Can you teach a man how to cook?

[boedicca]

Super easy baked chicken:

- Preheat oven to 350
- Place chicken parts in a baking dish (I use parchment paper to line it, but that's optional)
- Sprinkle with garlic powder, paprika, and parmesan cheese. (mr. boe also likes oregano on his pieces)
- Bake for approximately 30 minutes or until done

This is my emergency no time to cook meal. Add a salad or some steamed veggies. So easy.

 

[koshergrl]

Learn how to roux...once you can make roux, you can make simple, ordinary meals sublime.

Basic roux:

Butter (or shortening...or bacon fat...or lard)

Flour

Salt

Melt the fat. Add enough flour that it completely absorbs/bonds the fat.

Whisk over the heat until the mixture is bubbly through....if you want it to be darker, keep over the heat until you have the color you want. Add salt.

Add liquid, at least a couple of cups. It can be milk, or water or beef or chicken broth...it depends on what the sauce is for.

Whisk and allow to simmer until thickened, stirring more or less continually.

Pour into sauce container/gravy boat.

Once you get this down, you're as good as gold. This is how one starts for cheese sauce, or chicken fried steak gravy....

For the cheese, you add the milk and then gradually add shredded cheese after starts to thicken.

Sausage gravy:

Put sausage in a pan...cook and break up.

Add flour to sausage/fat in the pan...

Follow the directions above....sausage gravy (kids love).

You can do it with bacon too...fry bacon (then take out the bacon) and use the fat in the pan to make a good white gravy to serve...

DON'T FORGET THE PEPPER..or the salt. Without salt & pepper, you're just eating glue.

 

[boedicca]

And if you know how to make a roux, the drippings from a roast chicken make perfect gravy.

 

[koshergrl]

I am the sole provider for my little family and there have been times when dinner was beans...and breakfast was biscuits (if I made them)...Knowing how to make bread, biscuits, and gravy goes a long way towards turning "poor food" to "soul food"...and making meals feel decadent..instead of monotonous. So beans, instead of being just beans, become beans w/homemade rolls...and breakfast becomes biscuits & gravy.

 

[koshergrl]

And if you know how to make a roux, the drippings from a roast chicken make perfect gravy.

Or the drippings from any meat...

Take the meat out, pour off excess drippings...then put the pan on the stove, add flour and go to town.

Chicken gravy is fabulous...keep all the juice in the pan.

You can make gravy with cornstarch, too...I often do for chicken gravy because there's a lot of juice that I want to use in the place of water...so I just heat up the drippings & juice whisk some cornstarch into a small amount of water, and add a little at a time (while whisking) to the chicken broth/drippings....

 

[boedicca]

Roasting a chicken is perfect One Ingredient Cooking. I set the temp to 400 - it makes the skin crispier. A 5 lb chicken cooks in about an hour. As it's just mr. boe and me, we then have plenty of leftovers for a couple more dinners.

 

[koshergrl]

Knowing how to make homemade applesauce is very nice, too. It's cheap and it is soooooo good, and it's something you can serve with every meal until it's gone.

 

[koshergrl]

Roasting a chicken is perfect One Ingredient Cooking. I set the temp to 400 - it makes the skin crispier. A 5 lb chicken cooks in about an hour. As it's just mr. boe and me, we then have plenty of leftovers for a couple more dinners.

 

[koshergrl]

You can tell it's done when the drumsticks move freely and threaten to come off the carcass (or the meat falls off the bone when you wiggle)

 

[boedicca]

I am the sole provider for my little family and there have been times when dinner was beans...and breakfast was biscuits (if I made them)...Knowing how to make bread, biscuits, and gravy goes a long way towards turning "poor food" to "soul food"...and making meals feel decadent..instead of monotonous. So beans, instead of being just beans, become beans w/homemade rolls...and breakfast becomes biscuits & gravy.

Knowing how to make tasty "cheap eats" is something everyone should learn. We had our lean times, and it was good to be able to rely on that skill and knowledge.

 

[Toro]

Cooking is easy.

If you can follow directions, you can cook.

