Sauerkraut and Weenies (& Your Favorite Po’Folks Food!)
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When I was little, we couldn’t wait for supper each night. Mama always put together budget meals, not because she was trying to scale back on expenses, but because we barely had enough to feed us all and a “budget meal” was just a nice way of saying we could make a single pound of ground beef stretch for two meals.
This is one of my dear favorite meals as a girl and still is. It is a prime example of what I call “poor folks food”, and so very good! Oh goodness I’m getting hungry. I see this meal and I feel like a little girl with two pony tails coming in from playing outside, just barely stopping as I ran into the house and took my seat at our table. Remember how we’d fly through that front door when Mama called us for supper? Coming in all breathless and hot, and just as you hit the door you’d get a whiff of what was cooking and realize that you were starving.
Raise your hand if you had a dirt necklace every night when you were a kid! ~raises hand proudly~
Now I realize some folks are just not sauerkraut fans. Chances are, I lost ’bout half of you in the title of this post, but the funny thing is what happened to the other half! Some of y’all saw that title and your mouth started watering, you clicked on it to see the photo and your stomach started growling, and chances are pert dern good that you’ll be having this for supper tonight. Those who don’t fit into this category, feel free to think of the rest of us as weird, we won’t mind and there will be more sauerkraut for us!
This is one of those meals that is great with slices of polish sausage but I still like to cook it how Mama did growing up, just by chopping up a few weenies and cooking until the kraut and weenies brown a bit. It is divine served with a side of pintos and a big old slice of cornbread. Mmmmm, thats good eating right there.
You can add as many weenies or sausage as you like and if you’re vegetarian, just get some vegan hot dogs and keep on keeping on.
You’ll need: Sauerkraut and weenies.
You’ll also season with salt and pepper. How many weenies you use is up to you. We used to have to determine this based on how many we had, so to be able to use as many as you want is a big step up nowadays.
I have a friend from Germany ~waves to Gudrun~ who swears by the bagged sauerkraut so I started buying it and now I’m a convert, too. You can get it in the refrigerated section near the weenies usually and sometimes near the deli if they have a refrigerated section there as well. Mama likes the kind you get in a glass jar and we’ve both used the kind that comes in a can (which you get on the vegetable aisle). Overall, they are all good and there isn’t a lot of price difference so it is up to you to pick your favorite .
Slice your weenies and put them in a large skillet.
Add in about two cups of sauerkraut.
Cook this over medium to medium high heat, stirring often.
Season with salt to taste.
And pepper to taste.
You can start with 1/4 teaspoon of salt and 1/8 teaspoon of pepper and then adjust to make it just right for you.
You can cook this until your weenies and sauerkraut get a little browned or you can just cook it until everything is heated through.
It sure does look nice if you brown it but I can never wait that long.
Now here is a supper from the old days!
Tell me about your favorite “Poor Folks Food” growing up in the comments section below!
You are welcome to chat with each other in the comments as we all reminisce.
This is our big old dinner table and we’re all family here!
Ingredients
- 2-4 weenies (or polish sausage)
- 2 Cups sauerkraut
- Salt and Pepper to taste
Instructions
- Slice weenies into small pieces. Place in skillet over medium to medium high heat. Add Sauerkraut. Cook, stirring often, until kraut and weenies brown slightly. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.
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Ingredients
- 2-4 weenies (or polish sausage)
- 2 Cups sauerkraut
- Salt and Pepper to taste
Instructions
- Slice weenies into small pieces. Place in skillet over medium to medium high heat. Add Sauerkraut. Cook, stirring often, until kraut and weenies brown slightly. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.
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Suggested Accompaniments:
Pintos
Dixie Cornbread
Mama Reed’s Fruit Cocktail Cake
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Life is really simple,
but we insist on making it complicated.
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Posted by Christy Jordan
on Sep 3 2010. Filed under Main Course, Quick&Easy.
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I’m supposed to be spending my lovely day home – all by myself! – doing housework; however, I decided to jump on here to get some supper ideas… Oh well, the housework will still be here!
