Side

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

The fruit in the salad can be varied with the season. In summer, add cantaloupe; in winter, oranges are good.

You can fry this sausage in patties, stuff it into casings, or use it as an ingredient in other recipes that call for sausage. I use it in stuffings, in biscuits, smoked in links for gumbos, and as a breakfast meat. Use the recipe as a guide only. The wonderful thing about making your own sausage is that you can season it to taste.

A typical Israeli breakfast selection would include this salad (either already prepared or with the vegetables available), the pita bread, and Za'atar along with fresh goat's — or cow's — milk cheeses, yogurt, hummus, hard-boiled eggs, olives, and avocados (in season).

These bean fritters appear in several West African countries; they are called akara in Nigeria and Sierra Leone and akla or koosé in Ghana. Although eaten as a snack or side dish, bean fritters are also consumed as breakfast food with hot sauce as an accompaniment (it's more like a thick relish than a sauce). We think the fritters are great as an hors d'oeuvre. Although we use vegetable oil for frying in our recipe, red palm oil is the preferred frying medium in Africa. And traditionally the black-eyed peas are skinned, but we think you get more bean flavor if you leave the skins on (and save a lot of time as well).

Pierogies are large dumplings filled with meat, cheese or vegetables, and they are very popular in Poland. A precooked version is available frozen in many supermarkets.

During roundups, cowboys once saved any extra coffee for use in cooking, since water was sometimes scarce. The coffee powder in these beans is an adaptation of that. Add some hot buttered flour tortillas and a crisp salad alongside for a terrific meal.