Sliced Egg-a-Palooza

Have you ever eaten a dozen hard boiled eggs in one sitting?

If you make this, then you are about to.

What you will need:

A dozen eggs and a pot to boil them in.

Another pot and a package of Hollandaise sauce which I think calls for some butter, milk and lemon as well.

Boil the eggs in accordance with one of my earlier posts on How to Boil Eggs.

Peel the eggs and cut them in half lengthwise.  Cut the half in half, again, lengthwise.

By now, you have a plate full hardboiled eggs sliced to look like sections from an orange.  Set aside.

Make the Hollandaise sauce in accordance with the directions on the back. This is fairly easy to do; just don't get distracted.  You can burn this fairly easily if you walk away from the stove.

Once the sauce is done, pour it over the egg slices.

Important: Allow to cool a few minutes before eating.  If you start too quickly, you will not be able to stop no matter how hot it is.

Eat and enjoy.

Bueno Cottage Cheese

This has to be my most perfect recipe.

It tastes great.  It can be made in under a minute; and it may actually be good for you.

What you need:

A bowl
Some cottage cheese  (how much depend on how hungry you are)
Some salsa (medium or spice, your choice)

Mix the cottage cheese in the bowl with the salsa.  The ratio of Salsa to Cottage Cheese is not that important.  Experiment to suit your own taste.

Eat and enjoy.

jim

Tostadas

I love Mexican food.  It's easy to make, filling and tastes great.

Today, we are making tostadas.  This is a fried corn tortilla with stuff on top.

There is only one problem with your basic tostada.  You can only add so much stuff on top before it starts spilling over.  I have a solution for that.

What you will need.

A frying pan with a quarter inch of cooking oil in it.
1 pound of hamburger
1 can of olives
1 can of diced tomatos
1 head of lettuce
1 package of corn tortillas
1 container of sour cream
1 jar of Mexican cheese salsa (my secret ingredient available at Safeway stores everywhere)
2 cups of shredded cheese

First the tortillas.

Heat the oil until it reacts (fizzles) when you put a drop of water in it.

Put a tortilla into the oil.  Cook for about 1-2 minutes per side.  Some tortillas will sort of grow like a blowfish when heat is added. Don't panic.  Just poke a hole in it and allow to deflate.  I don't allow any bubbles to form in my tortillas since it messes with the balance of food you will soon be placing on top.

Make 6-10 tortillas this way.

Now, this next step is important.  Open your can of olives.  Dump the water out of the can and put the olives on a cutting board.  Now, dump the used oil out of the frying pan into the olive can, allow to cool and then throw away.  If you don't wait for it to cool, it will melt through your plastic kitchen garbage can (you don't want to know how I know this.)

Put your hamburger into the frying pan and cook until all of the pink is gone.  Drain off excess oil into the olive can with the other oil.

Take a giant bowl and put the hamburger into it.

Chop up the olives on put into the bowl with the hamburger.

Chop up a bunch of lettuce and put into the bowl.  I'm not sure how much a "bunch" actually is.  If you feel like you need some vegetables in your diet, use the whole head of lettuce.  Otherwise, use less.

Dump the can of diced tomatoes into the bowl.

Dump the Mexican cheese salsa into the bowl.

Dump about half of the sour cream container into the bowl (use it all if you like sour cream)

Dump the shredded cheese into the bowl.

Now, stir everything in the bowl together.  What you end up with is a taco salad without the tacos.  By mixing everything up in the bowl, you can heap it onto your fried tortillas without fear of spillage.  Everything should be pretty much stuck together.

Now, put the stuff in the bowl onto your tortilla.

Eat and enjoy.

jim

Vegetable Beef Stew with Dumplings

My favorite meal has always been Chicken and Dumplings.  Not just any C&D, but the kind my mom used to make. It had big chunks of everything.  The best part was the dumplings.  They were the size of a softball and always perfectly cooked.

So I thought, I should be able to do that.

Gave Mom a call and got the recipe.  It basically came down to "a little of this and a little of that and there you have it."

Wrong!

I should have remembered my own findings: Anything that involves bread is akin to witchcraft.

