***************************************
Sausage & Noodle Casserole
- 1/2 lb. sausage, crumbled & browned
- 1/4 cup onions, browned with sausage
- 2 cups noodles, cooked & drained
- 1-10 oz can cream of chicken soup, undiluted
- 1/2 can milk
Topping
- 4 Tbsp. melted butter or margarine
- 4-5 pieces of bread, torn into crouton-sized pieces
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cook and drain noodles in a 3 quart saucepan and return to pan. Brown sausage and onion in skillet. Season with pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, while browning. Salt (opt) depending on sausage. Drain. Add to noodles in saucepan. Add soup and milk and mix. It should look creamy, if not add more milk. When mixed put in 11 x 7 sprayed with non-stick spray pan. Now you make the topping. Tear the bread and put in small bowl. (we use the bread loaf heels too). In microwave safe bowl (glass measuring cup works well), melt butter or margarine. Pour over bread & mix so liquid covers most of bread cubes. Put on top of sausage/noodle mixture. We like it packed with bread on top. You adjust the butter amount and bread slices to your liking. Cover with foil. (I spray the foil with cooking spray so it won’t stick on the top. Bake for 20 minutes removing the foil the last 5 minutes, so the bread will brown and get crunchy. This will serve my family twice. Before I reheat it the next time, I sprinkle more milk on it so, it’s not so dry. Leave the foil on the whole time you reheat & maybe turn oven temperature down to 300 or 325 depending on how long you have to wait.
This isn’t a super spicy dish depending on your sausage. I’ve even add cut up pieces of bacon. You can add drained veggies to, or parsley to the bread. Whatever goes with your likings. If serving a bigger crowd, double the recipe and use a 9 x 13 pan.
*****************************************************
This next one isn’t that easy unless you have an assembly line going with others to help or your own set up to go in order. Then it only takes about an hour from start to eating. I got the idea from an Old El Paso can of green chile enchilada sauce. I call it
Sausage and Green Chile Enchiladas
- 1 lb. pork sausage, thawed
- 1- 8oz. block cream cheese, softened
- 1- 10 oz. can Old El Paso green chile enchilada sauce
- 1- 4 oz. can chopped green chiles drained, optional
- shredded cheddar cheese blend (about 2 cups
- 5 flour tortillas
Brown sausage in large skillet until no longer pink; drain; return to skillet. Spray 7″ x 11″ pan with non-stick cooking spray. Drizzle about 1/4 cup green chile sauce on bottom of pan just to cover pan. With the sausage, add the rest of sauce and cream cheese (cut in blocks). Turn on low to medium heat to get the cream cheese melted and mixed. While that’s melting, get a microwavable dinner-sized plate. Put a damp paper towel, 5 tortillas, and another damp paper towel on top. Don’t forget to stir the sauce mixture on the stove occasionally. Put the tortillas in the microwave for 30 seconds to warm so they are flexible.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Now get your assembly line ready, even if it’s just you line up your ingredients (tortillas, meat mixture, and cheese with pan at the end). Get a tortilla, some meat mixture (enough to eat), cheese on top. Roll it up and put in pan seam-side down. When you get 5 done to fill the pan; pour the remaining meat, sauce mixture over the top of tortillas and add more cheese on top of that. Depending on the size of tortillas they may stick out on both ends and get crispy in the oven. Use whatever accessories you want. We don’t put anything on them unless we have some leftover cheese sauce in the fridge to use up.
Cook for 15 minutes. I usually fix this for just my husband and me to eat. . .twice! What’s left gets covered with foil and put in the fridge. To reheat, I usually put in the oven, with foil on, while it preheats to 300 degrees. Leave it in at 300 degrees for at least 30 minutes. This time you will need a knife to cut into bites because the sauce has soaked up, but we still like them!
If you need to serve more people, use 2 cans of sauce, more tortillas, and a 9 x 13 pan.
