Palatial Expansion and Your Stovetop

[tomEisenbraun]

Okay, so I've just moved into an apartment again (after a tough few interim months in my dad's house), and I have discovered that, if God had not invented people who love to cook for us (namely, those who choose to date as well as cook for the hairier-sexed [most of the time] ones of us), I would be terribly malnourished and smoking a lot more cigarettes than my current per capita of none. All that terribly-phrased and probably horribly misused English to say, I need to be able to cook more than just chicken and rice. I've got a killer chicken and rice recipe, and I can cook up some mackin' Zatarain's and make some great basted chicken to go along with it, but I think both of those technically qualify as "chicken and rice". I can also put frozen broccoli in a pot of water and make broccoli.

Aside from sandwiches and apples, and some of my super-secret breakfast skillet prowess, I've run out of things to cook. My diet is lacking variety, and that brings me to the point where I'd rather not cook and eat anything rather than eating the same old thing. Which means I'll lose weight and not be very healthy. I don't eat enough veggies as it is, and apparently I've lost some of my lactose tolerance, because milk makes my tummy say "uh-uh" whenever I have more than a couple ounces. Sucks for ice-cream, but we'll live.

Well, all asides put aside, the purpose of this thread is:

You can cook. I can cook. More than likely, we cook different things. Let's share these, and we'll all keep from wasting away. Then we'll have a big MMJ Fanboard cookbook in a couple weeks, hopefully! That, and we'll have good new things to try out from all kinds of different people. This should be pretty fun, and we can all respond to each other's recipes and offer tips and changes and get a taste of where everybody's from, even as we eat hundreds and thousands of miles away from each other. I think it's kind of a cool idea, at least!

So donate your favorite recipes, and let's see what we come up with!

[tomEisenbraun]

(before I give my recipe, I do apologize if I immediately came off as sexist in my above post. My personal situation is that my girl loves to cook for me, but we're in conflicting schedules right now where we don't get to eat dinner with each other hardly ever. I love to cook for her, and she loves to cook for me, so it's a great trade-off, until I get tired of cooking for just one person and she's not around to give me reason to do something different.)

Moving on, here's my donation:

Chicken And Rice

-1lb. skinless boneless chicken breasts
-1 small can Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup (if you don't dig mushrooms, try Broccoli)
-a splash of milk
-2 pkgs Mahatma yellow rice (the kind in the tall skinny pack)
-some salt and pepper for seasonin' purposes

1. Preheat oven to 350[ch730]
2. Prepare the rice according to the package's instructions, but only cook for about ten minutes.
3. After the rice has cooked ten minutes, put it in a 9"x13" casserole dish as your bottom layer.
4. Season your chicken to taste with the salt and pepper and whatever other herbs and/or spices you like
5. Toss the chicken on top of the rice
6. In a small bowl, mix just enough milk into the soup to make it easy to pour. Keep it creamy. If it gets to watery, just even it out with a little bit of flour. Pour it evenly across the top of the rice and chicken, doing your best to coat the chicken the best.
7. Toss in the oven and cook for about 45 minutes.

I normally cook broccoli along with this meal, but I suppose other veggies would work just fine!

[dragonboy]

I love to cook but dislike following recipes. I far prefer just 'throwing' things in the pot & believe it or not it works 9 times out of ten.
Last night for example, I made a mean Chili using some mince (no idea how many grams it was) a tin of kidney beans, 1 tin of chopped tomatoes, 1 onion (finely chopped), half a tin of chopped pineapple, a handful of jalapeño peppers (finely chopped), lots of chilli powder, jalapeño powder, cumin, a little garlic, worchestershire sauce, chipotle tabasco sauce, a little bit of BBQ sauce & a dash of honey.
If I were to cook the same dish tonight there's a very good chance it could taste completely different but that's half the fun of cooking for me!

[tomEisenbraun]

Very cool!

What exactly is mince, if you don't mind me askin? That might be a food that just has a different word for it from the UK to Japan to the US.

[dragonboy]

What exactly is mince, if you don't mind me askin? That might be a food that just has a different word for it from the UK to Japan to the US.

Just minced beef. It was probably 50% beef & 50% pork actually. What do you can minced meat in the US? Ahh wait...ground meat?!!

[dragonboy]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minced_meat

Yeah ground meat  :)

[red]

I'm a rice/eggs/pasta master!  

Can't recommend the toasted peanut butter and banana sandwich, probably the best food ever.

[dragonboy]

I'm a rice/eggs/pasta master!

It's all well & good showing off but we need recipes!  ;)

[red]

It's all well & good showing off but we need recipes!  ;)

Whoa whoa whoa, there's only one ingredient in my recipes!  Although, sometimes I put red onion in my scrambled eggs or almonds in my rice.   8-)

[dragonboy]

 ;D  can't wait for your cook-book to come out!

[megisnotreal]

i love to cook.

the only thing is that i don't really have any recipes. i just sort of make it up as i go along. i have a lot of cookbooks and all, but the way my mom and grandmothers taught me to cook was, like, "you need a big heaping cup of flour" or "put in just enough garlic" and so on.

cooking is fun. if i could afford it, i would go to culinary school.

[tomEisenbraun]

Yeah, ground meat, ground beef, ground chuck. Depending on how lean the beef is, it gets different names. Ground chuck, ground round, ground sirloin...those go from highest fat content to the leanest. Ground sirloin is about 90/10 lean/fatty.

[tomEisenbraun]

well, how bout a specific question?

anyone have a good throw-together salsa combination? not actual quantities, but sort of a general scope of what to throw in there?

