If there is a Nobel Prize for bite-sized bits of pork you can eat off a toothpick, I am going to win it. This recipe was a mere experiment three weeks ago, and that very afternoon I told my girls to get ready, because I was about to be elected Queen of the World. Is there a Tailgating Olympics? If so, I’ll be the one on the top step, all bouncy and smiling and waving.
I didn’t dream this method up. I saw Susie Bulloch, BBQ maven extraordinaire and owner of the awesome website heygrillhey.com make it with cut up hotdogs on Food Network. She used an outdoor smoker. It seemed interesting, but a lot of trouble for some hotdogs. The idea hung around in the back of my mind for a couple of days.
Several days later I’m dealing with the stuff in the fridge. My life is such that I have a refrigerator that must be DEALT WITH on a regular basis. Half jars of condiments and pickles, leftovers, odds and ends from catering jobs, etc. Anyway, there it was: an unopened pound of Conecuh sausage that I’d taken out of the freezer earlier in the week, and then didn’t use because life zigged or zagged in a way I hadn’t seen coming.
Our local crowd already knows all about Conecuh sausage. It’s a regional favorite, a sausage made just up I-65 from here. On the Gulf Coast we like spice and a lot of smoke flavor in our sausage, and Conecuh brings both. We certainly don’t waste it by letting it outdate for no good reason. Clearly the BBQ gods wanted me to make Smoked Sausage Burnt Ends with that sausage, and I can take a hint. While Susie put her hotdogs in the smoker, no such preparation was necessary here. Our sausage was already smoked, making these burnt ends super easy to do in the oven. (If you can’t get your hands on Conecuh, any spicy smoked sausage will work.)
Susie B. also finished her burnt ends with a Kansas City-style BBQ sauce. (Sweet Baby Ray’s, KC Masterpiece, etc.) I did too the first time, and they were delicious. The batch pictured here was finished with another local favorite, though: Shube Sauce. Shube Sauce is made by my friends Rob and Brady Berglin right here in town. Shube Sauce is a tawny-colored, tangy sweet and spicy sauce that’s so good you can put it on anything at all. I highly recommend it, and I see it’s even available on Amazon in a pinch.
Don’t be afraid of the yellow mustard in this recipe. It’s just a glue to make the BBQ rub stick, and I can’t taste it in the finished dish. If you don’t have any BBQ dry rub lying around, I have an easy recipe for a quick dry rub on Overnight Pulled Pork, and also on Bacon-Wrapped Drumsticks. It’s versatile!
RTR!
Smoked Sausage Burnt Ends
Ingredients
- 2 lbs. smoked sausage, cut on the diagonal in 1-2" pieces
- 2 T. yellow mustard
- 2 T. dry BBQ rub
- 1 cup Kansas City-style BBQ sauce or Shube Sauce
- 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 250°. Toss the sliced sausage with the mustard. Once slices are all coated, toss with the BBQ rub.
- Put coated sausage in a baking dish, cover with foil, and bake for an hour.
- Raise the oven temperature to 400°. Carefully pour the excess fat off of the sausage. Add the sauce and brown sugar to the sausage in the baking dish and combine well.
- Bake uncovered for another 20 minutes or until some of the pointed edges are getting black.
Made this for a tailgate-themed potluck and it was a huge hit. I ate the few leftover bites for breakfast!!
I’m honestly craving some smoked sausage burnt ends. Time to make myself some.
Hi Alexis! Come back and let us know what you think!