I tried to make dumplings.  I tried from scratch and I tried with Bisquick.  I checked on the internet and I asked friends.  They all said the same thing, "Simply do this..."

The best I could do was a lump slurry.

Then there is this stuff called Corn Starch.  It's supposed to make the liquid thicker.  Same thing as the dumplings.  Everyone said, "Simply do this and then that..."

Turns out this stuff is temperamental.  You must first mix it with cold water or milk, the exact ratio appears to be either unimportant or a keenly held secret.  Then you add it to the cooking stew.  You must bring it to boil or the Corn Starch Gods will be unsatisfied.  However, if you allow it to continue to boil, the whole things breaks down.  You must "skirt" the boil.  Stay there long enough to get a sense of the heat, and then remove from the heat immediately.

This was starting to sound like Anti-Cooking For the Single Man.

Having tried and failed, I am going back to my old formula; one which has served me well.

Keep it simple.  Make it fast.  Make it good and make it filling.

What you will need;

A large pan with a lid
3 cans of Campbell's Vegetable Beef Soup
1 container of Pillsbury Biscuits (ever notice how hard it is to spell biscuits?)

In the pan, bring all of the soup to boil.

Take the Pillsbury biscuits and cut them into fourths.

Drop the biscuits onto the soup.  The reason you want a pan instead of a pot is to increase the surface area where you drop the biscuits.  The more surface area, the more room for the biscuits (which are about to become your dumplings.)

Turn the heat to low, cover and cook for 15 minutes.

Before taking it off of the heat, take out one of the dumplings.  Let it cool for a minute and then test to make sure it's done.  If the dumpling is not cooked all the way through, give it a few more minutes.

Eat and enjoy.

jim

Easy Side Dish

For most guys, an easy side dish is a bag of potato chips.

Step1: Open bag
Step2: Pour bag into big bowl
Eat and enjoy

However, there may be times when you want to impress someone without going to too much effort.

I'm not talking about impressing the gang that came over to watch the game.  I'm talking about the type of impressing meant to show you have a bit of culture underneath your 49ers T-shirt.

So here is our goal:  Must be easy.  Must be unique.  Must taste great.

Here is what you need:

• 2 peeled Granny Smith Apples.  The green ones that have a bit of tang to them
• 4 to 6 ounces of smoked Gouda cheese or some other mild white cheese that has brown edges (this indicates smoked - or at least I think it does).
• 1 can of whole kernel corn.  Be careful not to buy the creamed corn.  I can't tell you how many times I've made that mistake.
• 1 large, heaping tablespoon (the bigger of the two spoons) of sour cream.

Put the corn into the bowl.  Cut up the cheese and the apples so they are in chucks about the size of a kernel of corn.  Add them to the bowl.  Add the sour cream and stir.  You may need a little more sour cream to suit your taste.  It's best to start on the low end because sour cream is really hard to take off if you put too much in to begin with.

Eat and enjoy.

Pasta Dumplings

This is a multi-purpose food when only "bulk" will do.

There are lots of fancy recipes for making pasta.  You can spend a paycheck coming up with things that make long noddles and such.

Or you can do what I do.

What you will need:

A coffee cup
A large egg
1/4 cup of flour
Pinch of salt
Fork
And some sort of food that is more watery that you want it to be.


For this example, let's suppose you're making some soup.  You wanted to get the Hearty variety but accidentally got the regular.

Cook the soup in a pot on the stove (okay, I forgot to mention you will need a pot).  While it is heating up, put the egg, minus the shell, into a coffee cup. Add the flour and salt, then beat with a fork.  Do this with great vigor for about a minute or until the mixture turns yellow and creamy.

Once the soup is boiling, drip small clumps of the mixture from the cup.  It won't pour easily so you may have to help it.  A clump is about the size of a marble.  It wont be round because it's sort of runny but the volume of the marble is what you want.

The clumps will cook in the boiling soup to form pasta dumplings.  They take about 5 minutes to cook and you may want to taste to make sure they get done.

I just made the Chicken soup from this blog (a few posts back).  I decided it was too thin so I added the pasta dumplings with some peas and olives and it tastes great!

