Sausage Balls

Deep Run Roots

My family loves sausage cheese balls, and we have them for a light, quick breakfast a lot around the holidays since you can freeze them easily before baking. But this recipe is definitely different than the usual one we use. What will we think of them?

This is available on the A Chef's Life website here: http://www.achefslifeseries.com/posts/102

Captions

[00:04]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:06]: with Heather today we are working from
[00:09]: the front Sabine howard's cookbook and
[00:11]: we are making one of my family's
[00:13]: favorite christmas traditions we always
[00:18]: have sausage balls we usually have them
[00:20]: a couple times throughout the christmas
[00:22]: season and we almost always have them as
[00:25]: sort of a small snack for breakfast
[00:28]: christmas morning because we usually
[00:31]: have like three Christmas meals in a row
[00:35]: or in the 24 hours of Christmas
[00:38]: Christmas Eve to Christmas night so
[00:42]: that's a nice quick Christmas breakfast
[00:45]: for us that doesn't fill its up too much
[00:47]: so this is a different recipe that I
[00:50]: usually use usually and most often
[00:53]: people use this quick or baking mix of
[00:55]: some sort to make these but she is his
[00:59]: corn meal so let's get started I have my
[01:06]: corn meal already measured out in this
[01:08]: bowl and to this we are adding some
[01:13]: brown sugar some salt and some baking
[01:18]: powder because it's just plain cornmeal
[01:20]: you know there's no leavening to that so
[01:22]: we've got some baking powder in there
[01:23]: and we're just going to mix this up
[01:26]: except for if it's not super important
[01:29]: that it get to mix up great but we're
[01:35]: gonna then mix all the other stuff in
[01:37]: here as well all right
[01:42]: that's good enough and she is very
[01:47]: insistent that the cheese for this needs
[01:50]: to come into your house in a block not
[01:54]: pre-shredded it won't melt as well the
[01:56]: pre-shredded is covered with usually
[01:58]: sort of cellulose of some sort to keep
[01:60]: it from clumping so this will melt
[02:02]: better and she calls for sharp cheddar
[02:04]: so and on a medium graded on a medium
[02:09]: grater like of the box grater I have
[02:13]: this separate grater I also have a small
[02:20]: [Music]
[02:22]: injury from a cheese slicing incident
[02:26]: last weekend and I'm gonna be wearing a
[02:31]: couple kinds of love this for this
[02:35]: recipe including this cut fruit glove
[02:38]: this is really sharp I've cut myself on
[02:42]: this before so and when I'm done with it
[02:47]: I just wash it in the in laundry with
[02:51]: everything else so I'm just gonna grate
[02:54]: all of this in here and then we're going
[02:56]: to give it a toss
[03:09]: done grading my cheese into the bowl and
[03:12]: I'm just going to set this aside because
[03:14]: I have to create something else later
[03:16]: and I'm just gonna use the same grater
[03:17]: same glove because it's all going
[03:20]: together so now we just sort of toss the
[03:23]: cheese with the cornmeal mixture to sort
[03:28]: of get it coated so it doesn't all come
[03:30]: together and it will be mixed up when we
[03:33]: mix it with the rest of our ingredients
[03:40]: there's that you clean up a little bit
[03:45]: so now we need to make our sausage
[03:48]: mixture and I'm starting with our
[03:52]: favorite sausage is Nice's it's I think
[03:56]: it's a North Carolina product I believe
[03:59]: they're always at a State Fair giving
[04:01]: out samples of different things but this
[04:03]: is what we almost always need is for
[04:06]: sausage balls right into this also goes
[04:13]: some cream cheese and now we have to
[04:18]: grate this onion it's a small onion
[04:22]: grated and I'm just a fan grader onions
[04:25]: are really hard to great because they're
[04:27]: all separated you know they have the
[04:29]: layers and stuff and it's it's hard so
[04:32]: keep using my glove
[04:39]: where'd you see I got as much as I could
