing more veg to your diets.
We have pulled together some of our favourite simple sides for you to make that extra veg easy. But remember to take it at the pace your family is ready for – perhaps just a couple of spoonfuls of veg is the perfect start for now…
simple sides
There is nothing wrong with cooking some frozen peas to go with your meal! But if you need some inspiration beyond the standard spoonful of peas, try some of these to take your sausage & mash from good to great.
Garlic butter green beans
Cook frozen or fresh trimmed green beans until starting to soften slightly, then toss in minced/finely chopped garlic and butter for about 1 minute until it smells garlicky and the butter has melted.
Roasted squash
Butternut squash cubes, tossed in a little oil and salt and roasted until soft and super sweet are delicious with sausages! You can use ready-prepped fresh or frozen if you don’t fancy peeling and chopping it yourself, or if you aren’t squash fans, try sweet potato cubes or pumpkin instead.
Buttery cabbage
Finely shred cabbage, then pop into a large pan with a couple of tablespoons of butter and ½ glass of stock or water, cover with a lid, and allow to braise slowly over a low heat, checking and stirring often until soft and sweet (add a little more butter or water/stock if it looks like it needs it).
Easy frozen veggies
Try frozen corn cobs cooked and served with butter, mixed veg microwaved to piping hot, a bag of Mediterranean grilled veggies fried or roasted and served with a drizzle of olive oil or pesto, or even a bag of frozen cauliflower cheese baked until hot and bubbly (if you have a little more time, you could even try making your own!). Follow packet instructions and you have a super easy, no-prep side ready to go! We have loads of frozen veg tips here.
Mix up your mash
It’s an easy way to add more veg without changing the overall look and taste of the meal too much.
Mashed roots
Try making your mash half-and-half carbs and veg by swapping out some potatoes for cooked and mashed root veg like sweet potato, carrots, parsnips, celeriac or swede.
Mashed cauli
Try replacing half the potatoes with steamed or boiled cauliflower, blitzed until smooth to keep the mash familiar. It adds a subtle flavour without changing the colour. A little cheese stirred through adds cauli cheese vibes, too!
Mashed beans
Try a tin of butter beans or cannellini beans mashed or blitzed in to keep the colour but add in more veg ever so simply, no cooking required! A little garlic tossed for 30 seconds in a pan with a tablespoon of butter can add amazing flavour to this.
engaging kids
Play is essential!
Think of children helping in the kitchen as a role play game with four essential ingredients for maximise effect. One of the best ways to develop a love of veg in kids is to get them involved in the prep of the veg. Not only is cooking an essential life skill for kids to learn, but it’s a great, fun way to get them engaging with healthy foods!
Cooking with kids
One of the best ways to develop a love of veg in kids is to get them involved in the prep of the veg. Not only is cooking an essential life skill for kids to learn, but it’s a great, fun way to get them engaging with healthy foods! They don’t have to be involved in the whole process especially when they are very young (let’s keep the mess to a minimum!), just give them 1-2 smaller jobs they can own with some supervision.
If you are making sausage & mash, why not get younger kids helping make some simple veg sides with frozen veg, pushing microwave buttons or setting oven temperatures, and stirring through seasoning or butter when it’s cooked. They could help you mash the potatoes with some cooked cauli, root veg or beans, too.
Older kids might be ready to learn how to chop some fresh veg to serve on the side, or make a half-and-half mash with you using cauliflower, root veg or beans with the potatoes!
See if they can tick off.
Arts & crafts
While getting kids to interact with veggies for real and using their senses to explore them is best, encouraging veg-based arts & crafts can be a great start, particularly for those who are fussier eaters or struggle with anything too sensory.
Use these arts & crafts as a stepping stone to interacting with the veg themselves. While you make your sausage and mash, why not set them up with our peas cut out and colour page?
Games & puzzles
Like arts & crafts, games & puzzles are a very safe way to get veggies to become more familiar and takes any pressure off eating or engaging their senses around veg for now.
A great place to start with sausages and mash might be our Pea-doku game!
Sensory
Sensory engagement with veg is possibly the best way to get children to slowly become more familiar with a veg. Take away the pressure to taste for now (and remember that ‘tasting’ could be expanded to include sniffing, licking and smelling) and instead encourage exploring a veg with a sense of smell, hearing, touch or sight.
Why not start with some raw, steamed or boiled, and roasted cauliflower and get them to describe what they taste – does it remind them of anything? Do they taste the same, or different? Is roasted sweeter? Is raw strongly flavoured? If they aren’t up for eating them, that’s fine. Tell them that trying can mean licking or sniffing, too. The only rule is they can’t just describe it as “gross”, they have to use descriptive language to explain why (e.g. “I don’t like the raw one because it is too crunchy, and the steamed one is too white, but the roasted one was sweet so that one was ok”). See if they want to add some to the mash, or serve on the side after having engaged with them.
Serving
If your kids aren’t ready to be in the kitchen helping with part of the prep or cooking process, why not give them a job around the serving that could help them feel involved in the meal?
A crafty kid may like to design a beautiful menu, one who likes to help can lay the table. One may like to help you plate up the food, another may love to give the meal a theme! If you can (and we know it’s not always possible), try to eat with the kids, as they are much more likely to eat healthier food if they see it being eaten (and enjoyed!) by their families.
Why not let your child be in charge of planning the veg sides and picking which veg to add to the mash. Perhaps they want corn on the cob and to skip the mash entirely for sweet potato chips instead! Maybe they want to make the green beans side by cooking in the microwave then frying for a minute in garlic and butter with your help. Make sure to praise them for their choices as you pile them on your own plate, it may encourage them to try some on theirs!
Family Favourite Recipes
Use our step-by-step methods to slowly improve these favourites, too…
DO you have a question you’d like one of our experts to help you with?
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