Sausage Cheese Strata

Published: 08/25/2020 | Updated: 04/03/2024

An overnight breakfast casserole, Sausage Cheese Strata is comfort food at its finest! It comes together quickly and is easy to customize for specific tastes!

This is a brunch favorite around these parts for so many reasons:

It’s really affordable
It’s incredibly easy to customize with different add-ins
None of the ingredients are too crazy, and you probably have most of them on-hand already
You make it the night before, so the morning you want to serve it, all you have to do is pop it in the oven
It’s really filling, so you don’t need to serve too much else with it!

What is Strata?

Even if you think you’ve never heard of strata, you’ve probably eaten it before without actually realizing it.

It’s a layered casserole that’s usually served at breakfast or brunch. Layers of bread and eggs are the main ingredients and are pretty much the staples of any strata recipe.

Think of strata as a mix between a quiche and a frittata but with the addition of bread. You can make vegetarian strata, or you can add meat for a heartier meal.

What is cheese strata?

A strata is a layered casserole dish typically made with bread, eggs, and cheese. Cheese strata is a variation of this dish that includes additional ingredients such as meat, vegetables, and seasonings. This dish is easy to prepare and can be made ahead of time, making it ideal for busy weeknights or entertaining.

How to Make Sausage Cheese Strata

This savory dish is perfect for a holiday breakfast strata with sausage.

Start by cooking a pound of ground sausage over medium heat in a large skillet. Cook until it’s no longer pink. Remove sausage to a plate and drain the grease from the pan, leaving about 1/2 tablespoon to fry the onions in.

Then add 1 cup diced yellow onion to the pan and saute until translucent and cooked through. Add the sausage back into the pan and stir into the onion mixture for about a minute or two. Remove from heat.

In a large bowl, add the following:

8 eggs
2.5 cups of milk
1/2 tablespoon of dijon mustard
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Whisk everything together really well. Then add 1.5 cups of shredded cheddar cheese and stir into egg mixture.

Next, grease a 13×9 pan. Fill it with about 6 cups of bread cubes.

Then evenly spoon the sausage and onion mixture all over the bread cubes. Last, pour the egg cheese mixture over the whole dish.

Now here’s the key to making strata (and one of my favorite parts!). You really shouldn’t make this right away. You need to give the bread cubes time to soak up all that egg/milk mixture.

So cover your dish with plastic wrap and stick it in the fridge. Ideally, you should put it in the fridge overnight or for at least 8 hours. I know some people have only left it in the fridge for an hour, and they still end up with a great dish, but the texture is different.

So plan ahead and refrigerate this the night before you want to make it.

The next morning, set it out at room temperature for about 20 minutes before you need to make it.

Then preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Bake for about 40-50 minutes until the eggs are set and a knife inserted in the center tests done. Let stand for about 5-10 minutes before you cut it.

Tips for Making Breakfast Strata

You can add all kinds of veggies to this dish to customize it: mushrooms, asparagus, chopped peppers, broccoli, etc.
You can also switch out the meat if you want and substitute it with chorizo, Italian sausage, ham, or bacon. Or you can just leave the meat out completely and make vegetarian strata.
Feel free to add additional seasonings to suit your taste: chives, parsley, everything but the bagel seasoning, season salt in place of the regular salt, a little nutmeg.
You can also make your strata and freeze it! Before baking, wrap the casserole dish well and place it in the freezer for up to 3 months. To use it, thaw in the refrigerator overnight and then follow the directions in the recipe.

Print Recipe

4 from 9 votes