This healthy sausage gravy draws inspiration from southern-style country pepper gravy and turns boring ground chicken into a flavorful base for thick and creamy biscuit dressing. Unlike traditional sausage gravy, this healthy sausage gravy has nearly 5x more protein than fat! And if you pair it with my Greek yogurt biscuits, there’s no doubt you’ll be shredded by lunchtime.
How to Make the Sausage Gravy
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right? My recent recipe for homemade chicken breakfast sausage has been a hit. So instead of making patties, this sausage gravy calls for the same sausage recipe crumbled.
Can I get a yay for zero handling or making patties?
Sausage note: If you don’t want to mix the spices for your own breakfast sausage, you could use reduced fat pork sausage like in my egg and chorizo breakfast casserole or maybe even pre-cooked turkey sausage crumbles like in my breakfast chili.
Aside from the chicken sausage, you’ll only need 4 additional ingredients—light butter, flour, white or black pepper, and skim milk (or any milk).
And that’s it. Cook the sausage, stir in the flour and pepper, then add milk and cook until you have thick, super savory healthy sausage gravy!
Making Healthy Biscuits and Gravy
Like I mentioned in the intro, I used my Greek yogurt biscuits recipe to make gravy pillows. They are easy to make, buttery and fluffy, and have just 3 grams of fat each.
If you go the Greek yogurt biscuits route, you may want to double the biscuit recipe to match the amount of gravy this recipe makes. And if you’d rather spend your saved calories on real-deal biscuits, I won’t judge you for it.
And there are always options like the Carbquick biscuits I used in my hot honey oven baked chicken biscuits recipe.
Final Recipe Notes
Don’t sweat perfection in this recipe. It’s difficult to mess up.
If your healthy sausage gravy is too thin, keep cooking over a low heat (or add a bit more flour). Or if it’s too thick, add a bit more milk. The gravy will continue to thicken as it cools so keep that in mind when serving.
You can always season later. If you’re sensitive to spice, start with half the amount of pepper and add as needed when the gravy is ready. There’s even some wiggle room with the spices in the breakfast sausage recipe that I covered in the original sausage recipe.
And finally, the 3 primary healthy sausage gravy ingredients have all kinds of wiggle room. Something like whole milk or adding a bit of butter will make the gravy even creamier. On the other hand, something like almond milk will reduce the calories even further but you may not need as much.
The flour acts as a thickener and absorbs any remaining oil and fat in the pan before adding the milk. I haven’t tested any other flours, but my guess is they’d work just fine, too.
What I’m trying to say is, it’s all gravy, baby. Have fun!
Healthy Sausage Gravy
Ingredients
For the Breakfast Sausage
- 1 lb Ground Chicken, 97/3
- 2 tsp Black Pepper
- 1 tsp Smoked Paprika
- 1/2-1 tsp Crushed Red Pepper
- 1/2 tsp Kosher Salt, or 1/4 tsp table salt
- 1/2 tsp Rubbed Sage
- 1/4 tsp Allspice
- 2 Tbsp 24g Swerve Brown, or a brown sugar substitute
For the Gravy
- 2 Tbsp 28g Light Butter
- 1/4 C 30g All Purpose Flour
- 1-2 tsp Ground White Pepper*
- 3 C 720mL Skim Milk, or your choice of milk
Instructions
- Mix the spices for the breakfast sausage together in a small bowl while you heat a large skillet over medium-high heat.
- Add the ground chicken to the skillet, using a spatula to finely crumble. Add the spices about halfway through cooking, stirring until the chicken is evenly coated. Continue cooking until the chicken is fully cooked and crumbled.
- Reduce the heat to medium-low. Add the butter, flour, and white pepper to the chicken, stirring until no longer visible.
- Gradually add the milk and continue cooking for 8-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the gravy thickens. Once the gravy is as thick as you'd like, reduce the heat to its lowest setting to keep warm. (If the gravy thickens too much as it cools, you can add a bit more milk.)
