A sheet pan meal of fish, shrimp and smoked sausage with broccoli and potatoes.

Sheet Pan Seafood Dinner

A few years back, sheet pan dinners were all the rage.

I never quite got into them to be honest, mainly because with a mix of proteins and different varieties of vegetables, cooking stages are often involved in order to cook everything evenly and not overcook others.

A one pan meal of smoked sausage, potatoes and sweet bell peppers, tossed with simple seasonings and olive oil and topped with pats of butter.

Smoked Sausage, Peppers and Potato Bake

The combination of flavors in this dish is one of my favorites, especially when I'm not much motivated to cook, because it's such an easy dish to throw together.

This version includes a hickory smoked Conecuh sausage, tender yellow potatoes and frozen mixed peppers with onions, seasoned, tossed with extra virgin olive oil, dotted with butter and baked. It's simple, easy, tasty and super flavorful.

White beans, slow cooked with smoked meat and simply seasoned.

Classic White Beans

Mondays in the Deep South are all about the red beans, but did you know as an excuse to eat more beans on the regular, somebody at some point thought up White Bean Wednesdays?

Yep. They sure did!

White beans are right next to red beans to me so I'm not mad about it either.

Mini smoked sausages in a tangy sauce, perfect for any gathering.

Party Cocktail Sausages

Meatballs and mini smoked sausages - most notably those Lit'l Smokies - are two party staples and the best part? The sauces you use can completely customize them.

One standard mixture is the old school chili sauce and grape jelly blend and frankly everybody I know, even my grandkids, love that, whether it's on meatballs or sausages.

Russet potatoes, peeled and cut up, smothered with onion, smoked sausage and Rotel tomatoes and cooked in a rice cooker.

Rice Cooker Smothered Potatoes

Rice cookers may be a bit old school, but believe it or not, they're still a thing down here and for the most part, it's an appliance that is completely uncomplicated.

One simple "start" button is usually all there is to them!

You press it, it cooks your rice, kicks over to warm when your rice is done, and it actually holds the rice for a long time. As far as timing goes, it's really going to depend on your cooker, so holding on to that product manual is key to timing for the rest of your dinner.

This shrimp and sausage skillet meal, made in a flavorful buttery, garlic sauce, may be served over toast points, in baked pastry shells or with pasta or rice.

Singing Shrimp

Here's another great shrimp recipe from New Orleans!

It is said to have originated at Commander's Palace, sometime in the late 1980s, where it was prepared table-side and flamed with cognac for effect. Those table-side presentations are pretty exciting!

As far as I know this dish is no longer offered at the restaurant, although I haven't been to Commander's in too many years, so don't hold me to that!!

A quick skillet meal of shrimp and smoked sausage with wide egg noodles in a creamy sauce.

Creamy Cajun Shrimp and Sausage with Noodles

We are so blessed with fresh seafood and Gulf shrimp is available year round, very often fresh off the boat which is my preferred method of purchase. 

I'm always fooling around with different shrimp and pasta combinations to try different things and this is one of those instances. As a recipe writer and owner of a food-related website, there's a lot of experimenting and often it takes multiple tries to get a recipe just right.

At least that's my philosophy as a food blogger, because one thing I can guarantee and that is when a recipe appears on my website, it has been well-tested to meet my approval.

The best of late summer and early fall vegetables - eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash and sweet bell pepper - tossed with an olive oil, vinegar and herb-based dressing, diced tomatoes, garlic, chunks of red onion and sliced smoked sausage, then baked.

Ratatouille and Sausage Bake

I can't even begin to tell you how much I love a vegetable dish like this. The Cajun?

Not so much.

So, when I cook something like this it's all for me!

This sheet pan mix of roasted potatoes with loads of vegetables and smoked sausage is an easy meal that's packed with flavor.

Roasted Potatoes with Sausage and Vegetables

You may remember a near viral recipe for a simple sheet pan roasted potatoes with onions and sweet peppers flashing across social media platforms the past year or so.