[BH]

Each day that passes, I enjoy cooking more and more.  My mom is a great cook and she inspires me to do the same.  I'm still learning, but I think people that say they can't cook, really just mean, "I don't like to cook" because it's just as easy as following directions.  My local newspaper has a food section once a week and I like to try new stuff from there when I have time.  I'll post a few of my favorites when I get a chance.   Grilling and Smoking is also fun to explore.

[LizKing531]

well, how bout a specific question?

anyone have a good throw-together salsa combination? not actual quantities, but sort of a general scope of what to throw in there?

I had a pretty kick ass salsa recipe - from what I can remember

tomato
red onion
cilantro
small amount of hot pepper of your choice (jalapeno, habenero, etc.)
tomatillo


I think that was all I put in it - we were getting a veggie basket once a week from a local farm - this week is the last one :(    Looks like I've gotta go to the grocery again

Now, if we want to talk salsa recipes - might as well bring up queso recipes

1-lb WHITE american (from deli counter)
a couple splashes of milk
hoppy, strong beer (1/2) - recommend a good IPA

chili pepper
jalapeno
perhaps a seasonal hot pepper of choice
chipolte pepper

all peppers diced to a total of around a cup


simmer peppers in beer for about 20-30 minutes - boil off 1/2 the liquid - add cheese - add a bit off milk if its too thick - enjoy!      :P ;)

[vespachick]

I do this whole casseroly type thing in a big giant pan, you know, the kind you'd make a big pot of soup in, with non-plastic handles so it can go in the oven:

Brown some ground beef - I dunno, maybe a pound and a half; (I also freqently use ground turkey instead and it's still tasty, but needs more spicin up)
Throw in a chopped up onion and a garlic clove or four to brown;
Put in, oh, a cup of uncooked rice (I use white);
1 can of kidney beans
1 can of corn
1 smaller can of diced Ortega Chile's
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 can of sliced black olives
A bay leaf or two
salt, pepper, cumin and possibly some cinnamon or allspice
Probably needs some liquid so the rice can cook, I usually just use the liquid from the canned veg's; plus maybe a little water or stock if it's lying around.
Let it sit covered on the burner until the rice is cooked (20 mins?) until it's sort of thick and "stewey".
Once that's done layer the top with shredded cheddar cheese and put it in the oven to melt the top.

Eat it.  I like it with some sour cream and salsa.  Some people call it Texas Hash.  I call it deliciously easy.

[EC]

how about some soups?  mmm soup.  

ec's lentil soup with apples
1 cup green lentils
4-5 cups water
3-4 smallish onions
2-3 apples
lots of cloves of garlic (i use a whole head)
basil
cumin
cinnamon
probably salt if you like salt in food

rinse those green lentils real good.  put them in a biggish pot (like a soup pot) with the water and turn it to high.  in the meantime, peel as many cloves of garlic as you think you can handle (they cook so long that they're realy benign, but they're so good for you), cut each clove into thirds and throw them in with the lentils.  wait for it to boil.  

cut up the onions and start to cook them on med/high in a smaller pot in a bit of oil.  once they're starting to get soft, add the apples.  keep stirring.  

in the meantime your lentils are probably boiling - turn the heat down to low/med (2) and you'll leave that alone for a while (1-1.5 hours) but not before you dump a whack of basil in there.

back to the onions and apples - add cumin and cinnamon to taste (i bet cardamom would be yummy in there, too) and keep stirring eventually bringing the heat down so that the apples don't burn.  once everything in the apple/onion pot is really really soft, just put it aside for a bit.

the lentils will make their own soup - after an hour you're good - i like to leave them longer to get softer.  but you can throw that apple/onion stuff in there whenever you feel like it.

and then have it with bread and butter YUM!

another idea is to throw some pureed butternut squash in.  butternut squash is easy to cook (cut in half lengthwise, de-seed, put the halves cut side down on a cookie sheet and bake for about 20-30 minutes in probably a 350 degree oven - whatever your conversion is for that, i don't know.  once they've cooled a bit, just peel off the skin and throw in a blender and then throw them in your soup.)

soup is also romantic.  i had a soup date last week that ended well.

[bowl of soup]

I too love Soup.  The food of the huddled masses.  Make French Onion:
-Take about 8 medium onions and cut em thin.
-Throw a couple of tablespoons of butter and olive oil in a soup pot and met over medium.
-Throw the onion in with some thyme stir like crazy for 15 minutes until they start to brown.
-Cut the heat to med low, cover and stir every 3 minutes for the next 40 minutes.  The onions will turn almost dark brown (about the color of the people that Tracy hates).
-Throw a couple of shots of dry sherry in, bring the heat to high and cook off all of the booze.
-Throw in about 4 cups of beef stock (A box of Organic broth works too) and let simmer for about 30 minutes.
-Put in a crock, top with a hard piece of garlic bread and a mound of swiss-type cheese, melt under a broiler and you're there.

[EC]

cook off all of the booze.

exsqueeze me?  why the hell would you do that?

just kiddin'.

to me it's not real onion soup unless the cheese is gruyère.  mmm stinky cheese yummmmmm

[bowl of soup]

cook off all of the booze.

exsqueeze me?  why the hell would you do that?

just kiddin'.

to me it's not real onion soup unless the cheese is gruyère.  mmm stinky cheese yummmmmm

Yes, gruyere.  The closest that I could come to spelling that right was "Swiss-type".  I am a product of Florida public schools.