Happy eating and thanks for clicking on my sponsors as you leave.

Jim

Enchiladas

This has to be one of my favorite foods.

It's filling, cheap, easy to make and tastes great!

What you will need:

One of those big glass rectangular pans.  I suppose it doesn't need to be glass but mine is.
A pot

A package of flour tortillas.  These come in different sizes.  I use medium.  You will need at least 6-8.
A pound of hamburger
A small onion (size of lemon)
A can of olives (sliced or you can slice them yourself)
A can of tomato past (this is a little red can that comes in 6 oz containers)
A package of Enchilada seasoning (most stores have a section with packets of seasonings)
2 cups of shredded cheese.  Probably one of the orange varieties is best
Sour cream (optional)

Step 1:
Spray some Pam into the glass pan. Every man needs to have Pam in his kitchen.  It's either that or you will have to throw away all of your pots after you use them and then forget to clean them for a week.  Pam is like spray-on oil that makes cleaning a breeze.

Step 2:
Chop up the onion and cook over a medium heat with a bit of butter.  Once the onion turns glassy (about 5 minutes), add the hamburger.  Cook the hamburger until all the pink is gone.

Step 3:
Do this while you do Step 2.  Boil 2 cups of water.  Add the tomato paste and the seasoning.  Once it is all boiling, set to lowest heat for 5 minutes.

Step 4:
Add one cup of shredded cheese to the hamburger.  Add about a third of the water/seasoning mix to the hamburger.  Add the olives to the hamburger.  Stir.

Step 5:
Coat one tortilla with the water/seasoning mix.  Add some of the hamburger mix and roll up. This should be about an inch and a half in diameter.  Place in glass pan.  Repeat this until all of the hamburger is used up.

Step 6:
Pour extra sauce over the tortillas.  Sprinkle the rest of the cheese over the tortilla.  Place in oven and cook at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

Step 7:
Let cool.  Eat and Enjoy.  You can top with sour cream if you wish.

jim

Chicken Stew (or maybe it's soup)

Like most male-food, this is delicious, filling and easy to make.

What you will need:

A large frying pan with a cover
Something it stir with like a wooden spoon

• 1/4 teaspoon Marjoram (this is a spice like a mild version of oregano and may actually be interchangeable...but I'm not sure)
• 1/8 teaspoon Nutmeg (this is apparently important even though you are only using a small amount)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• an onion the size of a lemon
• 3 skinned and boned chicken breasts (buy them that way and save yourself some heartache)
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• 3 tablespoons of Paprika (a red spice that is very important)
• 1/4 cup of flour
• 1/2 cup of sour cream
• 6 hardboiled eggs (optional)
• 1 cup of cheese salsa (optional)
• Some type of pasta (optional)
• 1 can of olives (optional)

Step 1
Cut the chicken into chunks small enough to fit through an "okay" sign (thumb and pointy finger)
Set aside

Step 2
Cut the onion into little bits, maybe a quarter inch or smaller.  Saute in butter until it its glassy.  To saute means to cook in butter.

Step 3
Add chicken and stir for about 4-5 minutes or until most of the chicken is not longer pink

Step 4
Add paprika, salt, Majoram and nutmeg.  Stir for a couple of minutes.

Step 5
Add enough hot water to just about cover the chicken.  If you add less water, this will end up thicker and we can call it stew.  If you add more water, it will be less thick and we can call it soup.

Step 6
Bring to boil, then turn heat to minimum.  Cover and let it cook for 35 minutes.

Timewise, the first 6 steps should take less than 10 minutes.

Step 7
Check the chicken to make sure its cooked all the way through.  Add the flour and sour cream.  Stir in and turn the heat to high while stirring.  When it boils, turn off.

You are now ready to eat.

I have found that boiled eggs, chopped into quarters and added at this point make the meal a little more interesting.

This is also great the next day, reheated.

For some of the options:

Spread over pasta (type up to you)
Add olives, cut roughly
Substitute Nachos salsa for sour cream

Eat and enjoy.

jim

Mustard Flat-Steak

Men like steak.

