Sausage, Zucchini Flowers, & Tenderloin Thieves

Our local grocery store, HEB, is awesome.  A few weeks ago they had a "meal deal" (buy one thang, get others free) for free tortillas, cheese, & salsa when you bought an 8 pack of smoked sausage (I chose regular - not mesquite). 

 DONE!  I used the tortillas/cheese/salsa for other things...gave 2 sausages to a homeless dude along with other nutritious items...and then decided to make a manly meal of "red beans & rice" with the rest of the sausage.  That was weeks ago, and on our kitchen list of potential meals, sausage/beans/rice has been an option ever since.  I've been baking, cooking, eating so many holiday foods that this poor lil meal went overlooked....until tonight!  And I decided to make it in the slow cooker with a hodgepodge of what I had on hand.

Fortunately...it turned out to be DIVINE! A real hit around here, at least -- and with some sneaky veg additions, it made me feel like we'd won the gold medal for hearty healthy food.  Check it out:

In a slow cooker (with a liner - what genius invented these, btw?  please tell him/her I'd love to eat movie nachos together as a gesture of deepest gratitude!)

 Ingredients:

• 1 can pinto beans with jalapeno
• 1 large can red kidney beans
• 1 can ranch-style black beans
• 1 can of zucchini flowers, chopped (wha? I'll get to this)
• 6 links of smoked sausage, sliced into 1/4 inch rounds
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1/2 tbsp dried oregano
• 1/2 tbsp red pepper flakes
• 1/2 c water
• salt & pepper - liberally, to taste

Drain the beans, except for the ranch style black beans - they're not really drainable.  Add everything to the pot at the same time, meaning "in whatever order works for you." I tend to add the easy stuff first, then I chop & add the choppy stuff.  Speaking of choppy stuff - anyone weirded out by the addition of "zucchini flower?" I would be!  I've had a can of this stuff in my pantry for months.  I think I read somewhere that it's delicious & tastes great fried.  I probably saw this Tyler Florence recipe for how to make them. I'm easily persuaded.

So whatever, I bought a can.  It was in the "international foods" section with the Mexican foods.  Cost like $.89 and was weird looking but strangely alluring.  Zucchini flower?  What will it TASTE like?  Well, I wanted to add something mild to my redbeansandricewithsausage, and for some reason I thought that zucchini flower might work.

I also have ADD, so waiting months before using something in my pantry was both completely normal & maddening at the same time.  I may have bought it on impulse in early 2011, with no time or real plan for how to use it, but today, all of the sudden....I HAD TO USE IT IN SOMETHING OR I'D GO CRAZY!  If you are also ADD, you know what I mean.

Anywho. I popped open that little tin, and beheld some little pods with fronds, pods that appeared to have hairs on them!

Heck to the no!

But they beckoned.  And I, feeling suddenly very brave and adventuresome, decided that my commitment to these little babies must continue.  I NIBBLED ONE.  And y'all...it was good.  It was so good.  Not pickled, not hairy-feeling (just pleasently...spiny?) and mild yet zucchini-y. I chopped them!  I added them to the slow-cooker!  And I fed them to my husbun!!!!

After he raved over the dish (such a good husbun) I informed him that he UNWITTINGLY had consumed zucchini flower!  The source of FOLATE & POTASSIUM!  According to the interwebs, "at the tips of the growing zucchini are large pumpkin colored flowers. These zucchini-connected flowers are the female flowers of the zucchini plant. In equal amounts are zucchini-less flowers which are the male flowers needed for pollination. The important thing is that when harvesting flowers, harvest only the males and leave a few behind to pollinate the females."   So fellas, just FYI - these are MALE flowers.  They BELONG in a manly sausage & beans mess.

They start out looking like this:

 

And then they look like this...

 

And finally, in the can, they look like this:

 

Anyway, I snuck 'em into my red beans & rice.  And they didn't taste funny, they didn't taste like much at ALL - they were just a little bit of veggie wonderful!

Cook all that stuff on low for 8 hours or so.  You'll know when it's ready. Then serve it over hot cooked rice to someone you love!

 

xoxo

CATHERINE

Oh, and Erin?  You'll have to tell ME what to do with leftover tenderloin.  My crafty dogs nabbed mine off the kitchen counter while D & I were at Lowes - this is where my beef is now:

Comments

[Erin]

Oh no! That makes me cry for real. :( It is looking like I'll have plenty leftover due to flaky people, so I'll have to figure out what to do with it. I'll let you know!

Your rice and beans and sausage sound awesome - I've only ever made/eaten the Cajun kind. But enlighten me - what are ranch-style black beans? I have never seen them in the stores here, only the Cuban-style.

Happy New Year! :)