Advice needed!

[sorcyress]

I need very important advice, on two different concepts.

The first I will probably have people jumping to give --in Chicago, it has been declared that each of us kids will cook at least one dinner a week. I made some excellent pasta and cheese last week based on Magus's recipe, but I've slacked this week, and have no idea what to cook tomorrow night. Advice and recipes are needed!

Specifically I want to actually make something, ideally not mostly from a box. Stir-fry is a definite possibility, but I don't know what one would put in such a beast. I'm leaning away from a pasta dish, since both Nik and I did so.

I am, of course, not a cook and do not know how to cook, have any interest in cooking, or ever cook, and any such statements that seem to be to the contrary are a lie. Please take my utter lack of skill into account (ie, "dice" does not make as much sense to me as "chop into tiny pieces")

Also, this kitchen is a little bit lacking in equipment. There are two or three each of pots and frying pans, but we lack a bit in things like spoons. So, again, simpler recipes (that are not from a box!!) are better.

The second I will poss...

...dude, I totally just solved the second problem. I need a historical fiction book to read for the library reading challenge thing (which mom is totally kicking my ass on, mostly because I keep reading things like KoDT comics, which are awesome, but I'm not willing to call them some of the eight novels I have to read) and it occurs to me that "Napoleonic era" is totally historical fiction.

And therefore Napoleonic era with dragons is also totally historical fiction, right? Wevs, it follows the rules for histfic I was setting for myself namely not boring, and ideally Regency. Sweet!

(Unrelatedly, Scott Pilgrim is an awesome first book, and I am so pissed that the rest of the series isn't going to make it back to the library until after we've left. I may have to figure out the fastest (biking?) route to a local library to fix this.)

~Sor
MOOP!

ETA: When it comes to recipes, things without many spices are preferred, due to the aforementioned woefully understocked kitchen. So yeah, that. Also, thank you all. <3

Comments

[marcmagus]

I heartily approve of your solution to the second problem. Funny, those books seem to be coming up a lot today.

[shield-toad111.livejournal.com]

Ah, meal prep. I kind of love it, when my kitchen is stocked how I want it and I'm not exhausted..

Stir fries are really easy. I could tell you how to do it in a comment section, but it would get very long and involved. Ask if you want lots of details. Also, doing thai curry is easy if you use fresh ingredients and get a couple cans of coconut milk and a can of thai curry paste for the sauce.

Other things that are easy...

Tuna salad (I'll just do canned tuna, mayo, celery, onion, salt, and pepper) - serve on sliced cucumbers or lettuce.

Baked chicken pieces - I'll usually pick leg quarters -season (salt and herbs or seasoning salt) and then throw in oven at 350 for an hour; serve with whatever accompanying starch [usually rice or oven-roasted potato slices (cut up, toss with oil, salt, and pepper, throw in oven for 30-40 min at 350-450)] and vegetable you want with it.

You could broil sausages (15-20 minutes, I think) and then make mashed potatoes and some sort of vegetable.

Chicken or pork cutlets - pound until even, dust with flour, coat with beaten egg, coat with bread crumbs, fry (med heat for 5-7 min/side) until done. Done when you poke it and it feels springy rather than squishy. Serve with whatever starch and veg strikes your fancy. (Speaking of varied starches... ramen is actually an acceptable side dish if you make it in less water, and only use half a packet of the seasoning so it's not too salty.)

Soup - cut things up, throw in pot, add stock, salt, and pepper and whatever other herbs you might want, simmer for at least 30 min.

If you have time to be around, roasts are really easy, because you basically put seasoning on something and put it in the oven for awhile.

Let's see... meatloaf and meatballs are easy - take some ground beef, and some egg and breadcrumbs and onion and herbs/spices, bake in oven (for either) or fry or cook in sauce (meatballs).

Making meat sauce to go with pasta is another throw some stuff in a pan dish. (Cook an onion and some garlic in oil, add some meat, add some vegetables (mushrooms and peppers are what I usually do) and then add in canned tomatoes. Simmer for at least 20-30 min, Season to taste.

For resources, I really like epicurious.com for cooking recipes, though they do assume that you know basic cooking techniques. But they also have a search by ingredient option, which is helpful. The Joy of Cooking is a fabulous cookbook and I recommend buying a copy.

[shield-toad111.livejournal.com]

Also, I totally should have used this userpic for that comment.

[ncarraway.livejournal.com]

Naomi Novik. Yes?

[merseine0613.livejournal.com]

In this heat/humidity (and I know whereof I speak, as I am in a Chicago suburb now) how about a nifty spinach salad? You can pile on all the various things cut up into bite sized chunks such as:

• hard boiled eggs
  
• crispy bacon
  
• various veggies (carrots, celery, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes...)
  
