The Kitchen: all things delicious and disastrous

Ok.

So I found some barley at the health food store. I made my soup with soup mix and barley, more liquid than usual and a lot more vegetables than usual. My pot was filled to the brim and and very filling and delicious after I doubled my seasoning amount. Served it with egg noodles. For the curious:

• 1/2 cup barley
• 1/2 cup soup mix (split peas, lentils, barley, alphabet pasta, etc)
• 3 cups water
• 1 teaspoon chicken soup base
• 2 stalks broccoli
• 2 carrots
• 2 chicken thighs
• 1 very large onion
• ~10 mini potatoes
• ~3 cups chicken broth
• Italian seasoning, oregano and ground pepper

edited 17th Mar '11 7:45:13 PM by Jace

...Welp, using navy beans makes it taste really bland. I'd go back to using pintos and red kidneys, but I still have a bunch of the buggers left.

What are you making and are you vegetarian?

If you aren't vegetarian navy beans and ham go together like ham and beans or fry up some bacon. If you don't eat meat you can still add smoke and/or maple for more flavor. Carmelized onion and shallot and a little garlic can help jazz it up. So does tabasco or Louisiana style pepper sauce. Or curry powder. I improvise a lot in the kitchen.

I was making beans and rice, and while I'm not vegetarian, the whole point is to make something cheap and filling to eat during the week, and meat is expensive.

There's already onion in it, and I haven't tried it with curry powder.

edited 17th Mar '11 9:07:23 PM by EnglishIvy

The rice will soak up a lot of spice flavor without tasting like it. Bump your spice amounts.

Yep. You don't need to be that cautious with it. Go up a notch for next time.

My two adolescent cats are play-fighting. It's cute, but is often the precursor to breaking things.

So, my friend is having a housewarming party in a week and wants us to bring a plate. I live in a residential college with food provided, so ordinarily i don't cook. I have access to a kitchen but my ingredients are very limited, because there's no point in me buying a couple of kilos of flour when I only want a cup of it.

Any sugestions for quick things that won't leave me with lots of leftover ingredients?

edited 17th Mar '11 11:09:58 PM by LoniJay

Got a casserole dish? (or one you can borrow? Even the disposable aluminum ones work.) Baked spaghetti or ravioli usually goes over well.

edited 17th Mar '11 11:12:21 PM by Madrugada

Either that or make piggies in a blanket. two tubes of crescent rolls, and a pack of mini wieners. roll em in the dough and bake em from the package. I usually can make 32 because i split the crescent roll dough triangles in half.

Refried beans from a can heated in the microwave with cheese melted on top with a bag of tortilla chips is good and easy. You can fancy it up with chopped onion and peppers and stuff if you want.

I make a taverna platter that is: sundried tomatoes, pepperocini peppers, Kalamata olives, marinated mushrooms, aritchoke hearts and toasted pita triangles. Everyone makes little sandwiches to their taste. This is kind of expensive to make though depending on what's available.

Gazpacho salad: Chop up a cucumber, 2 tomatoes, an onion I usually use a sweet onion but purple ones look pretty, and one or two bell peppers green ones are cheaper but orange or yellow look pretty. You can make a dressing with olive oil and wine vinegar and jazz it up with salt pepper garlic and maybe some cumin. Or just buy some vinegar and oil commercial dressing and use it. Mix it all together and let is set for a couple of hours in the fridge. If you throw in a can of drained garbanzos it has a little more weight to it and becomes vaguely mid Eastern.

edited 18th Mar '11 8:43:16 AM by blackcat

Fun fact: When using minimal spices to bring out the flavor of the meat, make sure you use meat that has a good flavor and isn't, say, ten minutes from going bad after being in the fridge a week and a half.

My fiancee bought us a new cookbook I've been wanting! Too bad he's an ocean away.

What's your favorite cookbook Kitcobs? I love my new cookbook Never Cook Bacon Naked. It's chock full of recipes that are both simple and gourmet,and packed with tips and tricks to make each recipe fabulous. It even has sections about wine parings and knife sharpening and what to have in your pantry. It's awesome.

I need to get actual cookbooks. I just get random recipes online.

We have a whole bookcase of cookbooks and food books, from Larousse to Martha Stewart (actually, hers are pretty good).

Most of the time, though, we don't use recipes and just play it by ear.

edited 18th Mar '11 4:48:25 PM by Morven

I have a bookcase-shelf worth of cookbooks as well. I read them for pleasure, and (like Morven) mostly cook "by ear".

Ratio by Michael Ruhlman is fabulous. It's all about the basic ratios of cooking. Breads, quick breads, sauces, stocks, a bunch of stuff. His theory is that once you understand how things work, you can make shit up better. Because I used to spend a lot of time researching recipes to discover the common ground this book has really been handy.

Culinary Fundamentals by the Culinary Institute of America. Text book for culinary schools. Good basic info.

I tend to cook by intuition as well. I have one cookbook for soup, of all things. It was a gift from the family that took me in when I moved away from home.

I have a blank recipe book that I'm trying to fill, writing down my mother's recipes.

It's one of those ones divided into 'salads' 'meat dishes' 'seafood' 'deserts', but I think I'm going to take out the dividers and just fill it with deserts and baking.

I have a three ring binder with custom dividers. I write down interesting recipes and my modifications.

Don't do a whole lot of baking though.

I think American Cheese is okay.

It has it's place. For example, grilled cheese sandwiches just wouldn't be the same with any other cheese.

Cheddar works for grilled cheese.

It works, but for a seriously delicious grilled cheese sandwich you need that sliced and pre-wrapped American cheese, and an entire stick of butter.

...and a can of tomato soup.