What's Cooking?

[GrinfilledCelt]

Today, It occurred to me that I probably had most of the ingredients needed to make fudge. This is a good thing because I don't have the cash to do much of anything else for Crispness. So I looked up some recipes at FoodNetwork.com and found that I needed some half and half - I'll bet cream would be better and I need some butter and might as well get walnuts and more chocolate so I can make more batches... 50 ill-afforded dollars later I was ready to make some fudge. I call it Grin's Famous Not-So-Good Fudge. It's edible and better than nothing but affords me zero bragging rights - especially for someone living in Michigan. This cannot stand!

I followed the recipe so what gives? I went back online for further research and found that there are some important techniques to fudge making of which I was previously unaware. Too bad I missed the Fudge Factor episode of Good Eats. There is much science involved. Very interesting. Who knew? I learned a lot. Tomorrow I'll try again.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[Dread_Knight^Samurai]

Cooking meals...I'm not good at it but I suppose with my current skill, it's enough to satisfy my hunger. I wouldn't really care about the taste since I'm the one who's cooking. Most of the time, I cook for myself and no one else...just me. And that happened when my mom is not around and I'm short in cash. Fortunate enough the fridge is filled with raw food. Just need to make of use my creativity and some experiments.

And...it mortifies me, that my little brother can actually cooked pizza and some other food.

And somehow, the link that leads to the foodnetwork...it ain't working. Maybe it's just me.
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The mark of my divinity shalt scar thy DNA.

[GrinfilledCelt]

Learning to cook isn't that hard. Everybody likes good food so everyone has an interest in cooking good food for themselves. Otoh, it is also very true that if you are cooking for just yourself, it usually seems to be too much of a bother. Having just one other person to cook for seems to make all the difference.

Learning to cook isn't that hard. What do the people who usually cook for you make that you like? Ask them to show you how. Now you can make it too. There are lots of places you can look up recipes online. Don't try to learn it all at once - you can't. Take one recipe at a time and learn to make it well.

Remember that the more often you make the same dish the better you can make it. It usually doesn't come out too well the first time I make something. Today I made two more batches of fudge. Both came out better than yesterday's but, since I am a dumbass who can't resist experimenting even before I get the dish right, I did something to both that I knew could screw them up. I got mixed results. Both came out creamy and delicious but both didn't want to set up hard enough. I had to roll the pieces in powdered sugar to keep them from becoming one big piece again. Eventually I'll get it down and start cranking out the best fudge anyone anywhere has tasted like I did with my caramels.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[MidNightBlue]

er, i put down "If I had to cook, I probably wouldn't poison myself."

i cooked for myself for about half a year before i decided that it's a lot more ... er favorable? ... to just buy food that's cooked by other people ... yeah

i guess i just don't feel very motivated to learn especially when i can usually get what i want for very cheap

[GrinfilledCelt]

Make your own Bacon Vodka and Homer Simpson will be proud of you.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[Anime Otaku Chik]

I tried making some Scandinavian Flat Bread--it's pretty easy, but... I think I did something wrong because it came out too thick, and not very crispy. I am partially blaming the air-bake pan I have because everything ends up getting cooked different on that... I've stopped baking pizzas on it because the inside never gets cooked while the outside does... Actually, the few pieces that were thin and crispy enough tasted very good! Next time I'm just gonna have to roll it out thinner and put it on a regular cookie sheet.

Hmmm, what else... I'm thinking of making a batch or two of peanut brittle; some for Matthew for Valentine's and then the rest...?

I wonder what other bread I could make though... I'm really tempted! I've tried making french bread before and I'm not getting into that mess again... I could also try whipping up some homemade cinnamon rolls sometime. They take a while for the dough to rise and what-not but they taste soooo gooood!!
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[GrinfilledCelt]

You should watch all of Yakitate Japan before trying to bake any bread. I would think that an air pan would be awful to make pizza on. If anything, you want to concentrate heat on the bottom, not insulate it. Try a flat slab of stone next time. That would probably work well for your flatbread too.

You can always any excess peanut brittle my way.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[Anime Otaku Chik]

I haven't made anything yet but I'm having a dinner party Friday night. My friend is coming over to cook the chicken and I'm making mashed potatoes, green beans, and corn. I'm thinking I'll go to the market and buy some fresh corn. For the green beans, I learned from my ex that they are delicious with some pollo bullion, (It's like chicken stock; vegetable bullion is also acceptable) red peppers, worcestershire sauce, and some ground pepper.

The potatoes...well, how else do you make mashed potatoes? Peel them, cut them, put them in a pot of water and boil them, put them in the mixer and stick some real butter in there, and lots of salt and pepper.