• various other meats (ham, roast beast, shrimp/crab/krab...)
  
• shredded cheeses of various sorts and/or flavors
  
• a nice dressing - they make Spinach/Bacon dressing - which you can serve cold, or microwave it up for a nice hot dressing. Num!
  
• OH! and some greenery - spinach, radichio, romaine... pick some green leafy stuff and go for it.
  

If this isn't appealing, how about:

• easy chicken casserole (http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1639,145188-254202,00.html)
  
• tuna rice salad (http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1642,149190-247203,00.html)
  
• or easy stir fry (http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1939,152168-241207,00.html)

Really, for stir fry all you need is some meat - chicken is good - cut it up into "small chicken finger" sized strips and some veggies - and the veggies can be a frozen bag of mixed veggies or fresh, whichever. If they're fresh, cut them into pieces about the size of the chicken.

Heat your pan to medium-high or high with some good cooking oil - olive, safflower or peanut oil, depending on allergies and taste - and when the pan is fairly hot, toss in the thickest veggies... stir... wait a minute or two, then toss in the rest of the veggies and the meat... stir until everything is GBD: Golden Brown and Delicious. Well, maybe not everything... but definitely the chicken needs to be GBD.

For sauce, mix some spices you like (ginger, garlic, dry mustard, salt, pepper... whatever smells good to you) in some soy sauce. You can soak the chicken in the sauce before hand (30 minutes to 2 hours is plenty!) or toss it in at the end of the frying time.

Hope this helps!

Just sayin'

[whimmydiddle.livejournal.com]

The Once and Future King (of which you own a very lovingly annotated copy) is also historical fiction.

Re: Just sayin'

[herbertinc.livejournal.com]

I just finished reading that. It is awesome.

[elvenyukiryu.livejournal.com]

First... that book series is quite excellent, and a quick read IIRC. Secondly, if you are looking for something in the easy and stir fry category I recommend the skillet meal things you can get in the freezer aisle in the grocery store. Not as fancy as some of the awesomeness those above me are reccommending, but quite yum.
Another thought is my usual backup CRAZYrice. (rice+cubed meat+vegetables+cheese+Soy Sauce). it is ridiculously delicious and very easy to make.

[blaisepascal]

Do you have the ability to bake?

I've recently learned to add Yorkshire Pudding to my repertoire of easy-to-make dishes. Traditionally, it's baked in a roast drip pan after roasting the meat, but the recipe I have is for making it in muffin tins.

For 12 Yorkshire puddings:

Mix 6 eggs, 1 cup flour, 1 cup milk in a mixing bowl until a uniform batter (wisk until smooth, not long). Put bowl aside in refrigerator for at least a half-hour. If you wish to modify the flavor of the puddings, this would be a good time for additives: savory puddings can be made by adding minced onions and garlic (minced == chopped into tiny bits, or minced garlic == spooned out of a jar), paprika, herbs, spices, etc. Sweet puddings can be made by adding cinnamon, nutmeg, a little sugar, etc.

In a 12-muffin muffin tin, put a small amount of oil, grease, butter or fat into each cup. If bacon fat is your thing, this is perfect for it. Well, unless you are doing sweet puddings. Either grease the tin with the fat (i.e. coat the entire cup with a thin layer of fat), or prespray the tin with something like Pam or similar cooking spray. The fat does two jobs: mold release and flavor. Without the mold release, they may stick.

Put greased tin in the oven, preheat to 400°F (yes, put the empty, greased tin in before preheating).

When the oven is at 400°F, take the now very hot, empty tin out of the oven, and pour the chilled batter into each cup, filling them about half-way.

Put the now filled tin back in the oven, and ignore it for a half-hour to 40 minutes. When they are done (which you should check visually through the closed oven door) they will have risen to look like oversized muffins, well above the top of the tin, have a glossy-brown color, and may look like they've got a huge dimple in them. They should look solid, not wet.

Take them out (they may shrink/fall slightly), remove from tins, and serve.

The ones I had yesterday were made with dried onion, minced garlic, paprika and fresh dill, and were topped with shredded cheese post-bake.

If a roast is already being made, prepare the batter in the proportions mentioned above and when the roast comes out of the oven simply pour the batter, en masse, in to the drip pan filled with hot drippings, put back in the oven for 30-40 minutes, and enjoy after the main course.

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

Chili.
It's incredibly, incredibly forgiving.
Chop up some garlic into teeny little bits. Or buy the minced stuff that comes in a jar with water or olive oil (what I ususally do). Toss about a teaspoon into a skillet and throw a chopped onion in with it. When the onion's looking clearish, throw in about a pound of ground meat. Beef, chicken, pork, deer, buffalo, ostrich, heart of your deadliest foe (might want to marinate first, these are really tough), whatever. Cook until brown and crumbly. Pour off most of the fat. Dump crumbly bits into a big cauldron pot of some sort.

