Brussels sprouts came by their bad reputation honestly. For about forty years the standard American preparation was to boil them until they went grey and smelled like a locker room, and a whole generation grew up quietly pushing them to the side of the plate.
Roasting fixes every bit of that. Cut them in half, lay them cut side down on a hot sheet pan with bacon, and then leave them alone. The flat face caramelizes into something brown and nutty, the loose outer leaves go crisp like a chip, and the inside steams itself tender in its own jacket. Nobody pushes these to the side of the plate.
The seasoning is The OG, which is three ingredients: sea salt, organic garlic and organic black pepper. That is exactly what a roasted vegetable wants and nothing it does not.
One more thing in their favor. November is when Brussels sprouts are actually good. Cold weather makes the plant convert starch to sugar to protect itself, so the sprouts you buy after the first hard frost are genuinely sweeter than anything on the shelf in July. The Carolinas are in that window right now.
Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Bacon and The OG
Brussels sprouts halved and roasted cut side down with bacon until the edges go brown and crisp, seasoned with organic salt, pepper and garlic. Serves six, and there are rarely leftovers.
Ingredients
For the pan
- 2 lb Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved through the stem (quartered if they are bigger than a golf ball)
- 6 oz thick-cut bacon, cut crosswise into ½-inch pieces
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon The OG seasoning, divided
- 4 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed flat
To finish
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar (or balsamic)
- 2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
On the table
- Shaved Parmesan
- Crushed red pepper
- A wedge of lemon
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 425°F with a large rimmed sheet pan inside it. The pan goes in empty and comes up to temperature with the oven. Sprouts landing on a hot pan start browning in the first minute; sprouts landing on a cold pan sit there and steam while it catches up.
- Trim and halve. Cut the dry stem end off each sprout, pull away any loose or yellow outer leaves, and cut it in half straight down through the stem so each half holds together. Anything bigger than a golf ball gets quartered. Keep the loose leaves that fall off — roasted, they turn into the best part of the pan.
- Dry them. If you washed the sprouts, roll them in a clean towel until they are genuinely dry. Water on the surface has to boil off before anything can brown, and that lost time is most of the difference between crisp and limp.
- Toss the sprouts and the loose leaves in a bowl with the olive oil and 2 teaspoons of the seasoning until every cut face is slicked. Do it in the bowl rather than on the pan, so the seasoning lands evenly instead of in patches.
- Pull the hot pan out. Lay the sprouts on it cut side DOWN in a single layer with space between them, and scatter the bacon pieces into the gaps. If the pan looks crowded, use two pans. Crowding is the single most common reason roasted sprouts come out soft.
- Roast 20 minutes without touching them. No stirring, no shaking the pan, no opening the oven to check. The flat cut face needs twenty uninterrupted minutes of contact with hot metal, and every stir resets that clock.
- At 20 minutes, pull the pan. The cut faces should be deep brown. Scatter the smashed garlic cloves over the top, turn the sprouts with a spatula, and put it back for 8 to 10 minutes, until the bacon is crisp and the loose leaves have gone dark and brittle. The garlic goes in now and not at the start, because thirty minutes at 425°F turns it black and bitter.
- Tip everything into a serving bowl while it is still hot, scraping the brown bits off the pan in with it.
- Add the cider vinegar and the last teaspoon of seasoning and toss. Acid off the heat at the end is what keeps a bowl of bacon and roasted cabbage from tasting heavy — it lifts the whole thing, and you notice it missing when it is skipped.
- Scatter the parsley over and take it to the table hot. These are at their best in the first ten minutes out of the oven, so this is the dish to roast while the roast is resting.
Buying them, and why the stalk is worth it. Look for tight, heavy sprouts with no yellow or loose outer leaves. Sold still on the stalk they are usually fresher and keep longer in the refrigerator; cut them off with a knife as you need them. Sort by size before you start — sprouts of the same size finish at the same time, and a pan with golf balls and marbles on it gives you some burnt and some raw.
What is in season right now. Brussels sprouts are a cool-weather brassica, the same family as the collards and the cabbage, and like collards they get sweeter after the first hard frost — the plant converts starch to sugar to protect itself and you get the benefit. November through February is when they are worth buying, and Carolina growers are in that window now. Garlic out of the fall harvest keeps all winter, and flat-leaf parsley is still going outside.
No bacon, still good. Leave the bacon out and go up to 3 tablespoons of olive oil so the sprouts have enough fat to brown in. A handful of roughly chopped pecans thrown on for the last five minutes gives you back the crunch and the richness, and the pan stays entirely vegetarian.
The three variations people ask for. A tablespoon of honey or maple syrup tossed in at step nine, for anyone at the table who still thinks they dislike sprouts. Shaved Parmesan over the hot pan so it melts in. Or a handful of halved red grapes added for the last ten minutes, which roast down into something jammy against the bacon.
The air fryer version. 380°F for 12 to 15 minutes, in a single layer, shaking the basket once at the halfway mark. Cut the bacon smaller so it renders in that time. It is faster and the batch is smaller — fine for two people, not for a holiday table.
Leftovers, and the better breakfast. Reheat them in a hot dry skillet or a 400°F oven, never the microwave, which undoes everything step six bought you. Chopped and fried in a little bacon fat with an egg on top the next morning is arguably better than the original.
On the label. The OG is USDA Certified Organic, gluten free and kosher, with no MSG, no fillers and no anti-caking agents — sea salt, organic garlic and organic black pepper, and that is the entire ingredient list. It comes in a 5 oz resealable pouch, which is what we recommend: with no anti-caking chemicals in it, three real ingredients behave like three real ingredients and a pouch is easier to break up than a jar. The bacon and the Parmesan are not ours, so read those labels yourself if gluten matters at your table.
More to cook from here. This is one corner of the holiday table: The OG Mashed Potatoes, Southern Collard Greens and Candied Yams Sweet Potatoes fill in the rest. For what goes in the middle of it, there is Anything With Wings Thanksgiving Turkey. And if you want The OG on something else this week, Sunday Roast Chicken and Crispy Smashed Potatoes run on the same three ingredients.