The last time I made them we had the remaining enchiladas on a Saturday when my son was here. He wasn’t sure about it when I said “green chile” and got the sour cream ready to go on his. I said to try it first. He asked if we got them somewhere? I told him I made them and he said they were real good!
*******************************************************
Ham Balls
- 1 lb ground pork
- 1 lb. ground ham
- 1 lb. ground beef
- 2 eggs, beaten
- 1 cup milk (approx.)
- 2 cups bread crumbs (approx.)
- 1 Tbsp. onion powder (approx.)
- salt
- pepper
Sauce:
- 3/4 cup brown sugar, (I don’t pack it.)
- 1 tsp. dry mustard
- 1/2 small can crushed pineapple
- 1/4 cup white vinegar
- 1/4 cup water
Preheat oven to 325 degrees to 350 degrees. In a big bowl, mix meats. Add eggs. milk, bread crumbs, onion powder, salt, and pepper to taste. I have added minced onions and not as much onion powder. The milk and bread crumbs are approximate because as you mix it’s a milk to bread crumb ratio so it doesn’t get too dry or too moist. If anything keep a little moist because it will dry out during cooking time. I use a baseball-size metal scoop to form the balls to make it easier. If you don’t have a scoop form baseball-size balls in your hands. As you form them place them in 2-sprayed 9″ x 9″ pans to freeze 1 for another time and cook 1 now or a pan the next size bigger than a 9″ x 13″ pan. A 9″ x 13″ pan is snug and won’t allow the sauce to run down the ham balls.
When the ham balls are in the pan mix the sauce ingredients in a small bowl or larger measuring cup. Pour over the ham balls and bake for 1 to 1-1/2 hours. If freezing a pan I don’t pour the sauce over the top. I freeze the rest of the crushed pineapple, defrost briefly in the microwave, and mix the sauce before I cook them. If go in oven frozen, I decrease the water amount a little because water will cook out of it. Try this recipe to suit your family. That’s what I did. My husband doesn’t like pineapple so I made the sauce without pineapple and he told me that it tastes better with the pineapple, so I used a little. I left the ground beef out and we thought it tasted too much “pork” flavor. This is my recipe for you, now play with it to your family’s taste.
*****************************************
Crock Pot Ribs
- Separated Pork Ribs, the number is your choice
- Bottle BBQ sauce, your choice
Put separated ribs in crock pot. Cover with bbq sauce. Place on low for 6-8 hours. Enjoy!
This is simple, but I must give you a little information. Our pork ribs are kept in the freezer. I get 3 or 4 packages out of the freezer and put ribs and sauce in the crock pot the evening before I want to serve them. As it cooks on low until noon the next day, water gets added from the ribs thawing. I check it in the morning and see if I need to add more of the bbq sauce. Cooking for that long, the ribs come out falling off the bone. If your ribs aren’t frozen I would add some water so they don’t cook dry. Be careful not to eat the non-meat parts (fat, cartilage) of the ribs. Yes they are messy, but according to my family, IT’S WORTH IT! We put an empty plate on the table called “the bone plate”. Then our farm dog gets his share. When I make these, I have to use my biggest crock pot so we can have it for 2 meals. Make sure to put it in the refrigerator if you do this too. This way also takes about 1-1/2 bottles of bbq sauce. Either use 2 of the same kind of sauce or at least 2 flavors that work together.
Breaded Pork Cutlets
- fresh pork cutlets
- flour
- Windmill Inn Breader Mix
- pepper
- egg
- milk or water
This recipe is based on 4, maybe 5 pork cutlets. In 1 shallow dish crack egg and add about 1/4 cup milk or water, whisk with fork to make an egg wash. In another shallow container mix about 1/4 cup flour, 1/4 cup breader mix (or more), and enough pepper to see it when it’s mixed. Disposable pie pans are good if nothing else. I try to have more breader mix than flour for the flavor. Get a