Add a can of diced tomatoes. The kind that come with green chilis is always especially nice. Keep the water.

Add two cans of beans. Any beans you want. We usually go for black + kidney, but anything that'll keep its shape works well.

If you feel like it, add a can of drained sweet corn. You can also throw in chopped red or green bell peppers if you're looking to incorporate more veggies.

Add a big heaping tablespoon of chili powder.

Add the following, in whatever order or whatever amounts seem to work for you. Generally start with a teaspoon of each and work up from there.

Ground Cumin
Dried Oregano
Paprika (hot, sweet, smoked, whatever you like)
Garlic powder
Onion powder
Cayenne Pepper (if you want it hotter)

Serve with corn bread. We use jiffy mix with a can of creamed corn stirred into the batter. It's incredibly awesome.

[macaroniandtuna.livejournal.com]

I suggest garlic chicken (http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Garlic-Chicken/Detail.aspx). I've made it, it's simple and easy and delicious. Rice makes a good side for it.

[mrbelm.livejournal.com]

Your having no interest in cooking is one of the saddest things I have ever heard.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

I am sorry. I don't mean to have no interest in cooking! But I think of it a bit like sculpture --if I had to sculpt things to survive, I would do so, and my sense of pride would cause me to do as well as I could. But I get no intrinsic delight out of the art, and don't necessarily wish to drag the whole of the form down with my inadequate attempts.

I think cooking is awesome, I think people who *can* cook are awesome, I think watching cookery occur is awesome, and I think the end result of good cooking is one of those excellent things in the world.

But for me, it's just a survival skill. It's nothing at all compared to the delight I get from writing or dancing. I'm happy to leave it to the real artists.

((That is not to say that I don't fully intend to get Much Better at it. I see no reason why I shouldn't apply my occasionally perfectionistic tendencies to the art of the kitchen, and it is something I will have to do for the rest of my life, unless I somehow become gob-smackingly rich, or manage to shack up with someone who finds it as much a delight as you or shield_toad111 does.

Part of my stubborn denial that I don't cook is because I keep having to deal with people becoming uncomfortably enthusiastic with me when I mention I've been cooking. I don't like having to break their heart by pointing out that this doesn't mean I have joined the secret society of people who are actually good at turning ingredients into food, I just needed lunch.))

Whew, this got long. And a little meandery. Look, I never said I was any *good* at my chosen artforms, just that I enjoy doing them...

~Sor

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

Also now I feel all guilty. I'm sorry. :(

Oh, and it occurs to me that I *do* get some degree of intrinsic glee out of sous-chefery. On the few occasions when I've gotten to use a good knife to chop things, it's made me mind-bogglingly happy (though I wish I were better at the skill), and I like mixing things (it's fun to watch them blend, with the different colours and textures and such) and I am happy as a clam to wash dishes. There are certainly things I enjoy doing in a kitchen.

I'm just not a chef, nor will I ever be one. I'm just this college kid, trying to survive, yaknow?

~Sor

[mrbelm.livejournal.com]

Cooking is a skill that can be learned. If you never practice it, you'll never get any good at at.

[mrbelm.livejournal.com]

Sorry, hit the return key by accident...

Practice cooking skills and you'll get better at it. Buy and learn to maintain one good sharp knife. Learn a few recipes that are above the level of subsistence eating. Because the only thing more sad than not wanting to cook is relegating food to nothing more than necessary caloric intake.

Maybe when you return to Camberville I'll have you help out in my kitchen before I feed you.

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

I would like that a lot.

Food itself is absolutely not nothing more than necessary caloric intake. (If it were, I would be better at balancing what I ate to make sure I got my daily vitamins and such). There exist in the world such things as my boyfriend's mac 'n cheese, and apples-grapes-brie crepes, and more or less the entirety of JP Licks, or your awesome...well, everything really. There is even good food that comes in boxes, like Thin Mint girl scout cookies. Food is brilliant, and I really seriously enjoy eating it.

As an art form, however, I much prefer to appreciate than create. All good artists need an audience, no?

~Sor

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

Hm - chicken parm? (you can make rice, or mashed potatoes if you don't want to do noodles with it). You basically just put tomato sauce in a casserole dish, then chicken breast that you've dipped in egg and breadcrumbs, then more sauce, then some cheese, bake it until the chicken is done, put a little bit more cheese on top and broil until the cheese is nice and melty and browned.

Lasagna? (yeah, pasta - sorry - but it's simple..)