Amazing….just wow…I’ve never had anything like it. I’ve always considered biscuits and gravy to be like “ya ok it’s good but there’s other stuff that’s better.” But noooooo not in this case. I make this healthy gravy and the Greek yogurt biscuits for breakfast, lunch, dinner, leftovers, midnight snacks, extra snacks..lol I could keep going. It’s the perfect amount of spice and the macros are great! I’ve used ground chicken and ground turkey – both delish. I used skim milk most of the time but I did make them once with almond milk (all I had) and it was still incredible. You could slap this gravy on just about anything and your taste buds will be twerkin.
I have never made any kind of gravy before using this recipe and it is hands down the best gravy I have ever had! It’s the perfect balance especially on top of the Greek yogurt biscuits! Instead of the swerve brown sugar I just used regular light brown sugar and it turned out perfect! Would recommend. 10/10! Thank you Mason for all of these wonderful recipes!
I have never made any kind of gravy before using this recipe and it is hands down the best gravy I have ever had! It’s the perfect balance especially on top of the Greek yogurt biscuits! Instead of the swerve brown sugar I just used regular light brown sugar and it turned out perfect! Would recommend. 10/10! Thank you Mason for all of these wonderful recipes!
I’m not really a breakfast person, but smother something over a biscuit and I’m there! Very flavorful but somewhat spicy, I didnt mind the spice but my hubby wasn’t a fan. More for me 🤣
This along with the greek yogurt biscuit is great, just don’t use vanilla almond milk for the gravy. I made that mistake once because it’s all I had and will now make sure I have regular skim milk on hand each time.
This along with the greek yogurt biscuit is great, just don’t use vanilla almond milk for the gravy. I made that mistake once because it’s all I had and will now make sure I have regular skim milk on hand each time.
Made this for Sunday morning breakfast, exactly as the recipe is written. It is PERFECTION. I honestly liked this more than traditional sausage gravy, I think it had a lot more flavor and even had a nice little kick to it. Next time I might even skip the Cajun seasoning and see how it tastes without it! And of course I made the greek yogurt biscuits to eat with it and they were so incredibly delicious! 12/10 will make this again!
Made this for Sunday morning breakfast, exactly as the recipe is written. It is PERFECTION. I honestly liked this more than traditional sausage gravy, I think it had a lot more flavor and even had a nice little kick to it. Next time I might even skip the Cajun seasoning and see how it tastes without it! And of course I made the greek yogurt biscuits to eat with it and they were so incredibly delicious! 12/10 will make this again!
Growing up my dad’s special breakfast was making us biscuits and gravy. When I moved out I got the recipe for it and the first time I went to make it I was horrified at how many calories it would add up to for a single serving so never ended up making it but sausage gravy and biscuits was still such comfort homey food to me. When Mason posted the recipe I made it the next day and it was just as good as what my dad made but at half the calories! I omitted the Cajun seasoning because I thought the chicken sausage patties had enough flavor on their own and used unsweetened cashew milk. Not sure if it was because of the cashew milk or my preference on thickness but I ended up adding an extra 15-20 g of all purpose flour to get it to thicken up.
I’m not really a breakfast person, but smother something over a biscuit and I’m there! Very flavorful but somewhat spicy, I didnt mind the spice but my hubby wasn’t a fan. More for me 🤣
Growing up my dad’s special breakfast was making us biscuits and gravy. When I moved out I got the recipe for it and the first time I went to make it I was horrified at how many calories it would add up to for a single serving so never ended up making it but sausage gravy and biscuits was still such comfort homey food to me. When Mason posted the recipe I made it the next day and it was just as good as what my dad made but at half the calories! I omitted the Cajun seasoning because I thought the chicken sausage patties had enough flavor on their own and used unsweetened cashew milk. Not sure if it was because of the cashew milk or my preference on thickness but I ended up adding an extra 15-20 g of all purpose flour to get it to thicken up.