Here’s how my brain works to create a recipe. I want stuffed brussel sprouts. With bacon? No not bacon… Sausage. It will need garlic. Maybe fresh parsley. Go to the store. Brussel sprouts are way to small to stuff anything in… Ahhhh, baby lettuce cups. Yes those will work. Now I have to stuff the brussels inside of the lettuce? Okay, guess that can work. We need onion. Oh and a topping. Goat cheese!! Let’s put goat cheese on top and put it in the oven. Okay. I like it. And now we have a Paleo Lettuce Wrap recipe.
It’s fun to make original recipes. There are no rules. You can take inspiration from anywhere. And when it starts to look delicious, you take pictures, and boom you have a post. Its important to have someone taste it too. I had my two best taste testers for this recipe. My roommate Kathryn and I made it together first, and then I made it for my dad another night!
So this recipe is pretty simple, but I have a few notes on the ingredients. I bought typical sausage, in a casing, and “uncased” it. Meaning I took the meat out and threw away the casing. Some stores, like my local whole foods, will have the sausage un-cased already (just ground sausage). This would be the preferred method of purchasing it, but most sausage is “cased”.
The second time I made this recipe (to re-test it) I made it with Venison Sausage. My dad hunts deer, and so we have tons of deer sausage at all times. This came out great, and I would definitely make it with venison again.
As for the goat cheese, it’s not Whole30 and it’s not in everyone’s definition of Paleo. But I use dairy in my recipes, just a warning! If you want, for this recipe you could substitute cheese with some pecans or walnuts as a topping.
Lastly, I promised to start incorporating more about medical school. This summer has been amazing. It’s felt like I’ve been off of school for a year even though it has been 2 months, and a month of my summer was spent at the hospital doing a surgery rotation. Surgery was intense, but I really enjoyed it. My eyes have been set on Dermatology recently, but I know I really enjoyed so much about surgery.
The summer was so necessary for recharging my brain, but I know it’s time now to refocus again for second year. Second year is known to be the most intense and the most stressful, since we will be studying for the Step 1 test. Step 1 essentially determines what specialty you can go into and is known to be the most important test in your medical career! Kinda scary.. I’m very excited and nervous for the next year, but I believe it will be just as fulfilling and fun as last year!
Comment below with your thoughts and questions on these Paleo Lettuce Wraps!
Sausage Stuffed Lettuce Cups with Brussel Sprouts
Ingredients
- 1 lb ground sausage
- 10-12 brussel sprouts shredded
- 1 small yellow onion diced
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- ¼ cup parsley chopped
- 4 oz goat cheese
- 1-2 romaine lettuce heads or small romaine lettuce cups only available at certain stores
Instructions
- Cook the sausage in a pan on the stove on medium heat until the meat browns and there is no pink. Drain liquid from pan, and put sausage into a medium-large bowl.
- In the same pan, add the brussel sprouts and onion, and cook on medium. Use the oil from the sausage or add ½ TB of coconut oil. Cook for about 7 minutes, stirring frequently. Add garlic at 7 minutes, and cook all together for about 3 minutes.
- Remove the brussel sprouts, onion and garlic and place into the bowl with the sausage. Mix all with a spoon. Then assemble lettuce cups by placing about a ½ cup meat onto each romaine lettuce leaf, topping it with a pinch of parsley, and sprinkling with goat cheese.
- Next broil the lettuce cups in the oven for 2 minutes, to make it extra crispy and heat the goat cheese, or serve as is.
Leave a Reply