Brussel sprouts recipes fall into two camps: the ones that made half the country hate sprouts, and the ones roasted hard enough that the edges go brown and sweet. Everything here belongs to the second camp. My oldest will tell me straight out whether something is amazing, good or mediocre, so a vegetable has to earn its place at my table, and I have a lot of sympathy for anybody still sitting on the fence about this one. Roast them with bacon and parmesan, shave them raw into a salad with pears and crispy shallots, fry them and hand people toothpicks, stir them into risotto, or bake them under a Gruyere cheese sauce. There is a slow cooker version, a Red Lobster copycat, and a handful of 30 minute weeknight dinners built around them. Pick one and see if the sprout skeptic in your house changes their mind.
1. Fall Shredded Brussels Sprouts Salad
Raw sprouts, finely shredded, and the crispy fried shallots are the part people remember. Dried cranberries, chopped pecans, fresh pear and crumbled gorgonzola go in with them, and a maple balsamic vinaigrette pulls it together. Sprouts are in the same family as broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage, so eating them raw is completely fine, and shredding them thin is what keeps the texture crunchy instead of chewy. It holds up on a Thanksgiving table next to much richer dishes, which is exactly where it was designed to go.
Get the full tutorial at Iowa Girl Eats.
2. Risotto With Bacon And Brussels Sprouts
The technique post on this list, and worth reading even if you never make this exact dish. Soften the onion first so the risotto does not taste raw, toast the rice until it looks translucent so the starch releases properly, deglaze with white wine and simmer until the alcohol is nearly gone, then ladle hot broth in a little at a time for about 20 minutes. The bacon and quartered sprouts cook separately in a skillet and go on at the end. Parmesan and butter stirred in off the heat finish it.
Get the full tutorial at Savory Nothings.
3. Citrus Caramelized Brussels Sprouts
No oven at all. Three hundred grams of halved sprouts fry in a quarter cup of olive oil for three minutes over medium low, then the juice of one orange and half a lemon goes into the pan and cooks down over higher heat until it caramelizes and coats them. A tablespoon of pomegranate molasses thickens the glaze and gives the sprouts a golden color. Orange zest and three tablespoons of pomegranate seeds go on at the end. Twenty five minutes, two servings, and it looks far more elegant than the effort involved.
Get the full tutorial at Give Recipe.
4. Bacon Wrapped Brussels Sprouts
Four ingredients, and three of them are salt, pepper and bacon. Eight large sprouts each get wrapped in half a slice of bacon, pinned with a toothpick and roasted at 375 for 30 to 35 minutes on a foil-lined sheet, which is the whole recipe. Thirty five minutes total. The toothpick stays in, so they come off the tray ready to hand around as an appetizer, and the foil means there is no pan to scrub afterward. Serve with a dipping sauce on the side if you want to make more of them.
Get the full tutorial at PaleoHacks.
5. Parmesan Roasted Brussels Sprouts With Bacon
Six ingredients, one pan, forty minutes, and twenty of those are hands off. Cook the bacon first, trim and quarter the sprouts, then toss them with olive oil, half the parmesan, salt and pepper and roast them in a single layer on a lined sheet. Serves six at around 233 calories a portion. Roasting is what actually fixes sprouts, because the cut sides caramelize instead of going soft and sulfurous the way boiled ones do, and the bacon and cheese handle the rest of the persuading.
Get the full tutorial at Butter Your Biscuit.
6. Shaved Brussels Sprout Salad With Apples And Walnuts
A vegan winter salad built entirely from storage crops, which is why it costs almost nothing in January. Sprouts, onions and apples all keep well through the cold months, so this comes together from the winter farmers market rather than from twenty dollars of out-of-season produce. Use fresh sprouts, not frozen, because the texture is the whole dish. Shaving them raw is what handles the sulfur flavor most people object to, and the walnuts add enough fat to make it feel like a real meal.
