Sausage Hash Brown Quiche

Oh my goodness, they make preservative free sausage.  I don't know why it took me a year to find this and try it out.. but its probably for the better.  I know pork in itself can be a bladder irritant, but I figure if I want some sausage this would be the lesser of two evils.  I was so excited about this that I might have cooked the sausage and then ate some plain... As difficult as it was to stop eating plain sausage, I did restrain myself and made something.  (Goodness, I am glad some of you have IC and will feel the same way, because I am sure I sound crazy right now!) I found Jimmy Dean brand sausage at Kroger in the preservative free meat section- this little section is a new addition to my Kroger, and it is next to all the other meat sections.

I decided to make a hash brown/quiche casserole thing.  Sausage, peppers, eggs, and hash browns. There is not much more I could ask for.  Clearly I am in a food coma and blissed out on sausage, so I am just going to move on to the recipe.

Sausage Hash Brown Quiche

Ingredients:
3 C Shredded hash browns (thawed)
1/3 C Butter (melted)
8 Oz Sausage
1 Tbl Butter
1 C Chopped bell peppers (whatever combination of colors you want)
1 C + 1/4 C Shredded Cheddar cheese
4 eggs
1/2 C Milk
Salt & Pepper
Garlic Powder

Steps:
-Preheat oven to 425 degrees
-Spread hash browns in the bottom of a 9-inch pie dish, season with salt, pepper, and garlic powder as desired (remember, a little bit of garlic powder goes a long way!)
-Pour 1/3 C melted butter over potatoes
-Bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes or until hash browns start to turn golden
-As hash browns are cooking, brown and crumble sausage.
-Melt 1 Tbl butter in small skillet.  Saute peppers until soft.
-Mix sausage, peppers, and 1 C cheddar cheese in a medium size bowl
-In a small bowl, beat eggs and milk until well mixed (add salt and pepper here too if you desire)
-When hash browns are golden, remove from the oven.  Top with sausage mixture and then with egg mixture. Sprinkle with 1/4 C cheddar cheese on top if desired.
-Cook for another 20 minutes in oven at 425.  Remove from the oven when top is golden and delicious looking.  Let cool for about 5 minutes and serve!

"Ritz" Cracker Chicken

One of the biggest challenges I've found with cooking with my IC is making mainly-friendly meals that both kids and grown-ups enjoy. For years everyone in my family loved Ritz Cracker Chicken night. The crumbly, buttery crackers coating a moist piece of chicken- just delicious! After getting IC, this was one of the many meals that I resigned to never make again. That box of Ritz crackers has a crazy amount of ingredients.

However, during one of my weekly grocery store trips, I spotted a box of organic/preservative free crackers in the organic section. They looked just like Ritz crackers, so I bought them to see if they tasted just like Ritz crackers. Turns out they did, and they were gone within 24 hours.. waaay before I got around to cooking with them, Oops! But I bought them again and made this chicken for dinner the same night.

This recipe is a family pleaser. I made it for my younger siblings who are 10 and 12 and my cousin who is 5 when they all came over to hang out and sleep over at our house. I love living close to family, but sometimes it's challenging to feed them things I can enjoy too, especially when they are kids! However, this was a hit. There wasn't a bit left in the pan! As you can probably see from the picture, I served mine with homemade focaccia bread and black-eyed peas. The peas were of course not a favorite for the kiddos, but the benefit of being a cousin/sister is that I don't have to promote complete healthiness, and I get to always serve ice cream for dessert.

One warning: these crackers do have soy emulsifier as one of the incidents. Soy can be an irritant for IBS which is commonly an issue for us with IC. Personally, I can tolerate small amounts of soy once or twice a week. Just be aware of this if its a concern for you!

Ingredients:

1 pkg Boneless, skinless chicken breasts

1/4 cup butter, melted

1/2 pkg Late July Organic Buttery Crackers (or another imitation ic-friendly Ritz-like cracker

Butter to coat baking dish

1. Heat oven to 350 degrease

2. Coat baking dish with butter

3. Crush Crackers by putting them in a ziplock and mashing them until no large pieces remain- kids LOVE helping with this step!

4. Cut fat off chicken. Dip in butter, then in crushed crackers, and place in baking dish

5. Pour remaining butter evenly over chicken and sprinkle with mailing crackers

6. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until chicken is cooked through

Buttermilk Biscuits

Breakfast is a great meal to enjoy with IC.  So many of the ingredients are IC-friendly to start.  With the addition of newer all-natural foods like this bacon, which is preservative free, naturally wood smoked, uncured, no added MSG, gluten free, and delicious, breakfast gets even better. This is a completely "friendly" food, so enjoy it! 

There is, of course, the option of going to a butcher for bacon like this, or Trader Joes might sell some for cheaper.  However, I find great joy in being able to walk into a normal grocery store and find all the fixings for one meal. 

So after finding this bacon, I thought that breakfast for dinner sounded just about perfect.  I served the bacon, scrambled eggs, and some delicious buttermilk biscuits.  I also had some homemade crockpot apple butter... didn't even miss the jam!  Don't worry, I'll be sharing the recipe for that apple butter soon!

I do want to caution this recipe... buttermilk is listed as a "food worth trying cautiously" ingredient.  When buttermilk is made, there is a build up of lactic acid which is what gives it the sour taste.  I was able to enjoy it without a problem, but you might want to try a small amount first before going hog wild. (Get it? with all the bacon talk earlier, I couldn't resist.)

Anyways, onto the recipe!  

Buttermilk Biscuits

4 cups self-rising flour

1 Tbls white sugar

1 Tbls baking powder

2/3 cups shortening

2 cups buttermilk

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, and baking powder; stir until well mixed.  Cut in shortening until shortening is broken up... the mixture should look well mixed and pea-sized lumps only remain. Add 2 cups buttermilk and mix just to moisten.

3. Roll out dough to 1-inch thickness and cut into biscuits. Place biscuits on baking sheets.

4. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until golden.

The original recipe said it yields 18 biscuits.  I got closer to 14... Perhaps I could have rolled the dough out a bit more, but in my opinion, the biscuits were perfect.