Feb
02
I really like this technique for cooking steaks. I picked it up from the Amateur Gourmet. Nice and browned on the outside edges and barely bloody on the inside. Salt and pepper your meat for a minimum of fifteen minutes before cooking. Heat your pan to the highest setting with about one tablespoon of butter for every eight ounces of steak. Try and use a regular stainless steel pan because Teflon is no good for browning. Place another pad of butter on top of the steak and cook covered for two to four minutes. Flip and cook the other side for the same amount of time and you’ll have a medium rare steak in under ten minutes.
- steak
- salt
- black pepper
- butter
To make it like a Dutch Steak, top with the following, and broil. Leave your steak nice and bloody if you plan on adding this topping. It should only need two minutes on each side.
- Mix together the following:
- 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
- 1 teaspoon sweet hot mustard
- 3 tablespoons Parmesan
Jan
22
- 1 1/2 pounds ground meat
- 1/2 cored and peeled apple
- 1/4 diced potato
- 1 cup oats
- 2 eggs
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire
- 1/2 diced onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- salt
- black pepper
- dash of thyme
- 16 oz prepared red cabbage with apple bits
- paprika
Mix everything except the cabbage and paprika in a bowl. Knead until every item is distributed evenly. Place cabbage on bottom of baking dish. Sprinkle paprika. Spread meat mixture on top of cabbage. Cover and cook in oven for one our at 350 degrees. Forty minutes in, feel free to drain. With ten minutes left, cover with sauce.
Sauce for meatloaf
- 4 tablespoons minced onion
- 1/4 cup ketchup
- 4T of brown sugar,
- 4T vinegar,
- 2T Worchestershire Sauce
- 1 teaspoon basil leaves
Simmer everything in a small sauce pan and stir constantly. Serve with meatloaf.
Jan
01
- 1 can chili con carne with beans
- 1/4 cup diced tomato
- 1/4 cup diced onion
- 2 cups cooked rice
- cumin
- garlic powder
- onion powder
- 3 tablespoons sour cream
The purpose of this meal is to learn how to make do with little and at the same time learn how to stretch what you do have. I could have very easily used a whole onion or a whole tomato but when you are running low on produce, it can be a good practice to use them in portions so that you have some left over to flavor other foods with in the future.
Every time I cook chili or beans, I always make sure to have some cooked rice with the meal. This technique will stretch one can of chili into four separate meals that aren’t boring even if simple.
The only preparation, really, for this dish was the effort put into presentation. Warm your chili on the stove, at end of cooking time toss in your diced veggies but save about one fourth of the jalapeno for garnishing purposes. Season rice with your cumin and garlic powder, top with chili, then sour cream followed by jalapeno slices. The technique I used for the jalapenos was to cut at an angle in order to provide more surface area to make it look more pretty.
p.s. Canned chili almost never looks pretty or appetizing unless you are quite familiar with it.
Dec
30
I had an extra packet of mac ‘n’ cheese sauce mix lying around. Amazingly, this was made from stuff we had in the fridge.
- 1 lb of spaghetti
- 1 lb bratwurst, sliced into 1 inch pieces
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1 green pepper, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, minced or 1 tbsp garlic powder
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 can of diced tomatoes
- 1 c chicken broth
- 1 c heavy cream
- 1 packet of macaroni and cheese sauce mix
- Italian seasoning
- salt and black pepper to taste
Boil a pot of salted water and cook the spaghetti to al dente. Sauté the brats, onion, pepper and garlic in olive oil. Add the tomatoes and chicken broth, and reduce by half. Add the cream and reduce again. Add the rest of the ingredients and serve over the spaghetti.
sauté
Dec
30
- 1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
- 1/2 onion, minced
- 1/2 green pepper, minced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- salt and pepper
- dash cumin and cayenne pepper
- 1 c bread crumbs
- 2 eggs, beaten
- thin sourdough baguette slices, toasted
- diced tomato
- minced onion
- brown mustard
- grated Parmesan cheese
Mix all the ingredients up to the eggs, mashing the beans until lumpy. Place onto the baguette slices and garnish with the remaining ingredients.
Dec
28
My aunt made this amazing stuffing for Christmas dinner. I know it’s not Christmas day anymore but it’s okay to have a family dinner the Monday after. I honestly think this is the tastiest stuffing I’ve had.