Get the full tutorial at Wholefully.
7. Honey Balsamic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
This has been the most popular recipe on its site for more than nine years, which tells you something. The shopping advice is the part to steal: smaller sprouts taste sweeter, the leaves should be tight and bright green with nothing yellow or bruised, and picking ones of a similar size means they finish cooking at the same time. Trim and halve them lengthwise, roast, then finish with a balsamic and honey glaze that gives them a sweetness stubborn sprout-haters do not expect.
Get the full tutorial at Kevin Is Cooking.
8. Brussels Sprout Pasta with Lemon Cream Sauce
Thirty minutes and it feeds two. Three quarters of a pound of quartered sprouts roast at 400 for 20 to 25 minutes while six ounces of pasta cooks, and the sauce is garlic softened in olive oil with half a cup of heavy cream, a teaspoon of lemon zest and a tablespoon of lemon juice, simmered until it thickens. Hold back half a cup of pasta water to loosen it. Toasted walnuts go over the top. Swap in a lemon almond sauce and the whole thing is vegan.
Get the full tutorial at Naturally Ella.
9. Crockpot Brussels Sprouts
This is the one for a day when the oven is already booked, which on a holiday is every day. Two pounds of trimmed and halved sprouts go into the slow cooker with a cup of fresh cranberries, a third of a cup of maple syrup, two tablespoons of honey, a quarter cup of olive oil, a teaspoon of salt and half a teaspoon of pepper, then cook on low for four hours or high for three. Half a cup of feta stirs in at the end for another 20 minutes on high, with the rest crumbled over to serve.
Get the full tutorial at DIY Joy.
10. Crispy Asian Brussels Sprouts
A restaurant dish reverse engineered at home, inspired by the sprouts at Uchi in Austin. The restaurant fries theirs; this version uses a high heat bake at 400 to get almost the same texture without a pot of oil and the mess that follows it. Vegetable oil, soy sauce, maple syrup and fresh lemon juice make the glaze, and the balance of sweet, spicy and savory all landing at once is why people order them out in the first place. Sesame or grapeseed oil works if that is what is in the cupboard.
Get the full tutorial at The Baker Mama.
11. Lemon And Garlic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Learned on a trip to Italy, from friends who cooked them after a long night out, and insisted on the recipe before leaving. A pound and a half of halved sprouts toss with three tablespoons of olive oil, half a teaspoon of crushed red pepper flakes, two tablespoons of lemon juice, two cloves of garlic, salt and pepper, then roast at 400 for 35 to 40 minutes. Shake the pan every ten minutes so they brown evenly. Balsamic vinegar and half a cup of parmesan get stirred in after they come out, not before.
Get the full tutorial at Baker by Nature.
12. Shaved Brussels Sprout Saute
No oven and no roasting pan. A pound of sprouts gets sliced very thin, ideally on a hand-held mandoline, then sautes in two tablespoons of olive oil with a quarter teaspoon of kosher salt and a little pepper until the edges char slightly. Finish with one to two tablespoons of fresh lemon juice and a quarter cup of grated parmesan. Slicing them small is the trick, because it keeps anyone from biting into a whole bitter sprout, and the char plus the lemon and cheese takes care of the rest.
Get the full tutorial at Heather Likes Food.
13. Sweet Potato Brussels Sprouts Quinoa Bowl
Thirty minutes, and it is the most flexible thing on this list. Roasted sprouts and sweet potato go over quinoa with sliced almonds, and from there it takes whatever is in the fridge: shredded rotisserie chicken, leftover ground beef or chopped sausage all get added by the person who wrote it, and roasted butternut squash stands in for the sweet potato when that is what is on hand. Broccoli or cauliflower can go in too. It also makes up earlier in the day and reheats without falling apart.
Get the full tutorial at Lauren Kelly Nutrition.