[04:46]: from that onion there's a pile of stuff
[04:49]: left here the second half one a little
[04:51]: bit better than the first but I don't
[04:54]: know why I don't just bring out the food
[04:57]: processor for this because this always
[05:01]: annoys me I always try to do it by hand
[05:03]: because it's such a small amount of
[05:04]: things and I try not to dirty the whole
[05:07]: food processor for that but next time
[05:10]: I'll probably you said okay so I'm going
[05:13]: to switch Bluffs one sec so the really
[05:18]: the best way to mix this all up from now
[05:21]: on is with your hands and because I have
[05:24]: you know a small injury I'm just using
[05:29]: these gloves use them sometimes when I
[05:34]: have to cut a lot of raw meat or
[05:37]: whatever so yeah I use these in the
[05:42]: kitchen relatively often not a lot a lot
[05:48]: of raw meat handling or when I want to
[05:52]: cut hot peppers particularly because
[05:55]: they stick to your skin the heat sticks
[05:58]: to your skin and this will make you not
[06:02]: hurt your eyes or your nose or your
[06:04]: mouth later when you when you touch them
[06:08]: with your spicy yes so now I'm just
[06:12]: going to mix all of this up together and
[06:15]: then we add the cheese and the other
[06:18]: mixture and mix it all up together so so
[06:25]: this is pretty well mixed I think and
[06:29]: now I'm going to add the cornmeal and
[06:33]: the flour and my gloves keep wanting to
[06:36]: fall off but whatever
[06:40]: dump all this in here and now I just
[06:49]: keep mixing you want to make sure you
[06:53]: get all of it sort of moistened together
[06:58]: now I'm all done mixing these up and I'm
[07:03]: going to keep my gloves on as I warned
[07:06]: these into balls I'm gonna make some
[07:09]: room on my work surface one second so
[07:12]: I've got some parchment paper on my
[07:14]: baking sheet
[07:16]: I'm not going to bake all of these right
[07:17]: now these do freeze very well so I'm
[07:20]: going to make enough for us to just have
[07:22]: a stack right now and then I'm going to
[07:26]: put the rest of them on wax paper on a
[07:29]: baking sheet in the freezer when they're
[07:31]: all frozen just throw them in a ziplock
[07:32]: freezer bag and they'll be good so what
[07:35]: we're going for here is about a 1 inch
[07:38]: ball and they cook at a in a 375-degree
[07:45]: oven for a about 20 minutes when they
[07:51]: start getting golden then they're done
[07:54]: and I will show you what they look like
[07:57]: when they're all out the other
[07:59]: [Music]
[08:15]: on this episode of cooking the books
[08:18]: with Heather we made Vivian Howard
[08:19]: sausage balls from the deep runners
[08:22]: cookbook and as I said this is something
[08:26]: that we make every year we have quite
[08:29]: often and so this is a different recipe
[08:32]: for us it had cornmeal in it instead of
[08:35]: flour and I think as a family we prefer
[08:40]: the ones with flour however I believe
[08:43]: will will probably try this again sort
[08:46]: of maybe mixing half-and-half flour and
[08:48]: cornmeal because I think we liked what
[08:51]: the cornmeal brought to it but we have
[08:54]: you know we really like the traditional
[08:57]: the traditional recipe as well so if you
[09:02]: really like cornmeal if you like
[09:04]: cornbread this is probably a great
[09:05]: recipe for you if you won't try
[09:07]: something new or if you've never tried
[09:08]: them before certainly try this recipe it
[09:11]: was very easy didn't require anything
[09:14]: special besides you know a box grater
[09:16]: that Grady the onion step was probably
[09:20]: the hardest part of it the whole thing
[09:25]: her recipe says she it makes 40 1 ounce
[09:28]: balls I got 36 out of it not too bad
[09:32]: and we have some in the freezer now for
[09:35]: later so I hope you enjoyed this episode
[09:39]: of cooking the books with Heather and if
[09:41]: you did please hit the thumbs up button
[09:43]: and subscribe to come back and watch me
[09:46]: cook something next week
[09:49]: [Music]