The One Breakfast Sausage Brand That's Better Left In The Freezer Aisle

You may think it's impossible to mess up sausage, but you'd be wrong. In our ultimate ranking of popular breakfast sausages, we saw plenty of great contenders. Some options were surprisingly flavorful meatless brands, some featured chicken over pork, and some had simple tastes and high-quality ingredients to create a delicious morning protein. But Banquet, the lowest-ranked brand on our list, simply didn't have anything going for it.

Right out of the package, our taste tester was put off. Eating is meant to be enjoyed by all the senses, with even sound affecting the way we experience food and drink, so it's hard to get excited about these grayish-brown logs. The package's ingredient list included soy protein, which by itself shouldn't have been an issue, but there are plenty of other delicious vegan alternatives for sausage. Banquet's brand simply tasted like a poorly made meat substitute, lacking flavor and texture to the point where our tester couldn't find anything positive to say about it.

Banquet's links are squishy rather than tender and bland rather than flavorful, all compounded by an inedible-looking texture — it's recommended you avoid this brand. However, it's certainly not the only low-quality brand that's better left in the freezer aisle. Fortunately, to find a quality brand, all you have to do is pay attention to the packaging.

An attractive, well-made box of sausage may entice you to purchase a specific brand, but you should also pay attention to the nutritional info on the back. In particular, look at the list of ingredients. Sausage is not a complex dish, and high-quality brands like our tester's No. 1 one choice, Jones Dairy Farm, only has five ingredients.

Specifically, try to avoid brands that use BHA or BHT, two preservatives found in some of the lowest-ranked brands on our list. Banned in the European Union, these antioxidants prevent fats from going rancid, extending their shelf life, but they also may indicate low-quality, mass-produced foods. Typically, salt and water are perfectly good at preserving foods in higher quality brands, like Jones Dairy Farm and Applegate, our tester's top two recommendations.

If you're looking for a high-quality vegan breakfast sausage, try to avoid patties that are primarily wheat gluten. To be clear, there is nothing wrong with wheat gluten when it's prepared as seitan, a historically popular meat substitute. However, many manufacturers have taken its ability to replicate meaty textures and mass-produce it without accounting for its naturally bready texture and taste, something that's typically avoided with plenty of seasoning and preparation. When you put it in a Western breakfast sausage brand, you get a poor imitation of what should be an excellent ingredient.