This savory Venison Breakfast Sausage recipe is a delicious, healthy addition to your morning. You can make this in 20 minutes or less. My family loves this easy recipe--either fried into patties or used in sausage gravy to pour over biscuits.
You can also fry the sausage and crumble to use on pizza, in this Scotch Egg Recipe, in some fun Breakfast Egg and Sausage Tarts and many other recipes. Anywhere you use bulk pork sausage - you can substitute homemade venison sausage. This recipe takes only a small number of pantry ingredients.
Quick Look: Venison Breakfast Sausage
- ⏱️ Prep Time: 10 minutes
- 🔥 Cook Time: 10 minutes
- 🕒 Total Time: 20 minutes
- 🍴 Servings: 4
- 🍫 Calories: 189 kcal per serving
- 🌰 Variations: You can use Elk, Pronghorn Antelope, or Moose meat in this recipe.
- Serving Suggestions: This sausage goes great with homemade pancakes or in sausage gravy.
- ✅ Difficulty: Easy
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Key Ingredients
- Ground Venison. I use venison that is ground with no added ingredients (like pork). You may substitute ground elk, pronghorn, or moose.
- Italian Seasoning. You can substitute sage if preferred. You can also add some brown sugar for a sweeter sausage.
- Bacon fat. Save the drippings when you fry bacon, and use in this recipe. Coconut oil, beef tallow, or olive oil work, too.
See the recipe card for full information on ingredients an quantities.
I like to grind my venison straight (without added fat). This way, I can add extra fat as desired. You don't have to add extra fat content, but ground venison is pretty lean, which can make it dry.
Chef's tip: Breakfast sausage is typically juicy, so I like to add a secret ingredient: bacon fat! You can use butter, coconut oil, or even olive oil if you prefer. I just prefer the flavor of bacon fat.
How to make Venison Breakfast Sausage
- Step 1: Combine all spices with the melted bacon fat and stir.
- Step 2: Pour seasoning mixture into the ground venison, then--using your fingers--gently mix the spices into the meat, being careful not to mix too much.
- Step 3: Form into patties.
- Step 4: Melt a bit of bacon fat in a skillet, and fry patties over medium heat until internal temperature is 160, about 3-4 minutes on each side. Remove from pan and serve hot.
Venison Breakfast Sausage FAQ
Venison is very lean and high protein, which makes it a healthy source of vitamins and minerals, including vitamins K and B-12, iron, and zinc.
This very quick recipe uses melted bacon fat and pantry spices mixed together and fried for a tasty, easy sausage.
Deer sausage is delicious for breakfast! Add some eggs and toast for a traditional American breakfast.
Yes, you can triple or quadruple this recipe and freeze until needed.
More Breakfast Recipes
If you tried this Venison Breakfast Sausage or any other recipe on my website; pull up a chair, put your boots under my table, and tell me how it turned out in the comments below! Don't forget to leave a 🌟 star rating!
Venison Breakfast Sausage
Ingredients
- 1 lb ground venison
- 2 Tableaspoons bacon fat melted
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
- ⅛ teaspoon cayenne
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
Instructions
- Stir the seasonings into the melted bacon fat.
- Break apart the venison in a bowl, and pour the seasoning mixture over the meat.
- Using your hands or a spoon, mix the seasoning blend into the meat until well-mixed.
- Form into patties and fry for 3-4 minutes per side over medium heat, until internal temperature is 160° F.
- Serve warm or refrigerate for use in other recipes.
I am not too familiar with cooking with venison so I have been just googling recipes. A lot of them say that it is very "gamey" and to use something acidic to get rid of that. You recipe didn't call for anything acidic to help that. So do these end up having that "gamey" taste? I have picky in-laws that I cook for so I just want to make sure not to mess this up. lol
I believe that sex/age of animal, field-dressing, and processing are the most important things to consider when it comes to gamey flavors. If you are serving meat from a doe or young animal, it will taste a lot better than a big old trophy buck!
Having said that, I don't add anything specific to cover wild game taste. I am pretty picky about wild game, and I don't think this recipe will be noticeable. If you are concerned, you could mix in a bit of pork sausage to give it a juicier texture. There are enough spices in this recipe that it should cover any gamey flavor.
I have fed wild game to many friends who 'hate' wild game, and they either don't notice the difference, or they agree that it tastes good. Good luck with the in-laws!
Excellent recipe! In addition to age and field dressing, I would add quality of shot. The less time the animal is in full flight the less adrenaline dumps into its system.
Yes! Very good point!
Since I started processing/butchering our bucks and does, we have not had gamey venison. We have a girl with with a sensitive palette and she enjoys venison steaks, chili, burgers...it just isn't gamey.
A tip is mix 50 - 50 venison-beef for the chili, burgers, meatloaf.
"Gamey" is mostly a term for people who don't care for the taste of venison. Age and sex of the animal have very little to do with it. The biggest factor in better tasting meat is field care. Get the animal gutted and the meat cooling as quickly as possible. This will make the flavor of the meat milder, which is what most prefer and reduces what some call the gamey taste.
Exactly...boils down to not being lazy....process quickly, then have a beer!
My hubby says to drain as much blood from the deer as possible, that will also help it to not taste gamey.
Yes, for sure.
I have been looking high and low for a bulk sausage recipe that does not use sage. I have had a very successful year hunting and need ways to use all of the meat. Is it possible to used ground pork butte in place of the bacon grease if I want to make a large batch such as say 15 pounds so I can freeze it for later use? If so, what ratio of venison vs pork butt? Thank you!
Yes, replacing the bacon grease with pork butt would make very good sausage! I think the ratio is just personal preference... I am planning to make a bulk recipe using 25% pork, ground with the venison. It's been a few years since I did this, so I want to make another batch with my next animal, and write down all my measurements.
Thanks for the recipe and I'll try it this week-end.
BTW, twitter now allows tips from one user to another (no-fee on twitter's part). Consider enabling it.
I haven't heard of the Twitter tips.
It was delicious I had to add more seasoning just for my taste. Will definitely use it again.
Me too...added more Italian parsley and bacon....yummy!
I had not eaten deer in a long time and my memory of it was that I didn't like it. However, we got a lot of deer from our daughter and so I tried your recipe and it was delicious! Everyone loved it! Thanks!
I'm so happy to hear that! We really like the sausage, too.
Made it this morning. Super moist and flavorful. I added soffritto seasoning from Trader Joes instead of Italian and went with grated butter. I finished them with a small dash of real maple syrup while they rested. A great hearty start to my day.
Those adjustments sound delicious!
Hi I'm wondering if I can use bacon grease in my sausage to get the bacon flavor, what I mean is mix bacon grease in ground moose or deer, make my sausage and then freeze it?
That would work just fine!
My man doesn't like the taste of sage, so finding recipes without it has been a challenge. I am in the process of cooking the first batch right now, and it smells heavenly!
We make breakfast sandwiches: fried egg, slice cheese, sausage, mayo and bread of choice. YUMM
When mixing in a bowl don’t be afraid to put a nice splash of red wine yum 😂👍🏻🦌
Agreed!