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I thought about waiting until later to post this first recipe, but...I was inspired by the daily Google picture for today (honoring Sesame St. 40th anniversary) to bake cookies. Yesterday they had Big Bird's legs as the "L", which did not inspire me to make chicken...Cookie Monster on the other hand is one of my favorite characters and I LOVE this picture; Kudos Google Creative team!
OK- so sausage and peppers. This recipe is so incredibly easy to make. It's one of those that screams "If I can do it...you can do it!"
In my trial and errors, I have found what tastes best is to use both hot and sweet sausage and every color pepper with only a few green ones mixed in. The pictures that will follow were taken as I prepared to make this for a party of 100. It's A LOT of sausage, but the ratio to peppers and onions will be the same even if you are making a smaller batch.
To make this recipe, I used (8) 1lb. packages each of hot links and sweet links. That's 16lbs of sausage. In a large roasting pan, brown sausage in a 350' oven, stirring every 15 min. or so. While that is cooking, you want to wash and cut in strips (about 1" thick) your peppers. I used (6) peppers of each color- red, orange and yellow and only (3) green. Then cut up onions (2lb. bag) in the same size strip. Throw all together into a big bowl.
You should have slightly more onion than peppers. If not, add 2-3 more onions.
Once the sausage is browned, there is a very easy way to show guests which is hot and which is sweet. At this point, I cut all the links in half (across, not lengthwise). I then split the sweet in half, lengthwise, careful not to cut all the way through. Once this is done, add all the peppers and onions.
The ratio of sausage to peppers should look like this.
Then I add (1) large can (28oz.) of tomato sauce. (I use Hunts brand). Just pour over the top, no need to stir just yet. Then shake on salt and pepper. I would say I add about 2 tsp. of each to this size recipe.
You can see in this picture how much pepper and salt and sauce is on top. This is before it is put in the oven.
Cook this in the 350' oven for about 45-60 minutes, stirring every 15minutes or so. The water from the peppers and onions will mix with the juice from the sausage and sauce and will give you enough "sauce". This will be done when the peppers are soft- if you picked them up with a fork they would droop over the sides.
That's it. So easy. If you need a smaller batch- I would probably break it down like this:
For every package of sausage links I would use (1) green pepper, (2) of red, yellow and orange; If the peppers are huge, then I would half the quantity. Use 5-6 onions. The sauce is the tricky one...if one package of sausage, I would use the tiny can, 2 packages, the medium size can, 3 pkgs use 1 medium & 1 small can, 4 pkgs 2 medium cans and 5 or more 1 big can of sauce.
I just made this the other night and did not add the sauce and it was still really good. I think the secret is the multi-color peppers.
Now time to make cookies!!
