Easy Oven Baked Candied Yams and Kielbasa

This recipe is one of our family’s favorites. This is a recipe we use for gamedays. This recipe can go whichever way you prefer! It can be a spicy dish for those flame heads who can’t get enough spice, it can be more along the sweet side of life so that even the kids can enjoy it, or you can even change it up so that it’s sweet and spicy – changing it to more sweet or more spicy is the beauty of this recipe, and I’m sure it’s one that’ll go into your recipe book. It’s got a sweet, savory, somewhat smoky flavor that’ll please kids and adults alike!

INGREDIENTS:

• 3-4 yams peeled and cubed
• 2 pounds of kielbasa sausages sliced thin
• 1 cup of imperial brown sugar
• ½ cup of ketchup
• ¼ cup of prepared horseradish

OPTIONAL: 

• ½ pound of your favorite bacon
• 3-4 jalapenos sliced
• 1 teaspoon of liquid smoke
• ½ teaspoon of Worchester sauce

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. While the oven is heating up, work on washing, peeling, and cubing your potatoes, and slicing your sausage. The sausage should be sliced no more than about half an inch thin.
3. If you choose to add in bacon and jalapenos, go ahead and cook them in a skillet as you normally would, but cook until *almost* done. You’ll finish the cooking process of the bacon in the oven – but cook them together. (I like to use peppered bacon with this recipe.)
4. Butter or grease a 13×9 baking dish, and set to the side.
5. In a large bowl, pour all the ingredients in, and mix very well until the majority of ingredients are coated with the sugar and horseradish, along with any other optional ingredients you opted to add.
6. Pour the mixture into the baking dish and set in the oven, and bake for about 90 minutes (or until the potatoes have a golden brown crust and the sausage is done.) Be sure to stir the mixture about every 30 minutes, and keep an eye on it.
7. Serve when completely done, and enjoy while hot!

SIDE NOTE:

If you’d like to take this recipe a step further, you can actually do the same things, but instead of using a baking sheet, use a skillet and cook it over a charcoal grill for added flavor! This mix would go good with a side of some mashed potatoes with some brown gravy. As a matter of fact, we actually have a good homemade recipe for loaded mashed potatoes here. It’s got savory things in it such as bacon, and cheese, and would be a good companion to this dish to balance out the sweetness of this dish. However, if you don’t like too much sweetness you can cut the sugar in half, but if you enjoy sweet and spicy together, try adding in the jalapenos and you can even add in crushed chili flakes, and if you dare, you can sub the sausage for a spicy variation.