How to make snags a little more interesting

I don't usually eat sausages.  Unless they are of the fancy, schmancy, exotic, spicy ones.  Unfortunately my family like the plain old beef ones.  So to compromise I try to cook beef snags in either a curry or tomato based casserole.  This is my stumbling introduction to what I did with my my exciting delivery today.


You may have read my previous post on the Panasonic Competition where I was able to give away a rice cooker and electric toothbrushes.  After this I was able to enter a competition with Soup where I was one of the winners of a Panasonic MS183 Rice Cooker.  And as luck would have it, it was delivered today - a day when I had to stay home from work as my Chicken came home sick from school (there were some vomity episodes in our hallway, at her school and in my car on the way home - luckily I foresaw the upchuck and had brought along a bucket).

After working out the Chinese/Australian translations in the instruction book, I made a version of the recipe in their book of American Baked Rice (????). OK, it's actually sausages and rice and tomato sauce. With a bit of relish and garlic added. Lazy woman's dinner but it wasn't too bad. Probably could have done with a can of tomatoes but for once I didn't have one in the pantry.

I did like the fact that you can throw it all in, turn it on and it turns itself off and then switches to 'Warm' in case, like me, you go off and do something else (like turn the computer on) and completely forget you were cooking dinner.  "Yes dear, dinner's ready, I've just forgotten what it is. It's in the cooker, there's the spoon, I've just got to finish reading Edenland."

What's your cheat dinner? My mum used to say if you want your man to think you've cooked dinner, just put your wineglass down for a minute and fry some onions before they come in the door.  They'll think there is something wonderful simmering.  Then heat up something frozen.  OK, she didn't actually tell me to do that, but I saw it happen often!