Sausage and Sauerkraut Soup

I believe this is the first time I’ve ever eaten sauerkraut – at least knowingly. And guess what? It’s pretty good! Who knew?

I know you may be cringing in your seat at the word sauerkraut but I urge you to suspend your prejudices against it and give this mind-blowing soup a chance.

I have to thank Cat for posting her Smoked Sausage and Sauerkraut Soup a couple of weeks ago. She was convincing in her presentation of redeeming qualities for sauerkraut. Enough to make me want to give it a try. So I made it for dinner last night and LOVED it. Love, love, love, love, love. This might be a new favorite. So easy to make and lots of flavor. Don loved it too. This was by far one of my most successful efforts to make a recipe (on my own) that I picked up from a fellow blogger. Yay me!

My version is only slightly modified from Cat’s.

Ingredients

1 can of sauerkraut. Rinsed and drained.

• 1 lb of link sausage,
  chopped roughly
• 1 can of sauerkraut,
  rinsed and drained
• 1 sweet onion, chopped roughly
• 1 large parsnip,
  peeled and chopped roughly
• 1 tbsp chili garlic paste
• 1 tsp coconut oil
• 4 1/2 cups water
• 5 homemade rabbit broth cubes
• 1/2 tsp black pepper
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt

First, get everything chopped and the sauerkraut rinsed. Everything else goes pretty quickly.

This is so easy to make, it probably only takes about 40 minutes to prepare from start to finish. (If you aren’t taking 3 times as long trying to photograph every bit of what you are doing.) 🙂

Onions. Good.

Parsnip anyone? This was my first time eating parsnips too!

The parsnip is said to have a buttery, spicy, sweet flavor. I did not taste one raw so I cannot say but they blended nicely with the soup which was spicy, but not overpoweringly so.

(Our sausage had green onion in it too.)

Saute your onions and garlic. I like to use a little coconut oil but butter or olive oil work fine too.

The red bits are the chili garlic paste. Mmm…good stuff.

Add the sausage to the onions for a bit.

While the sausage and onions cook, place all the other ingredients in a pot and begin warming it.

Then add your sausage and onions!

Place a lid on the pot, bring it to a boil, and then reduce the heat and let it simmer for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally if you like.

Don kept asking me, “Is it ready yet? It smells GREAT!”

I never would have imagined. I don’t know what I thought sauerkraut would taste like, I really never thought about it. I just went along with the crowd assuming I wouldn’t like it. Wrong. This is going to be one of my easy, go-to meals when we need something quick and flavorful. (Thanks Cat!)

So damn good!

To feel safe and warm on a cold wet night, all you really need is soup.
~ Laurie Colwin

Other Sauerkraut Recipes

• Skinny Sauerkraut (cowboysandcrossbones.wordpress.com)
• Fall food (ckenb.blogspot.com)
• Cabbage Soup Is In The Pot (forgetthepain.net)
• jota / bean, sauerkraut and potato soup (briciole.typepad.com)