- 6 cups crumbled cornbread (to be cooked prior to this)
- 4 apples (cooking apples)
- 2 sprigs parsley
- 2 sprigs sage
- 2 sprigs rosemary
- 2 sprigs thyme
- 4 stalks celery
- 1 large yellow onion (2 small onions will work)
- 3/4 cup Half and Half
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 3 eggs
- 5 links Colosimo’s red wine sausage
- 8 tablespoons butter (this is a whole stick)
- 4 cloves garlic
Melt one stick of butter in a frying pan and soften your peeled cored diced apples and place these aside.
The purpose of the sausage is to help make a base for the stuffing. We can do this by slicing each sausage in half, then scraping the meat from the casing. Discard the case. Brown the sausage like you would with ground beef. After the sausage is browned, add the sliced celery and onion. Cook until slightly tender.
Using your fingers, scrape the leaves from your sprigs of herbs and chop them finely before adding to the mixture.
Take your crumbled cornbread and mix with the apples. Blend the eggs with half and half then add to the cornbread mixture. Knead gently. Once this is all blended, mix with the sausage mixture by hand. Make sure that things are moist enough to form into balls.
Roll into balls slightly smaller than your fist. You’ll only get one shot at shaping these correctly. Place into muffin cups in a muffin tin and bake at 375 for 20 – 30 minutes. For extra pizazz you can garnish each serving with a pecan or parsley or whatever you think would be good.
I may or may not edit this post in the near future for better readability.
While
cooking the meat mixture,
Dec
22
Things have been tough lately and I’m sure most people can agree. For the next few months I will be sharing recipes that depend upon canned goods other items that people receive from the food bank. I’ve known a lot of people that have had to rely on charity from others recently and these are some of the things I have been cooking for friends and family based on the canned goods they receive from food donations.
Here’s a great way to use up all those canned tomatoes you have in your food storage. You’ll need three different types. Fresh produce can be difficult to come across during the winter but with the right spices (if you’ve been stocking your pantry properly) you can make some decent tasting food.
Spaghetti Sauce
- 1 28oz can crushed tomatoes
- 1 16oz can stewed tomatoes (I got lucky and this one had bell peppers in it)
- 1 16oz can diced tomatoes
- 1/4 cup brown sugar (to taste)
- Italian seasoning (most people have this instead of parsley, oregano, rosemary and thyme)
- splash of olive oil
- minced onions
- onion powder (to taste)
- garlic powder (I’d normally use garlic but I’ve noticed a lot of households don’t carry it)
- dash of cinnamon
- 1/2 of an apple
All you really need to do is cook your sauce first so that it can stew slowly for a while. This will allow all the flavors to blend. Plan on spending about thirty or more minutes with your sauce.
Start with the crushed tomatoes on a medium heat and then add your spices. After everything has blended for a few minutes go ahead and add your stewed tomatoes. If they are whole, slice them. If they are already sliced, you will still want to cut them in half or quarters.
Do not put in the diced tomatoes or the apples until the very end. If you have baking type apples then you can put them in with the diced tomatoes about10 minutes before you are finished. About the same time you start your noodles.
Most people make the mistake of starting their noodles with everything else. Generally, you will want to save the noodles for last.
I wanted to make some carbonara but I didn’t have any pancetta or Parmesan, so I just tossed the noodles with a couple of raw eggs. Don’t let this scare you. All you need to do is throw the noodles into a bowl with eggs and black pepper immediately after you drain the water. The heat from the noodles will cook the eggs well enough. Once the noodles are in just keep stirring and tossing those noodles.
I know this isn’t anything fancy but many people might like to know how to make spaghetti sauce if they don’t have the pre-made stuff laying around. I served tonight’s dinner with some fried and breaded eggplant with a side of green beans and apple muffins for desert. We just used the Jiffy brand boxed muffin mix. Nothing in this meal was fresh but it should be appropriate for the way most people stock their kitchens.
I took some pictures but I failed at figuring out how to transfer them from the cell phone to the computer. Hopefully your imagination makes it look yummy but that’s hard to do knowing everything came from cans.
