A different take on sliders

I love the Fall…the cool weather, the leaves changing color, Halloween and, of course, the flavorful hearty food.

In my hunt for new dishes to try, I came across a recipe for pumpkin cinnamon rolls. That got the wheels turning in my head for a sweet and savory mix…pumpkin cinnamon rolls stuffed with sausage which evolved into pumpkin rolls for sliders using pork sausage instead of burger patties and an apple cinnamon chutney to top it off.

During one of my “bad movie nights”, I decided to try this idea out.

Pork sausage patty with sage, ginger cole slaw on a pumpkin roll

I made the dough the night before using this recipe. I admit I have very little experience with making dough; I ended up adding a little too much flour so the rolls came out a little dense but were still edible. The pumpkin flavor was very mild. I would use this recipe again, though I would maybe add a little bit more cinnamon and spice to try and make it less “white bread roll”-tasting.

Due to time constraints, I opted to buy Jimmy Dean’s pork sausage with sage rather than prep my own patties. Surprisingly, these were pretty decent and a time saver!

I thought the sliders needed some “crunch” texture-wise and wanted something to compliment the pork. I scrapped the idea of the chutney and decided on a ginger cole slaw.   I used a bag of pre-cut slaw mix, mayo and a mixture of freshly ground ginger and ginger powder to make it.  In regards to amounts, I just followed the usual mayo to slaw ratio and added ginger till it was to my tastebuds’ liking.   The slaw had a nice crunch, spice and also added some color as well.

The overall consensus by my guests were that these sliders were a hit though some thought I had a heavy hand with the ginger.

It’s an easy dish to make and one where most of the work can be done ahead of time…perfect for a quick meal or for a party.

Sweet potato + carrots + honey + ginger = yummy mush

I got the urge to experiment in the kitchen again.

I had bought some sweet potatoes (or are they yams?  the white-fleshed ones) and had some phyllo dough leftover from another experiment…hrm…mashed sweet potato cups!  To flavor up the sweet potatoes, I boiled some carrots, added honey and ginger and some curry seasoning and a little bit of milk and mashed it all together.

Phyllo dough is still a pain in the arse to deal with if you are not very experienced with it.  I managed to line a muffin tin with some decent looking pieces.  I scooped the mixture into it and topped with some minced chili-spiced dried mango.  Baked in the oven till the phyllo was nice and crispy-brown.

It came out tasting really good.  There’s a initial sweetness but at the end of the bite, the ginger and curry come out with a little kick.  The phyllo gave a contrast to the mushy texture and so did the minced mango bits.  I think a regular muffin tin was too big as there was too much filling compared to the amount of phyllo.  A mini-muffin tin should make for better bite-sized pieces and textual ratio.

Since the mixture wasn’t blended well, I got a mosaic of orange carrot, yellow mango and white sweet potato.  A little bit of green would help with the visual…maybe sprinkle some garnish…green onion?

You could opt to leave out the phyllo dough and just serve this as a subsitute for mashed potatoes to change things up.

Sorry, no pictures.  My camera batteries were dead.