14. Sweet Chili Brussels Sprouts
Two cups of halved sprouts with two teaspoons of olive oil, roasted at 425 in a cast iron skillet that goes into the oven while it preheats, which is what gets the cut sides properly browned. The sauce is made on the stove while the oven heats: a clove of garlic, two tablespoons of honey, two tablespoons of rice vinegar, a quarter cup of water, a teaspoon of cornstarch, half a teaspoon of chili flakes and a pinch of salt. Forty minutes, four servings, gluten free, and it doubles as a way to learn Thai chili sauce.
Get the full tutorial at Lively Table.
15. Crispy Brussels Sprouts With Garlic Aioli
Twenty sprouts cut into wedges, drizzled with canola oil, salt and pepper, tossed on the pan so every piece is coated, then baked at 400 for about fifteen minutes until at least one side is golden. The aioli takes a minute: six tablespoons of mayonnaise, a quarter teaspoon of finely minced garlic, a teaspoon of lemon juice and a tablespoon of finely chopped flat leaf parsley. Serve the ramekin in the middle of the plate with the sprouts around it and toothpicks on the side for an appetizer.
Get the full tutorial at Anna Costa Food.
16. The Best Brussels Sprouts
A confident title, and behind it sits the simplest thing on the list. Three cups of halved sprouts go into a skillet with black pepper, garlic salt and a tablespoon of olive oil over low heat, and they brown on each cut side before anyone flips them. Ten minutes in, a second tablespoon of oil and a quarter cup of seasoned bread crumbs go in for another ten. No oven, no sauce, no bacon, no glaze. The crumbs catch in the loose leaves and hand a plain vegetable the crunch that roasting usually has to work for.
Get the full tutorial at Horses & Heels.
17. Fried Brussels Sprouts With Smoky Honey Aioli
The restaurant version, made properly. A pound of halved sprouts gets tossed with three to four tablespoons of flour and fried in vegetable oil at 375. The aioli is the part worth the trouble: two thirds of a cup of mayonnaise, a minced garlic clove, a tablespoon each of honey and olive oil, the juice of half a lemon and half a teaspoon of bourbon smoked paprika. Thirty five minutes, two to four servings, and the writer admits she has been using that aioli on every other roasted vegetable since.
Get the full tutorial at How Sweet Eats.
18. Buttered Brussels Sprouts Penne
Scaled for one person, which is genuinely hard to find. Half a cup of uncooked penne and six medium sprouts sliced in half, two teaspoons of olive oil and a tablespoon of butter. The sprouts go cut side down for three minutes without moving them, get turned for one more, then the butter, a teaspoon of minced garlic and seasoning go in for two minutes until the butter browns and the garlic crisps. Poured over the pasta with shredded parmesan. One bowl, 463 calories, about ten minutes.
Get the full tutorial at MyFitnessPal (recipe by Maebells).
19. Red Lobster Fresh Roasted Brussels Sprouts
A copycat worth the effort, because the brown butter is where all the flavor is. Washed sprouts with the stem ends nipped off and loose leaves pulled go onto parchment with olive oil, salt and pepper and roast at 400 for 20 to 25 minutes. With about ten minutes to go, butter goes into a small pot and gets swirled continuously until it smells nutty and turns caramel colored, then it is poured off and the solids discarded. Drizzle it on just before serving. Keeps four days in the fridge.
Get the full tutorial at CopyKat Recipes.
20. Brussels Sprouts Gratin
The holiday dish on this list. Sixteen ounces of trimmed and halved sprouts roast at 400 until crisp, then go under a light cheese sauce built from chopped shallots, half a tablespoon of butter, two teaspoons of flour, three quarters of a cup of fat free milk, fresh thyme, a tablespoon of parmesan and two ounces of grated Gruyere. It bakes in an eight by twelve gratin dish. Fifty minutes, six servings, and 110 calories a half cup, which for a gratin is genuinely surprising.
Get the full tutorial at Skinnytaste.