I'm old enough to remember when people just made these kinds of things with little to no fanfare, but hey, if social media can drum up some interest in cooking, well, anything... I'm happy about it!

Food, after all, isn't just about nourishment, although some would have you think so.

Chili Beans and Rice

A mix of kidney beans with pintos, chili seasonings and browned, smoked sausage, served over rice.

Chili Beans with Rice

Any kind of a beans and rice dish is a winner for me.

• It's hearty and filling.
• It's high in protein and fiber.
• It's inexpensive.
• If you use a brown rice and a turkey smoked sausage, it's pretty good nutrition.
• And, the most important thing. Done well, with a great blend of herbs, spices and seasonings, they are delicious!

A quick skillet version of white beans and rice with ham, made with canned beans, the Trinity of vegetables and rice.

Ham and White Bean Skillet

Beans and rice are a big deal in the south, always have been really. Back in the day, they were an important part of the dietary needs of the people, because families were large and relatively poor, so any kind of bean was an inexpensive, nutritious and filling dish.

Mostly our beans are slow cooked from dried beans, on the top of the stove, and that's really the way I still love them best to this day.

Don't get me wrong. Electronic pressure cookers like the Instant Pot do an excellent job and makes a great pot of beans from dried, but slow-stewed still rules in my book.

Fresh frozen sometimes fill in, and though faster, still take a little care to make.  

Fresh green beans, trimmed and snapped and layered in with salt pork, onion, sliced smoked andouille sausage, plenty of freshly cracked black pepper and pork or chicken base or stock, cooked in the Instant Pot.

Instant Pot Green Beans, Potatoes and Andouille

I absolutely love a pot of slow stewed, fresh green beans, so much so, that I can literally make a meal of a pot, especially when you throw in some ham or andouille sausage! Just give me that and some cornbread, and I am in heaven y'all!

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I use my Instant Pot {affil link}, or one of my other electronic pressure cookers a lot, yes, even in the summer. I was never real attached to a slow cooker much, but I do a lot of cooking in the Instant Pot.

This Instant Pot version of green beans comes in right up there along with the slow stewed version, even though instead of hours slow stewing, they come together in just minutes. I've made them enough times now, varying the way I do them, that I'm finally ready to publish a standalone version.

No worries if you don't have an Instant Pot though - just click here to get to my slow-stewed, stovetop version!

A smaller batch of classic jambalaya, made with the trinity, rice, shrimp and smoked sausage.

Skillet Jambalaya

There are rice with protein dishes in just about every region of the country. Chicken Bog, Red Rice and Pilaf are some of the top southern favorites, but in my part of the south, it's all about jambalaya.

Whatever version you know, they all involve rice, vegetables, protein - and often a variety of proteins - and mostly made in huge batches, intended to feed a crowd, making it perfect for Mardi Gras.

Sometimes a gal just wants some jambalya for herself!

A sausage and peppers dish, using spicy Cajun sausage, pan seared cabbage wedges, sweet onion and diced tomatoes with green chilies, served over rice.

Cajun Sausage and Peppers with Cabbage

This is just a little different take on the old Italian sausage and peppers dish, adding a mix of colorful peppers, spicy Cajun sausage and pan-seared cabbage wedges.

Instead of a sauce that's typically used with sausage and peppers, I'm using diced tomatoes with green chilies in order to allow the individual elements all shine on their own and not be buried in sauce. For the sausage, I'm using smoked instead of a raw, encased sausage.

Classic Chicken and Andouille Sausage Gumbo (Gumbo Ya-Ya)

A classic light roux-based gumbo, made with a cut up chicken and andouille sausage, served over hot steamed rice.

Chicken and Andouille Sausage Gumbo

I've been making and sharing Miss Lucy's chicken gumbo with y'all for years, but admit, her classic Cajun-style method is not exactly the way that I usually make my gumbo.

Miss Lucy's recipe makes a roux, then adds water to the roux and then adds the chicken, sausage and trinity (onion, bell pepper and celery) to the pot, a classic Cajun one pot prep.

