It’s been months since I shared a recipe. But having lost this bit of cooking treasure for a few hours last month, I’m posting it here for you and for me and for posterity, too. There are some recipes I don’t want to think about losing. This is one of them.
Part of our lives since the mid-nineties, it came to us out of the glossy pages of a recipe magazine, the sort stacked in wire racks near cash registers, that I once picked up during busy career days…to peruse to pass away minutes till time to check out my cart full of groceries. In one of those odd life ironies, now that I have more free time, I no longer shop at Walmart…which means I rarely stand in grocery lines.
We prepare this recipe along with a skillet of fried potatoes to serve as sides with grilled or broiled bratwurst, which makes a nice winter meal. In summertime, it becomes a tasty relish for brats (or hot dogs) on buns.
When I say ‘we,’ it’s a way of saying that it’s my better half that’s in charge of preparation. He makes the kraut and brats and I get out the buns and potato chips 🙂 Or fry the potatoes… just like Mother did more suppers than not, all those years ago when I was growing up.
With my husband entering retirement next week — how can this be??? — maybe we’ll team up in the kitchen more often. I hope so. Having that chemistry background, he likes to experiment with new recipes where I tend to love the same old things. Like this recipe lost and found.
Sweet German Sauerkraut
1/4 cup oil 1/2 cup sugar 2 cups coarsely chopped onion 1 16 oz can sauerkraut, well-drained. 1/4 tsp salt 1/2 cup cider vinegar 1/2 tsp caraway seedHeal oil in large skillet over medium heat. Add sugar. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture turns a light caramel color — about 10 minutes. Add onion, sauerkraut and salt (some sugar will harden, but will eventually melt while cooking). Cook over medium heat for 15 minutes, stirring frequently. Add vinegar and caraway seed and simmer for 30 minutes. Serve warm. Leftovers freeze nicely.
Serve warm. Leftovers can be frozen.
an everyday life 
oooh that looks nice.
I’m going to be in Germany for Easter so shall see if I can get my share of Bratwurst!
ps. Happy New Year, dear friend!
Happy New Year to you, too, dear Viv. So trite to say… but it doesn’t feel possible, that in a few days time, that January should be already used up…
Germany sounds lovely, with or without the brats souvenirs. But then, I’m just hungry for travel, I think. I seem to get that way this time of year. Nice that you have that trip to look forward to in April.
Janell
I love it when you post a favorite recipe. I have tried many of yours and enjoyed them so much.
I’m so glad to hear how you’ve enjoyed the recipes. I knew of your success with the lemon cream pie… but good to know others hit the mark as well.
Sometimes I wonder whether anyone uses the online recipes as much as me. They originate from many different sources — most with personal modifications to my own taste — and I’ve found it easier to go online than to find the original index card or book from which they sprang. I’ve so many to share… like Amy’s baked green beans and some pumpkin cake muffins (that I lost last November when I wanted to make them and found two weeks ago — on the same day as this sauerkraut recipe) and Don’s Cajun Shrimp Spaghetti, which is one of our children’s favorites …. if I could just lasso a little discipline, I could publish one a week and get it done…
Hope you are still enjoying retirement. I’ve read more novels this past year, — which as I think about it, was my grand vision of retirement eleven years ago — than all my other ‘retired’ years put together. Such an enriching year….
ps.. Attending St. Paul’s Cathedral most Sundays now and wow, I think I’ve finally stumbled upon something that feels like home…..
Janell
I do, I do! Use online recipes, that is. I have a little folder called (reasonably enough) “Recipes”. I started it when I wanted to send a few favorites to an online friend. Then, I added all of EllaElla’s recipes. Then I thought – what if there was a fire and I lost my recipe box? (Hurricanes are no issue, as it goes with me.) So, I’m slowly going through and adding everything from The Box. I do them as text files, and have them backed up on a flash drive and intend to move them to the cloud, through my ftp server.
And now I’ll add this recipe to the mix! Thanks for the tip on freezing, too. I enjoy some of these things, but don’t want to eat them day after day as I often do with the cooking for one routine.
If you ever were moved to post that Cajun shrimp spaghetti, I certainly would add that to the file, too!
Linda,
Glad to read that you enjoyed the recipe.
I was more than a little frantic when I’d thought I lost this. So your archival project sounds like something I should begin — but will I? I’m shaking my head at the mere thought of it… so, I’d be surprised if I muster up the willpower for it. Yet…all those recipes in books and on cards — sometimes, for one that falls off the rotation, I even forget from which book it came! At the least, it would be helpful to have an index of recipe names to cookbook titles and page. But I don’t ever seem to do those things I know I should. Remember that tornado safe room… the one that I don’t have…?
But, at least your seed is planted. I’d be beyond sad if a house fire were to destroy my irreplaceable recipes…. some written in my mother’s hand or that of my Great Aunt Blanche or Aunt Carol…. Gosh… with my husband retiring, maybe he’ll take this on… he could even scan an image of the actual card…..
Food for thought 🙂
Janell