First of all, before we get started on the sausage egg roll, and orange Asian dipping sauce recipes I want to say that I loooove these little dishes.. The the white dish was given to me by a friend, who is always so encouraging, and tries to stay upbeat even in the darkest of times. Bless her heart, her family just recently lost their home to a fire and even with losing her home to a fire only 10 days before Christmas, she has still managed to make me smile every day.  I hope that if I am ever faced with a situation like the one she has been in that I can maintain even half as much of a positive attitude as she has been able too. That said, the second dish is the little cup with the orange sauce, is actually a measuring cup from an adorable little set of measuring cups my daughter picked up at Ross'. This cup is the 1/4 cup measuring cup the other 3 cups are different colors but look exactly like coffee cups.. Isn't it the cutest? I searched for a link I could share to either piece and was unable to find anything but if I do I will be sure to post it because everyone needs these dishes.

Now.. let's talk sausage egg rolls, and home made orange dipping sauce. I had just quit cooking for a while. My son had 2 jobs and wasn't getting home until midnight every night so he would have already eaten by the time he got here, my daughter working night would usually grab something on her break and not be hungry when she got home, my 14 year old son was perfectly happy to eat MC Donald's or hot pockets every night, and had a habit of coming into the kitchen to microwave something WHILE I was cooking supper and then not be hungry when food was ready, and hubby just pisses me off.. So there really hasn't been anyone here to appreciate my efforts, so I stopped. Well.. Deer season is over so son is not skinning deer every night any more, and the others gained a new appreciation for what Mom was no longer doing for them, so I am no longer on strike and back in the kitchen, and the sausage egg rolls and orange dipping sauce were a success.

I call meals like we had tonight, "appetizer night" I cooked several appetizer type foods and filled their plates with them, and no complaints, in fact I even got compliments. But this sausage egg roll, with orange Asian dipping sauce was the star of the show with the grown folks...



The entire menu was this.. I made the Hormel chili, Rotel tomatoes and Velveeta slow cooker dip over tortilla shells, I did the sausage and cabbage egg rolls, with the orange dipping sauce, and I did pepperoni and cheese egg rolls with marinara sauce for dipping. Something for every taste bud in the house, and being a home full of carnivores there was no lack of meat in the menu.

I wish I had gotten pictures of the pizza egg rolls and dip but I didn't. I wasn't even planning to mention them but here I am mentioning them. So let me just lay it out there as simply as I can...

Pepperoni pizza egg rolls

• 4 or 5 pepperoni per egg roll
• approx 1/4 cup mozzarella cheese per egg roll
• dash of basil per egg roll

roll up and fry until golden brown and serve with spaghetti sauce or marinara sauce for dipping

Cheesy Chili tomato slow cooker dip

• 1 can Rotel tomatoes, 
• 3/4 block Velveeta cheese, 
• 1 can Hormel chili, 

put all in crock pot and simmer until ingredients are melted together.. serve over Frito's, Doritos, tortilla chips, over baked potatoes, over french fries, over tater tots, or any other way you can think of.. The sky is the limit on this one...

  As for the pizza egg rolls, my 4 year old granddaughter came to me today and she said, "I like your food, and I want more, but its all gone." Bless her heart if I had had the ingredients to make a second batch I would have just for her. I think this is very similar to pizza rolls, minus the sauce, but I offered sauce for dipping,and satisfied the 4 year old in the process because she just likes her pizza plain. When we order takeout pizza we have to order a special pizza for her and me) no sauce extra cheese cuz we just aren't into sauce.

I guess by now, you are wondering why I'm rambling on about all these things you didn't come here for instead of getting down to business... Well.. OK.. OK.. Let me get to the reason you came here.. Those yummy sausage egg rolls with that Delicious orange dipping sauce.

I was worried that using just sausage in my egg rolls might make it a little breakfasty, and I didn't want that.. I toyed with the idea of mixing my jimmy dean mild sausage with ground pork to cut the sausage flavor, but I ended up not doing that and am pleased with the results. When I added the onion powder, the cabbage mixture, the chopped garlic, and the salt pepper and sesame oil it really didn't leave much of a breakfasty sausage flavor to the egg roll. It was just yummy good goodness. In fact I got very little "sausage flavor" to the egg roll at all.



I cooked my filling the night before and then put it into a colander inside a bowl over night wrapped in tin foil in the fridge. I'm a cat napper so I was up several times in the night and stirred it around and this gave it both time to cool, and time for any access liquid to drain out of it. So if possible I would recommend cooking your mixture over night and storing in the way until time to cook.

So, here is the sausage and cabbage egg roll recipe.. read on for the orange sauce recipe..

Jimmy Dean mild sausage egg roll recipe

1 tube Jimmy Dean tube sausage fully cooked
2 packages dole coleslaw mix
1 tbsp sesame oil
1 tbsp finely chopped garlic (I use the pre-chopped stuff in a jar)
1 handful ( approx. 1/8 or 1/4 cup) very finely chopped white onion
salt and pepper to taste (I used Hawaiian black salt cuz my Hannah bought it for me for Christmas but you can use whatever salt you have on hand)

add your ground sausage, onion, and garlic and cook until sausage is browned. add 2 packages of coleslaw mix and and all other ingredients and stir frequently for 1 to 2 minutes. Cut off heat and allow to cool in cooking pot. When cooking pot has completely cooled remove mixture to colander and place colander in a bowl large enough to allow for drainage and place covered in fridge for at least 2 hours.. over night is best. roll up and deep fry in approx 3-4 inches oil until golden brown.. server with dipping sauce of you choice or recipe that follows this one..

Orange Asian dipping sauce

1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup white vinegar
1 1/2 tbsp sesame oil
1 tbsp toasted sesame seed
1/2 cup orange marmalade
1/3 cup water
1/2 tsp chopped garlic
1/3 tsp more or less to taste red pepper flakes
3 tbsp honey
1 1/2 tsp ginger powder

add all ingredients to pot simmer until mixture bubbles and orange marmalade is completely melted, then cut off heat and allow to cool 15 minutes before replacing to storage container and refrigerating over night.

The orange Asian sauce was a hit, I caught hubby not only dipping but trying to pour the sauce into the egg roll so.. that's a good sign ya'll, and I served him two each of the pepperoni pizza egg rolls and the sausage and cabbage egg rolls and he went back for a third on the sausage egg rolls, with the sauce. I won dinner tonight friends..

As I have said before I think egg rolls are an awesome vessel for anything you want to put in them, much like tortilla wrappers, and when I told my friend what I planned to cook, she had a brilliant idea for breakfast egg rolls that I plan to try so look for that recipe here soon.. Sausage and egg and cheese egg rolls. How yummy does that sound?

What do you put in your egg rolls? Would love to hear all about it in comments..