We barbecue big slabs of it and then eat it in giant bites, like a lion eating a carcass before the hyenas close in.

As withmost food, its the volume that counts.  Quality is nice but hey, if it was cooked on a grill, how bad can it be.

Today, we'll cook with spices.  Just a few so don't get overly concerned.

What you will need:

A hammer
A garlic press (more on this in a minute)
A frying pan

One steak
A tablespoon of mustard (any kind)
Two cloves of garlic (more on this in a minute)
Salt and pepper
Optional: Costco Monterey Steak seasoning (replaces salt and pepper)
A bit of flour
A tablespoon of butter

Step 1
Clean off your hammer.

Step 2
Use your hammer to pound the steak flat.  When you are done it should be about half as thick as it was when you started.  It will also be much wider.  There is a utensil for doing this but I don't see any reason for getting one since you will only make this occasionally.

Step 3
Spread the mustard generously (thickly) on both sides of the steak.

Step 4
Add either the salt and pepper or the Costco seasoning to both sides.

Step 5
Peel the outer skin off of three cloves of garlic.  A clove of garlic is similar to a slice of an orange.  The easiest way to get the skin off is to press down sharply on the clove with the base of your hand.  This will squish the clove and loosen the outer skin.  Place the cloves into a garlic press.  A garlic press looks sort of like a nutcraker.  It smooshes the garlic for you.  Spread the smooshed garlic on both sides of the steak.

Step 6
Sprinkle flour on each side of the steak

Step 7
Melt the butter in the frying pan with the heat set on high.

Step 8
Cook the steak in the frying pan.  I'd go with about 4-5 minutes a side.  This depends on how rare you want your steak and how thick it is.

Eat using big bites and enjoy.  I'd suggest small bites but you wouldn't listen anyway.  I know I wouldn't.

Jim

Swiss Cheese Pogacsa

It's time to try our hand at baking.

Today we are going to make Hungarian Pogacsa (po-gotcha).  This is a flavorful biscuit that is good for another inch or two should you be looking to add to your waste line.  I did some experimenting with online recipes before making my own (which we will be using).

The first thing you need to know is that any type of cooking that involves yeast is fairly similar to witchcraft.  We've all seen our moms make homemade bread and it all looked so easy.  The fact is that star alignment and ritual sacrifice may have been playing a role.

However, I have  broken the code.  So let's bake.

What you will need:

A giant bowl, like something you could put fruit in.
A small bowl, like something for cereal
A cheese grater with both small and large sized grates
A measuring cup
A wooden spoon
Some wax paper
A cookie sheet
A teaspoon
A small glass about 2 inches across at the top
Rolling pin
A small paint brush

4 cups of flour
1 cup of cottage cheese (warmed to room temperature)
1 cup of milk (warmed to room temperature)
1 stick of melted butter
1 cup of finely grated swiss cheese
1 cup of coarsely grated swiss cheese
1 rounded teaspoon of yeast
1 egg yoke and 2 egg yokes.
1 rounded teaspoon of sugar (powdered)
1/2 teaspoon of salt (at most)
Eye of newt (kidding)

Before you start, there are a couple of things you need to know about yeast.  First of all, it's not a precise thing.  For example, a teaspoon of yeast will be good for 2 cups of flour or 4 cups of flour.  I spent a lot of time assuming I needed to have an exact amount.  Secondly, Yeast is what you need to make the dough rise which in turn makes the bread fluffy.  Yeast won't work if the temperature is too cold or too warm.  So wherever the yeast is, try to keep is warmish. Finally, yeast is a living, single-celled organism that dies when exposed to salt.  So go easy on the salt and don't add until its time to cook (by then the yeast has done its job).

With regards to egg yokes.  To separate an egg yoke from the clear part.  Break the egg in half and pour the yoke back and forth, allowing the clear part to overflow, preferably into the sink.

Warm up the milk in the microwave until it it just above room temperature.  Not hot!

Put the milk in a small bowl with the sugar and the yeast.  It will start to foam after a few minutes.  This is just the yeast doing yeast type stuff.