Baked fish? Salt and pepper and lemon juice, bake it until the fish flakes with a fork. Sides? - potato wedges? just cut the potatoes into wedges, toss in a bowl with oil and salt and pepper, put on a baking sheet. Same method for brussels sprouts (works beter with fresh but also works with frozen).

If my couscous recipe looked good to you, you can totally do it with less spices. Just cook the chicken in some oil with whatever seasonings you have around that seem good.

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

Breakfast for dinner? Scrambled or fried eggs, breakfast sausage, Home fries - cubed potato (pre cook in microwave for a minute so it doesn't take forever in the skillet), small pieces of onion, salt pepper garlic, whatever spices you have that look good.

Veggie omelets, bacon omelets?

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

Speaking of egg dishes: QUICHE!

Buy a pie shell. No really, just buy one. Making pie dough is one of those secret cooking arts that takes years to perfect.

6 eggs + 1 1/4 cups half-and-half + 1/4 teaspoon salt. Beat until smooth, uniform, and a little bit frothy.

Add 1-2 cups of whatever you want. No, really. Pretty much anything. Veggies, meats, cheeses. Anything that tastes good together. All it needs to be is reasonably dryish (fresh tomatoes, for example, will leak out too much water) and delicious. Meats should be cooked before adding to eggs.
Faves: Bacon and swiss. Mushrooms and Parmesan. Bell peppers, cheddar, and chicken. Spinach and feta.

Pour eggy goo into shell. Bake at 375 for half an hour. Let stand at least ten minutes before cutting.

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

If you have leftover batter, fry it as if you were making scrambled eggs. It is also tasty.

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

Great idea. Yes. You can use milk instead of half-and-half with no problem. :)

[kdsorceress.livejournal.com]

Hopefully this will reach you in time --will frozen veggies work, do you think? Or will they be too damp?

~Sor

[moniquill.livejournal.com]

Thaw first (microwave defrosting will do) and blot with paper towels.

[harena.livejournal.com]

My favoritest historical fiction ever is River God (http://www.amazon.com/River-God-Novel-Ancient-Egypt/dp/0312954468) by Wilbur Smith, which follows a Pharaoh's slave as he helps them get through a slice of ancient Egypt's history.

Also, i'd suggest my baked chicken which is the easiest thing to make ever (duh, if i can cook it anyone can) and is very versatile: slap any number of chicken legs or thighs or drumsticks in a shallow pan, season as you desire (i put salt, garlic powder, paprika, & basil) and bake at 350 (after preheating to 450 or so and immediately turning it down after putting the chicken in) for an hour. Done'd!

Also Also, don't let anyone make you feel guilty for not loving cooking and/or not being good at it. :| It's just not everyone's cup o' tea, dangit. And, of course, it's my own personal hobby horse 'cause i'm supposed to like cooking 'cause i'm a *girl* AND a mother so everyone's always trying to *fix* me and say "You'll like it better if you only get more practice and it gets easier blah blah blah" and i get highly resentful of this. And so on. So no getting guilty or i'll set your negvox on fire, so there. *shakes an enraged ferret fist*

[woozle.livejournal.com]

Historical fiction: We're about to zoop out the door so I'll have to look up the exact title if you can't find it, but it's got "The Redemption of Christopher Columbus" in it and it's by Orson Scott Card (who I am still not boycotting despite his odious views on certain subjects). Part of it is true-to-history, and part is alternate-universe -- but it's pretty clear which is which, iirc.

Also Harry Turtledove has a whole series of alternative-universe historical fiction. I don't know if that's helpful.

Your dislike of cooking makes you more more similar to both of us over here at Hypertwin Central, and does not make me at all sad. (I could probably write a further paragraph on this subject. but it would be getting a bit off-topic and... time.)

I could whang together something resembling recipes for stir-fry chicken and stir-fry spaghetti sauce, if that would be useful (ingredients, just so you know what kind of Thing they each are: garlic, lots of chopped onion, chopped pepper, tomatoes, and whatever spices and sauces you happen to have on hand; ratios very flexible) but I don't have it written down at the moment since I do it mostly extemporaneously.

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

The Christopher-Columbus book is called "Pastwatch" and is a great book, IMO. (OSC's odious views aside.)

[ms-hecubus.livejournal.com]

You should read "Master and Commander" by Patrick o'Brien. I seriously love those books!

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

Next time you are at ratatosk's place.. check out this cookbook that he has in his kitchen: How To Cook Everything (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0471789186). If you think it might be useful/helpful, I'd be thrilled to get you a copy. (I kind of want one too. :)

You don't have to like or enjoy cooking, but it is a good skill to have. :) *hugs*