Some like it hot

D and I L-O-V-E spicy food. We are definitely members of the "Some like it hot" club. We can order a plate of sautéd onions and jalapeños at a Mexican restaurant and make a meal out of that alone! And bring me some hot salsa, please! It makes everything better. And don't even get me started on garlic! I put it on everything, I might put it on ice cream if it were socially acceptable. Not really, that would be disgusting. Since Jakob said he likes a little spicy flavor, too, I thought bacon wrapped stuffed jalapeños sounded like a good idea. He asked what the jalapeños were and we explained that they were peppers. He sniffed them and said they have them in Germany, but they look different. It turns out they were a little too spicy for him - apparenlty some don't like it so hot. I will admit, they were a little warmer than usual, but I still devoured about six of them - don't fret dieters, I used fat free cream cheese and turkey bacon. Next time I'll boil them before I stuff them to take out some of the heat. I also made a sausage and potato hash and Jakob liked it well enough that he had seconds and said it tasted very good! He wasn't sure about the BBQ sauce at first - he sniffed it, too - but he decided it tasted good on his hash. And there's no judgement here. I always, ALWAYS sniff a new food before I eat it. And I can assure you, if it smells like fish, I won't be eating it. I have a serious aversion to seafood. It's the smell, I just can't handle the smell. I don't care how awesome the flavor is, if it smells too fishy, I will gag. Tuna salad sandwiches, salmon patties and the occasional crab cake is about as seafoody as I get. And I can't eat the tuna sandwich cold, I have to grill it like a grilled cheese. Go ahead, call me weird, I don't mind. My husband does it all the time. Many years ago, I went to the Korean church my friend's mother attended for a Christmas potluck dinner. As we went through the buffet line, my friend was telling me what everything was and I was sampling as much as I dared. And I really stepped outside of my box that day, folks. I didn't want to be rude or look like a spoiled brat or embarass my friend's mom in front of her whole church, so I made sure to take a respectable amount of food. Then, at the end of the table was a huge salad, which was the only food I recognized so, of course, I took enough of it to feed five people - just in case all of those samples I had turned out to not be so great. My friend's sister pointed at my plate and said, "Look at the little American girl loading up on all of the salad!" We all had a good laugh about it, so I sort of know what Jakob's going through. I'd be sniffing everything if I were in his shoes, too. Every day must be a totally new food experience for
him. We've had BBQ sauce so much since he arrived, he probably thinks we eat it on everything. I can just hear him telling his friends and family back home about our BBQ addiction. He'd say it in German, of course, so I wouldn't understand him and I'd just pretend he was telling them how lovely we are. I wonder what they use instead of BBQ sauce? I'll have to google that. I've posted this recipe on my FB page before, but in case you missed it, here's the easy recipe for the hash:

Sausage & Potato Hash

• 1 package smoked polish sausage, sliced into slightly-larger-than-quarter-size pieces
• 4-5 red potatoes, cubed - I like to leave the skin on
• 1 green bell pepper, cored and seeded, give it a rough chop
• 1 yellow onion, sliced thick, about 1/2-3/4 of an inch, then just quarter the slices and separate them

Make sure you don't chop the veggies too small, they will shrink a little as they cook. If you chop them too small you'll end up with a mush and not a hash. Throw the sausage into a large pan and cook over medium-high heat for a few minutes until the juice starts to come out of the sausage and coat the pan and the sausage starts to get a little crisp around the edges. You can cover them for a few minutes to help get them going. Add the potatoes and stir to get them coated in the juice from the sausage, this will help to keep them from sticking. Cover and continue to cook for 5-8 minutes. Add the bell pepper and onion, again stirring and coating. Cover and let it cook a few more minutes, stirring occasionally to keep it from sticking, until the onions are translucent and the peppers and potatoes are soft. Throw a heaping helping on a plate and top it with a little BBQ sauce, I like Billy Sims Sweet & Mild BBQ Sauce. Now, eat that stuff up! :)