Another Kielbasa Attempt

What's this? ANOTHER blog post in under a week? Are the planets in alignment? Are we in Bizzaro World? Fear not, my friends, for I was able to get out of work on time tonight AND had the drive to actually cook and try to modify a previous recipe that I posted. As the title of this post suggests, I'm trying to use kielbasa again.





So, since my local grocery store tends to put kielbasa on sale for Buy 1 Get 1 Free all the time, I had an extra package in the freezer from my last recipe. I didn't have any potatoes, but I did have a few other ingredients in stock, so I figured I'd try something similar.





Kielbasa, Zucchini & Peppers

Ingredients:
1 Yellow Pepper
1 Zucchini
1 Yellow Onion
1lb rope of your favorite Polish Sausage
1 pinch of Coriander Powder
1 tsp Thyme leaves
Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper to taste
1 box of Goya Yellow Rice



Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 425F
2) Roughly chop the onion and yellow pepper into medium sized chunks
3) Slice the zucchini about 1/4" thick, halving the larger slices to reduce cooking time
4) Put onion, pepper and zucchini in a bowl and lightly coat with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, thyme and coriander and toss with your hands. Spread onto a large baking sheet.
5) Slice the kielbasa about 1/4" thick and distribute on the baking sheet as well.
6) Cook the rice using the directions on the box. Once you cover the rice, put the baking sheet in the oven.
7) Roast for 25 minutes tossing after 10 minutes. Increase oven heat to 450 when there is 10 minutes left.
8) Plate the rice and serve the kielbasa on top.

Enjoy!
--Kyle

Living with Allergies: Silk Nog

Sorry for the lack of updates folks! It's been very busy the past few months and I've barely had time to cook anything. There are a couple of recipes that I'm working on and I should be able to get a new one up in time for Thanksgiving.

However, in lieu of that, I've decided to try something new. As many of you know, I suffer from dairy allergies. A number of people get this confused with Lactose Intolerance. However, it's not the lactose that I'm allergic to but rather some other protein in milk. This makes enjoying some of my favorite foods and drinks rather...difficult.

Case in point: Egg Nog

I've loved egg nog ever since I was a child and it's one of the things in the holiday season that I really really miss being able to enjoy. This year however, my local grocery store started carrying Silk Nog - a soy alternative to the holiday favorite.

I first saw it a couple weeks ago, but was a little scared to try it. My love of nog got the best of me however and today I broke down and bought a carton. Just shaking the carton told me that something was different with this product. When I went to pour myself a glass, I immediately noticed a diffence in the consistency. It was thin. It definitely didn't have the same consistency as normal egg nog. This was highly disappointing, but I can kind of understand it. Soy milk always seemed thinner than regular milk to me.

After getting over my immediate shock at the lack of thickness, I gave it a taste. I'm sad to say that it doesn't really taste like I remember egg nog tasting. In fact, it has the nutty flavor of regular soy milk with a slight egg nog flavor added on top. It's definitely different and I'm not sure how I feel about it. I'm sure that a little fresh ground nutmeg would have made it taste a little better, but since my kitchen is a little understocked in terms of ingredients and tools at the moment, I had to go without.

As this product is really the only one out there at this time for those of us with Milk Allergies, I believe that it is an good replacement for the real thing. My hope is that in the future, they can alter the recipe that they use to give it a more authentic flavor instead of it just being Egg Nog flavored soy milk.