Crazy sausage lady

For those new to the blog, this started as a little project for me to do this year after deciding to quit my job towards the end of last year.  I am cooking my way through Nigel Slater's The Kitchen Diaries Volume III a year of good eating aiming to cook on the same day where possible.  So far I am completely up to date and slightly ahead of the game as last night I cooked the Polish sausage, sauerkraut, onions and soured cream (meant to be cooked January 29).  See pages 28 - 30 of the book for the recipe and picture. 

I am ahead as I am unlikely to be able to cook at all next week...as it is my last week at work!  I feel like I am having some sort of mid life crisis.  I have quite my job, had a dramatic haircut yesterday and the sport's car is on order.  Ok, so I am joking about the sport's car but I do feel I am on the cusp of something.  My last 'Sunday night feeling' (I hope, but who knows what the life of a SAHM will bring).  Anyway, enough about me, on to the cooking.  'Tonight Matthew I am going to be...'

So I had a sausage nightmare - have you ever had one of those?  No me either. This recipe calls for a polish sausage called Kielbasa.  From my internet research some of the major supermarkets (including the new budget ones) stock this.  However, it appears none within a 10 mile radius of my house.  So, onto plan B.  After some research, I think Kielbasa is a fairly generic word for sausage and there are different varieties of it.  Anyways, the majority seemed smoked and when thinking of the other ingredients in this recipe, onions, sauerkraut, etc.  It made me think of a frankfurter so that is what I went with after a very odd discussion with myself over a bratwurst in the supermarket aisle (crazy sausage lady).

I bought two sorts (this is the first time I have ever purchased a frankfurter):

For the recipe I used the jumbo ones as they seemed more similar in size to the picture, so I thought the cooking times would be akin.  Sauerkraut was easy to purchase but only came in giant jars (I will be googling sauerkraut recipes after finishing this blog):

I know I have said this before, but this is a beautifully simple recipe and perfect for an easy midweek supper/Sunday evening tea.  I was thinking as I was dicing my onions, that I still dice my onions in the same way my home economics teacher taught me many moons ago.  Mrs Carter will be proud, I have come along way from the two jars of Canderel in a cake recipe (don't ask)...

Onto my finished article and I am quite pleased with this one:

Even dolloped on the plate in a haphazard fashion it still looks good.  Nigel is right, sometimes the best dinners are, "the food you throw together".  

This was super tasty and easy to eat and last night we did, on the sofa in front of the TV in our pyjamas.   I will be cooking this again and the frankfurter was sausage success. 

JanieCooksNigel

24 January 2016