Aug
25
Yes, cola. I know it sounds weird, but cola adds color and sweetness to the sauce without adding any off flavors and not nearly as sticky-sweet as recipes that use brown sugar. Besides, it’s a fun “secret ingredient” to amaze your friends with at the next barbecue. Use diet for a sugar-free sauce. (I prefer Diet Rite for this, since it is sweetened with Splenda–saccharin breaks down when heated for a long period of time, and it will not be sweet.) Also good are orange or lemon-lime sodas. The chipotle pepper adds smokiness, but you can add liquid smoke at the end if more smoke flavor is desired.
- 1 small onion, minced
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 1 dried chipotle pepper, chopped
- 1 tsp olive oil
- 1 6 oz can tomato paste
- 1 12 oz can cola
- 1/2 c vinegar, white or apple cider
- 1 squirt yellow mustard
- 1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
- salt and black pepper to taste
- hot sauce to taste
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- 1 tsp liquid smoke (optional)
Over a medium heat, sautee onion, garlic, and pepper in olive oil in a medium saucepan until onion is soft and translucent. Add tomato paste and sautee 2-3 minutes, mixing with vegetables. Add all but the last 3 ingredients and stir to mix. Reduce heat to low and simmer 1 hour, stirring periodically. It should thicken quite a bit.
Add lemon juice and hot sauce to taste. Add liquid smoke, if desired.
The mixture will be chunky. If you want a smoother sauce whir in a food processor for a few seconds until smooth.
Jul
21
This isn’t quite how lasagna is traditionally made, but I’ve never made lasagna before and they were the only noodles I had so I just threw this together.
- 1 box lasagna noodles
- 1 dozen spinach leaves
- 1 can pink salmon
- 1 can whole tomatoes
- brown sugar
- 1/2 pound shredded cheese
- 1/8th of a read onion, sliced thin
- 3 cloves garlic
- oregano
- sea salt
- black pepper
- crushed red pepper
- lemon juice
Pre-cook your lasagna noodles just under al dente. Rinse them off with cold water and butter the bottom of a baking pan. Arrange one layer of noodles, I used three for each layer, on the bottom of the pan and top with the spinach. I drizzled a teeny bit of olive oil and then generously sprinkled black pepper on this layer. Add another layer of noodles and fill this layer with your salmon. I could have added capers here if I would have thought about it, but instead I just splashed some lemon juice and sea salt with a pinch of garlic powder onto the salmon layer.
The next layer will be another row of noodles and then your can of tomatoes along with the thinly sliced onions and garlic. Sprinkle some brown sugar across this layer. You can break up the tomatoes with your fingers, no need to slice them. Spread some oregano and crushed red pepper on this layer before topping with one last row of noodles.
The top layer is just the shredded cheese with some more oregano and bake it in the oven at about 375 for approximately thirty-five minutes or so. You know it’s done when the cheese starts to brown slightly. Use the next to bottom rack if you can.
For a side, I made some green onion soup in a beef broth. Both of my dinner guests loved this concoction and ate three servings.
Jul
10
This is all made with items I got from the food co-op. Well, except for the spices and the butter and the tomato sauce.
- 1 lb beef sliced into strips
- 1 green bell pepper
- 2 cups cooked rice
- 2 tablespoons butter
- chili powder
- cumin
- onion powder
- garlic powder
- cayenne
- salt
- black pepper
- honey
- basil
- a few ounces of canned tomato sauce
The secret to making this good is: don’t be afraid to over-spice this. The second most important thing to remember is that your meat will cook quickly. Start with a hot pan with all of your butter and soften your diced pepper. Make sure to have your rice cooked beforehand because this is going to go quick. While the rice was cooking I covered all of the meat with salt, pepper and chili powder.
Once the bell pepper has softened, toss in your meat and cover it with the rest of your spices as it browns. I used everything quite heavily in almost equal amounts. The honey can come next, use maybe two to three tablespoons. This process should take no more than a minute because your meat is close do being done. Dump in the tomato sauce, reduce to a simmer and stir in your rice. Let me remind you, don’t be afraid to use too much cumin, chili powder or cayenne. After a few more minutes, your meal is done.
You can stretch this meal by adding half an onion to this recipe and serving with warm tortillas. For a side serve some re-fried beans however you like them.