In the giant bowl, add the flour, the cottage cheese and the melted butter.  Stir with a big wooden spoon for a couple of minutes.  Note that there is not really enough moisture here to absorb all of the flour.  Don't worry about that.

After the milk/sugar/yeast has been mixed  and set aside for 10 minutes, add it to the flour, along with one egg yoke and the finely grated Swiss cheese.  Stir with the wooden spoon for two minutes.  Then, set aside the spoon and mix this all with your hands.  Continue to mix it until the dough takes on a shiny appearance and it stops sticking to your hands. I've noticed that sometimes the dough stays very sticky.   When that happens, I add more flour, a tablespoon at a time, until it becomes merely "tacky." (tacky = just a little sticky).

Leave the dough in the giant bowl.  Cover it with a sheet of wax paper and a dish cloth.  Set it in a oven that is turned off but has the internal light turned on. This will make it slightly warm in the oven, but not too warm.

Wait two hours.

When you pull the bowl out of the oven, you should see that the dough is magically about twice the size it was when you put it in there.  This is because the yeast has been forming little bubbles in the dough.  If it has not "risen", try burning some incense and maybe chanting a little bit.  The gods need to be suitably impressed or your yeast will not work.

Punch the dough with your fist.  This will cause it to deflate a bit.  Sprinkle on the salt and work it in with your hands for about 30 seconds.  Set the covered dough back into the oven for 30 minutes.

Take the dough out of the oven and set the oven temperature to 350 degrees.

Find a wide open space on your counter and sprinkle flour on it.  Plop the dough onto the counter and roll it out with a rolling pin until it is about 1/4 of an inch thick.  Fold in half twice and roll out again.  Fold in half twice again and roll out again.  You can do this a third time if you want to practice with your rolling pin.

Finally, roll out the dough until it is about 1/2 inch thick.

Take the cookie sheet and cover it with a sheet of wax paper.

Take the small glass, turn it upside down and use it as a cookie cutter.  Cut out circular biscuits and place them on the cookie sheet.

In your small bowl, which you have rinsed out, place two egg yokes.  Stir them with your small paint brush.  Then, use the paint brush to spread the yokes across the tops of your biscuits.

Lastly, sprinkle the coarsely grated Swiss cheese across the tops of the biscuits.

Cook at 350 for 25-30 minutes.

Eat and enjoy.

I know this seems like a lot of work but once you have all of the stuff ready to go, it takes a few minutes (not counting the time the dough is rising.)

Jim

Mexican Deviled Eggs

I just made these as an experiment.

I have to admit that I wasn't paying that much attention to the measurements so you will have to make adjustments to suit your taste.

What you will need.

Bowl and fork, spoon and pot for boiling eggs
1 tablespoon of mustard (a tablespoon is the bigger of the two spoon sizes, but should never be confused with the granddaddy of spoons - The Ladle).
1 tablespoon of Mayo
Three heaping tablespoons of Mexican cheese salsa (in salsa section - its the orange one)
A pinch a salt (with salt, always start small and add more if you need it)

Boil you eggs.  As a refresher on egg boiling.  Put eggs in water and boil.  When water starts to boil.  Turn  off the heat and let the eggs just sit in the hot water.  After 10 minutes, put the eggs under cold water.  After 5 minutes or so in the cold water, peel eggs.  You can wait until later to peel the eggs but it may be messier.

Cut eggs in half.  Put the yoke in a bowl and set the outer halves aside; you will need them soon enough.

Once all of the egg yokes are in a bowl, add the salt, mustard, mayo and Mexican cheese sauce.  Mush all of this together with a fork.  It should be lumpy and creamy at the same time.  If it's too lumpy, as some more of the ingredients.  Don't ask me which.  I really don't think it's important so long as you have plenty of the Mexican cheese salsa in there.

Use the spoon to fill the outer half eggs.  Put as much in each shell as you like.  If you end up with just enough stuff to fill the very last shell, then you are paying too close attention.  I always have too much of one or the other.

Now, as you look at the giant tray of delicacies, set a mental limit on how many you intend to eat right now.  Failure to do this will result in bloat.

Eat and enjoy.

jim