I prepare my gumbo in a way that is more traditional where I live - brown the meats, prepare the roux, cook the trinity in the roux, then add the water or stock and the rest.

However you make it, we eat a lot of it and it's mighty good!

Shrimp and White Bean Stew - Great Northern, cannellini, navy or your favorite small white bean, cooked in a ham bone broth, with the trinity, Rotel tomatoes, andouille sausage and small shrimp.

Shrimp and White Bean Stew

I literally have been trying to get this recipe written and uploaded to the blog for almost two weeks! What can I say... seeing as I'm at the age of being mostly retired now, we techically at least because, trust me, a recipe website is as much work as what I did in my corporate legal career!

Anyway, I don't spend too much of my time being in a hurry to do much of anything anymore.

You may have also noticed that the Deep South summer-like fall heat finally gave way to some much cooler, near winter-like fall temperatures. Though it's sure been nice having some cooler temps the past couple of weeks, along with that comes a certain degree of laziness on my part. Though I do still cook, not a lot of writing happens.

 

A skillet meal of smoked sausage with rotini pasta in a creamy, cheesy sauce and topped with French fried onions.

Cheesy Conecuh Skillet with Rotini

This southern heat seems to get harder and harder on this old body every summer and it has been unbearable some days, to the point where a minute outside is more than enough. When it's not hotter than hot, it's raining. Like bucket-loads kinds of rain. There were a few times I thought the Gulf Coast was gonna float away into the Gulf of Mexico!

My gardens that were so beautiful this spring, are now loaded with weeds, but with the heat index it's impossible to get out there long enough to make a difference. Doing it early in the morning or late in the afternoon just means getting carried away by gnats. It's just a no-win situation!

A white bean stew, made with smoked ham, a good quality andouille or smoked sausage and a mirepoix of vegetables.

Ham and Sausage White Bean Stew

I have still been working my way through the freezer - some of our meals were reheated leftovers, others, whatever meat I happened to grab first.

In the past two weeks or so, I've baked a ham that I'd picked up on a holiday sale and froze, which along with some frozen sides, gave us a couple of meals and leftover ham for sandwiches. Pre-seasoned ground beef I'd picked up on sale, cooked and put up, became one of our favorite casseroles - Ground Beef Mac and Cheese.

Spicy Sweet Andouille Sausage Bites

Andouille smoked sausage, grilled, browned in a skillet or broiled, cut into bite-sized pieces and tossed in a spicy sweet sauce. Great party appetizer!

Spicy Sweet Andouille Bites

There is literally some kind of football on in this house every single day. Don't get me wrong - I like football just fine! The Cajun is a fanatic though, so on those three days of the week that a live football game of some form isn't on, he's catching up with a replayed game he didn't see live, because he was watching another game.

In between that, there's all the commentary shows where they show highlights, talk about all things SEC and NFL, with team reports, developing stories, player interviews, player injuries, breaking news and all other things football. He really needs a man cave with about a half dozen televisions. That probably wouldn't even be enough!

A quick, chicken broth-based soup, made with white beans and greens, spicy andouille smoked sausage and veggies. Add pasta if you like!

Turnip Green Soup aka Swamp Soup

Hello everybody and, if you're landing here when I wrote this in September... Happy Grandparents Week! Okay, okay, I realize it's an "invented" holiday - though not really for the reasons that you probably think. It didn't actually come about because a corporation wanted to sell cards and promote the sale of flowers as rumors would suggest.

Grandparent's Day was initiated at a grassroots level by a West Virginian mother of 15, Marian Lucille Herndon McQuade, who with her husband, Joseph L. McQuade, had 43 grandchildren, 10 great-grandchildren, and one great-great grandchild. Mrs. McQuade wanted Grandparents Day to be a family day, to honor grandparents, and to give them an opportunity to show love for their children's children, providing them with the wisdom and guidance that only older people can offer.