Portuguese Sausage Skillet

Looking for a Portuguese sausage recipe? My friend Nelson recently sent me a copy of his Portuguese Travel Cookbook, and having skimmed through the stories and photos I couldn’t wait to try out this Portuguese sausage skillet dinner recipe! The book is much more than just recipes; it’s wonderful collection of stories about life and food in Portugal. From what makes Vinho Verde so special, to celebrating feast days in small villages, and one-on-one chats in the kitchen with farmers.

And when it comes to food, there’s a section about port tonics that remind me of when Pete and I traveled to Porto years ago, sipping bubbly port tonics while watching the sunset over Porto from the balcony at The Yeatman Hotel. It’s the kind of cookbook you sit down with over a cup of coffee to savor the stories while bookmarking foods and recipes you’d like to try later. And this Portuguese sausage recipe had my mouth watering from the moment I read about them on the page.

Portuguese Sausage Skillet – Rustic Simplicity

What I love about this meal is it’s rustic simplicity, combining basic whole ingredients that you can pick up at your local grocer or farmers market to make a pretty hearty one-dish dinner. It’s made with Linguiça, a mild Portuguese style pork sausage made with chili-seasoned smoke-cured pork and seasoned with garlic and paprika (which gives it that nice red color). It’s really popular in Portugal, though the origins are actually Italian. If you can’t find Portuguese sausage at your local grocer, fresh chorizo or a spicy Italian sausage is a good subsitute.

TIP: Use Canned Beans To Save Time

The original recipe in Nelson’s book called for dry red beans. We’ve made this recipe a couple of times now at home, and Pete and I actually prefer the creamy texture (and the time savings) of canned red beans. So instead of adding the beans at the beginning of the cooking process, I added them later to basically just heat them with the spinach so they wouldn’t over cook. Want to see how to make it? Check out the video below!

Give it a try at home and be sure to check out Nelson’s book, The Portuguese Travel Cookbook. Also, if you like this recipe, you might also want to try our Italian Sausage Skillet for a different variation for your weeknight dinners.

How To Cook Portuguese Sausage

Start by gathering together the ingredients for this recipe. Here’s what you’ll need:

Ingredients For Portuguese Sausage Skillet

• Portuguese sausage
• red beans
• potato
• carrots
• white onion
• spinach
• garlic, minced
• bay leaf
• water
• olive oil
• salt and pepper

Wash and dry the produce, then peel and dice the carrots and onion into small cubes. You’ll want them to be about 1/4″ to 1/2″ thick so they cook quickly. If you’re using whole carrots, quarter the carrot slices. And if you’re using baby carrots, cut them in 1/4″ rounds. 

Slice the sausage into 1/2 inch thick pieces.

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan, then add the onion and garlic to soften.

Next, add the sausage and cook for 2-3 minutes until starting to brown on the edges.

I like to use tongs to individually flip the sausage pieces in the pan to get them to brown evenly on both sides. Plus that carmelization has lots of great flavor.

Add the carrots, potato, and bay leaf. Season with salt and pepper and cook 1-2 minutes.

Pour the water over the sausage and vegetables, then cover for 10 minutes until the potato and carrot begin to soften. This is where the potatoes take on some of the flavor of the sausage and it tastes amazing.

Add the red beans and spinach, cover for another 3-5 minutes until the spinach has wilted and the cubed potatoes have cooked through and softened.

Season with salt and pepper and serve! This Portuguese sausage recipe is a true one-skillet meal, so you can carefully take the whole skillet to the table to serve. As for what you can pair with it, try some dinner rolls or fresh bread to soak up the sauce in the pan. Enjoy!

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Originally published Aug 14, 2016. Updated 2023.