Foods I'm Afraid to Cook: Bratwurst Edition

There are a few simple foods out there that, for whatever reason, intimidate me when it comes to cooking them. Bratwursts are very near the top of that list. I didn't start out afraid of them, but after a couple of failed attempts, I've become increasingly more wary. When I say previous attempts failed, they were certainly edible enough, but always ended in a nightmare mess of a pan for not all that great a result. Last weekend during our Pike Place Market trip when B's eyes lit up at the sight of all the all the various options in the case at Uli's, I knew I was in for another attempt.

Last night, after searching online for the easiest cooking method, I settled on a combo of recipes. I still can't say I was thrilled with the results, but it was definitely the most successful attempt yet.

I started by melting about 2 tablespoons of butter in a small dutch oven.

Once the butter was almost completely melted, I added a 12 oz bottle of beer (Bard's Tale Ale Gluten Free beer, to be precise) and brought the mixture to a low boil. I added the 4 sausages to the mixture, reduced the flame to a simmer and covered.

After the sausages were cooked and the beer mixture had reduced to a thick, almost syrupy consistency, I removed the sausages into a bowl and poured the remaining mixture into the same bowl, leaving just a small amount of liquid in the bottom of the dutch oven. I then added a medium, coarsely chopped white onion to the pan and raised the heat to medium.

Once the onions were fairly well cooked, I returned the sausages to the pan and covered them with the cooked onion.

I finished cooking the sausage by browning them on all sides before removing them from the heat and serving them with the onions (for me only) and mashed potatoes.

I still made a pretty good mess of the pan and they weren't fantastic, but this was definitely the most successful attempt yet. At least I've conquered a bit of the fear. I also ordered a double burner grill that should be arriving with the groceries from Amazon Fresh any minute now, so maybe next time I'll just toss them on the grill.

As for tonight, we're being lazy. We just spent the last hour playing Kinect Sports on our new Xbox Kinect and are surprisingly very tired! It's Barracuda Taqueria night for us!  Happy Sunday!