I guess the corn is gonna have to be broiled in the oven, unless I just do the small ones to save the effort and just boil them...
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[GrinfilledCelt]

Mashed potatoes are easy. You basically got it. Most people add milk or sour cream. I know a lady who adds a couple of beaten eggs. Personally, I never bother to peel them - just wash them real well.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[Anime Otaku Chik]

Oh yeah, I add milk too. Forgot that part. They're better when they're all creamy. I hear creamer works well too, but I prefer milk. I guess eggs could work but that seems odd to me...
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[kaji]

i fancy myself to be a pretty mean cook - however when i cook formyself i dont always go out of my way to make something kick ass, - i only seem to have motivation to do a really high end job when i cook for others.

[GrinfilledCelt]

Mean cooks beat eggs and whip cream.

When I bother to cook for myself I usually cook mass quantities and eat the same stuff for a week. Because I like to experiment and cannot make myself throw out food I sometimes end up with a big pot of something really awful. I got lucky this week. I made a big pot of spaghetti. I cook three pounds of spaghetti to two large cans/jars of sauce. This makes for a dry-ish meal but I (and Italians) know that pasta is about the pasta not the sauce. I usually add an onion and maybe some other vegetables like carrot, celery and/or bell pepper and some kind of meat.

This time I used some loose, mild Italian sausage which I combined with some ground beef I had. It's yummy!
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[GrinfilledCelt]

For years since she has been gone, I have pined for my Grandmother’s Rhubarb* Custard Pie. “There isn’t much I wouldn’t do for just one slice” I could be heard saying. Then I happened to say that to a friend of mine whose Mom was friends with my Grandmother and attended the same church.

She said, “I think I have the recipe for that” and produced this:

P I E ! P I E !
CUSTARD RHUBARB

Mix:
2 Eggs
1 Cup Sugar
2 Tbs Flour

3 Cups Rhubarb (chopped)


Pour mixture in a baked pie shell and
Bake @ 425 for 10 minutes
Then @ 350 for 30 - 40 minutes

What? No Milk? I couldn’t get a hold of her at baking time, called my Mom. She didn’t know. Decided to go without milk based on recent disasters caused by playing ‘knows best’ with other recipes. I mixed up the eggs, flour and sugar and it was almost as thick as pudding. My Mom had said that maybe the rhubarb would give up liquid as it cooked, so I went ahead and added it and started cooking the pie crust. After that the rhubarb had indeed given up enough liquid to thin out the mixture quite a bit. More misgivings, my friend had said to fill the pie crust with rhubarb and pour the mixture over it. I'll try it that way next time.

To make matters worse, the little-used oven at my house has no knob (where the settings were printed) or oven thermometer, so setting the temperature is pure guesswork.

I managed to bake a frozen pie crust without burning it, but it shrank and cracked badly, leaving wide cracks. After it cooled a bit, I dumped the above mixture in. After thirty minutes total time in the oven, it was smoking badly and looked a bit over roasted so I pulled it. It looked awfully juicy under the toasted rhubarb which I hoped would thicken as it cooled. It did. I think I had too much Rhubarb. The rhubarb floated in the custard in My Grandma's pies, but was packed in and piled high in this one.

What I ended up with was a pie my Grandmother wouldn’t come up with on her worst day, but I’m convinced it is the same recipe she used. It’s still tasty, I’m in heaven and I will try again soon with a better oven.

Try it yourself. It’s easy, different and very good. I've demonstrated here that it's hard to screw it up to where you don't want to eat it. I'm looking forward to making it again without all these mistakes.

It's flavor is on the tart side so kids usually won't eat tons of it. That's a good thing - leaves more for you. For those of you who are kids or have retarded taste buds, real pies are funnier:



*I don't know about the availability of rhubarb in SE Asia. Here it grows as a weed in many people's yards and is very hard to get rid of. It looks like a clump of large arrowhead shaped leaves on stalks. The stalks are the part you eat and are like red-tinged celery. The British grow it in darkened sheds, like mushrooms, so that it comes out white.
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Songs for the flash frozen.

[jjjynx]

We don't have yards here in Singapore, and even if we did it's just be a small garden for show, with maybe a coconut, papaya or some other random fruit tree, sometimes.

BUT THAT LOOKS SO EDIBLE, I'm drooling now, really, probably coz I haven't had breakfast and I'm alone at work, which sucks.

If it's that good I ought to give making pies a try. We eat rice everyday, for lunch and dinner, and bread for breakfast, so I don't eat pies often, rarely, perhaps once every two years, like Pizzas.

But I did get hands on for a bunch of other food, like Poh Pias (like buritos, with thinner skin and lots of ingrediants), Fried Ikan Bilis (small salted fishes), and instant noodles, lots of instant noodles. I think there's something wrong with my country and instant noodles.

But dang I'm still hungry.

[GrinfilledCelt]

If only we could just invite each other over for dinner...
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Songs for the flash frozen.