Easy Lentil and Sausage Stew

13 Jan, 2026

The other day a 4 minute YouTube video of Jacques Pepin cooking a stew came up on my feed. I'd never heard of or watched Jacques but the length of the video caught my eye - not a short, but a short enough video to see if it's a recipe I fancied. And it was! (I mean you can't beat a stew in winter, right?)

I very much eyeballed my quantities and mixed it up slightly, but roughly below:

• 6-8 sausages, chunked
• 1 leek, halved then coarsely sliced
• 1 brown onion 🧅, coarsely chopped
• 3-4 cloves of garlic 🧄, coarsely chopped
• 1-2 carrots 🥕 (medium sized), coarsely chopped
• 1 tin of chopped tomatoes 🥫
• 300g? lentils (I used red split)
• 600ml water (maybe..? I eyeballed it. Make the saucepan a bit 'watery')
• vegetable stock cube (optional)
• smoked paprika (optional)

1. Fry the sausage in 2 tbsp olive oil for 7-8 mins (get 'em crispy) in a saucepan (move them around a bit)
2. I deglazed the pan with some Worcestershire sauce
3. Add the leek, onion, carrot, and garlic to the the pan, fry for 4 mins (I added a little smoked paprika here)
4. Add the tin of tomatoes, water, and lentils. Season with salt and pepper (I added the stock cube here)
5. Cook for 30-40 mins or so, until the lentils are cooked and it has thickened up. Add more water if necessary
6. Eat (with yoghurt 😋 maybe after it's cooled down a bit)

there's no sausage or leek emoji?!

#recipe