To this day, my favorite “po folk” meal has to be fried potatoes and Treet. Not Spam – Treet! I’m told it was due to the fact that Spam is about twice the price of Treet. If I’m stumped for supper ideas, it’s one of hubby’s first suggestions every time! At $1.25 a can, sometimes now we even get to use 2 cans! He just started a new job after a month of being unemployed, and his first check is still a week & a half away, so I went through the pantry this weekend and was thrilled to see 4 cans of Treet sitting on the shelf!
We just cut the Treet into bite-size pieces and dump in the pan with the potatoes as they’re frying. You have to love a meal that fills up so many people for so little money! Add some cornbread and my family thinks “wow, she fixed one of my favorite meals” and I think “wow – I fed my family for under $3.00 (or under $5.00 if I splurged and used 2 cans!)
My favorite po folks food was also the famous SOS. Now adays it is a treat for me because neither my husband or son will touch it so on days they want a dinner i dont particularly care for i will mix this up for me and take the extra to work the next day for lunch. Yummy! Although i have recently started using your tip of precooking the hamburger meat and freezing it which i have found to be a lifesaver on nights when i am exhausted. Now i can just make enough for me instead of feeling like i have to cook a whole pound of meat.
I’m super late to the party, but came across this post while I was planning my menu for next week. We had two budget meals my mom made aaaallll the time that I absolutely hated……creamed chipped beef and creamed tunafish. However, I’m pretty sure my fiance would absolutely love both of my most hated childhood menus, so I might have to give them a second chance!
Not late at all Katie!! We are just glad you joined us!!
My favorite (and still is) is fried potatoes and weenies. LOVE THEM… Especially with spinach or turnip greens.
I like Jodi T.’s idea of weenier and fried potatoes, the kraut would be hard on our sensitive tummies. Will be making something like it this week, thanks for the inspiration! Love the budget meal planning posts!
My mama would cook up some stewed tomatoes, put a little thickening in there and pour it over corn bread. Would always have fried potatoes cooked with onion with it. Yummy, also has a lot of crap and weenies(kraut and weenies) lol. Also salmon patties. If you didn’t get enough to eat you could always eat you some milk and bread, with a little onion or cheese!
I had two favorite “po folk” dishes. Macroni and tomatoes and fried potatoes with onions with weiners sliced and cooked on top! Delish! I sure didn’t know we were “po folks” with good food like that!
I fry my kraut in bacon grease. It’s so much better that way.
I haven’t had kraut in years so I’ll have to go out & get some! My mom used to make us fried bologna, “soft” fried potatoes & pork n beans…that was some good eatin’ right there:)
Same as yours, girl
This WVa girl (who now lives in Ohio with a Buckeye hubby) loves her weenies and sauerkraut with a side of pintos and cornbread…. that’s some good eatin’! Not so sure he agrees, but I make it just the same, you don’t want it? There are fast-food places all over!
Yummy and cheap ….. feed mom and 5 kids (dad worked nights). A hot German potato salad and hot dogs in the pressure cooker. I have a sneaky suspicion Mom ate mostly potatoes. Gotta love a sacrificing mom. Miss her daily!!
An additional idea to make the sauerkraut more family friendly ……. rinse the kraut to reduce the sour and drop in a sliced apple during cooking.
Pork and beans and wienies,mac n cheese,and corn bread is a good one. Another one is Salmon patties and pintos, YUMMMM Good eatin.
A big bowl of potatoe soup and cornbread. Now that is good eatin’!!! My aunt wouldn’t eat it. She said it made her feel poor. Funny… to me there’s nothing any better.
Tina
I have to agree with you Tina, good eatin indeed!!
Mom always added a bit of sugar to give it a sweet & sour flavor. Added water as needed until sauerkraut took on on a caramel color. Made for my family, too, but haven’t made it for years. Son ~ now 42 yrs old ~ loved it so much he make in his own home.
my paw would feed me saltine crackers and ketchup. we loved it. Mom used to make us a treat on Saturday mornings of white bread dotted with butter and sprinkled with brown sugar and toasted under the broiler. Aunt Sue used to make the best tomato sandwiches from tomatoes from the garden, Sunbeam bread and Dukes mayo, we called them Sue Sandwiches. The tomatoes were from grannies garden and the 1″ thick, red and yellow slices were bigger than the bread slice. MMMMMMMMM!
Oh my goodness, you have me drooling Barbara!!