Epicurious.com: Recipes, Menus, Cooking Articles & Food Guides

 

[Wake]

Wow, you guys have shared more than enough helpful information on cooking. For that I'm grateful. No longer will I desperately eat handfuls of bran flakes and water while longing for sauteed chicken breast and veggies.

Oh, and I had learned the hard way about putting salt in a pot of boiling noodles. The resulting monstrosity stuck to everything and threatened to devour my roommate for sustenance. On the next try two cups of salt had been added, and the resulting salt headache lasted a month—worst of all were the deers hungry for salt.

You've given me plenty of ideas, and I'm eager to use this new information to create a foodstuff that doesn't develop a life of its own.

 

[koshergrl]

Next installment...spanakopita and souffle.

 

[koshergrl]

Cuz everybody with kids should work really hard on creations the kids won't eat.

 

[strollingbones]

first thing you need is a well stocked pantry....here is where everyone will disagree....

you need spices, a mixed pepper corns and grinder, get a good sea salt....not gourmet just good...
you need a few dried products...onions, tomatoes, mushrooms then they are always ready to go...

use your imagination and taste often...as with everything a kiss is involved...as in keep it simple stupid...

one of the easier dishes, put italian dressing and soy sauce together and bake a chicken breast in it in the oven...flip it half way....serve with pasta and you look like a prince...

here is another cheater recipe....but good and easy.....1 bar of cream cheese..room temp....1 cup of heavy whipping cream, 1 cup cold water, 1 pack instant pudding mix...i use sugar free....mix it together dish into individual dishes.. chill top with fresh fruit and a bit of chocolate sauce...

good food is simply, fresh ingredients made with love unless your married to blanche moore lol

 

[koshergrl]

Strawberries with dishes of kool whip and brown sugar...

Dip first in cool whip, then in brown sugar = heaven.

I've had to learn to cook without a well stocked pantry. My staples are meat, beans, potatoes, flour, sugar, oil, butter, cheese, yeast, baking powder and baking soda, onions and whatever veg is on sale or is hiding in the back of my cupboard. Applesauce and/or apples, and jam. My spice cabinet is never super well stocked...I've needed dry mustard for something like a year now, lol. But I have multiples of other stuff that I never use.

But I also have multiples of stuff I do use...cinnamon, garlic, pepper, salt. I always have more than one because whenever it's on sale, I grab it.

 

[peach174]

Wow, you guys have shared more than enough helpful information on cooking. For that I'm grateful. No longer will I desperately eat handfuls of bran flakes and water while longing for sauteed chicken breast and veggies.

Oh, and I had learned the hard way about putting salt in a pot of boiling noodles. The resulting monstrosity stuck to everything and threatened to devour my roommate for sustenance. On the next try two cups of salt had been added, and the resulting salt headache lasted a month—worst of all were the deers hungry for salt.

You've given me plenty of ideas, and I'm eager to use this new information to create a foodstuff that doesn't develop a life of its own.

This is also a very nice website for teaching you how to cook.
Video Cooking Recipes - Add Your Recipe

 

[koshergrl]

Oh and a head's up..if you are going to buy the cheap bagged Mexican spices...you might throw them in your freezer for a few days (particular the ones that consist of seeds...) to kill any critters in there. I was reading some foodie blog and there was a whole huge segment devoted to yuckie bugs in the pantry, and how they got there....I never buy spices like that (and really, it's for that reason...I look at them and think.hmmm...wonder what's in there....)

 

[Wake]

Oh and a head's up..if you are going to buy the cheap bagged Mexican spices...you might throw them in your freezer for a few days (particular the ones that consist of seeds...) to kill any critters in there. I was reading some foodie blog and there was a whole huge segment devoted to yuckie bugs in the pantry, and how they got there....I never buy spices like that (and really, it's for that reason...I look at them and think.hmmm...wonder what's in there....)

Ew...

Mom did an experiment once with an old box of macaroni noodles. She emptied the box into a bowl of water and waited. Soon, husks of cocoons and living/dead larvae vacated the noodles. Guys, check your noodles. You wouldn't want extra protein of a foreign kind.

 

[koshergrl]

Yuck!