recippies

Three eggs in a row from my fridge:

My mother in law gifted me the very tasty, very expensive pistacio cream on the left. I liked it a lot, so I wanted more but not at such a high price point, so I ordered the jar on the right.

It did not taste like the first one. It was bitter, oily, and overpowering. The first one had a texture like biscoff, the second one had a texture like Nutella.

So, I figured, nut butter is nut butter, right? And I made basically the 3-ingredient peanut butter cookie recipe. Awful. Way, way too much sugar, caramelized instantly and converted to elemental carbon in the oven.

For the second recipe, the pistacio creme was the only source of sugar, and I added an egg white and a *lot* of flour. I wanted it to retain the essence of a rolled cookie, with a twist on the criss-crossed fork marks on a traditional peanut butter cookie. The second version came out as tiny dry biscuits, barely sweet and notably pistacio flavored, but generally unpleasant.

This couldn't be a rolled cookie. It had to be a drop cookie.

So I started creaming butter and sugar and got to work.

BUT. The reason I was excited at the first version even though it was terrible: these cookies contain toasted black cardamom and rose extract. So they're cardamom pistacio rose cookies. And the last version is light and delicate and fluffy and sweet with a very pleasant bitter edge from the pistacios.

.75c granulated white sugar

.333c pistacio cream

1 egg

.5 tsp rose extract

.25 tsp ground cardamom

.5 tsp salt

.5 tsp baking powder

1.5 c flour

Preheat oven to 400 fah

Cream together butter and sugar

Mix in egg, pistacio cream, salt, baking powder, and rose extract.

Whisk flour in gradually until a sticky dough forms.

Use a spoon to drop 1 tbsp of dough per cookie onto a baking sheet covered in parchment paper.

Bake for 8 minutes, until edges start to brown.

The secret is in the water; literally, it’s IN the water.

See, when you boil potatoes, a lot of special starches and sugars and stuff leeches out into the water. When you drain the water before mashing them, you throw away a lot of good stuff, which is a big part of what makes mashed potatoes “dry” and bland, even when you add large amounts of cream and butter and things.

So don’t throw out any water.

Here’s how you do that:

First, cut your potatoes into smaller cubes than you probably do. (I’ve left the skins on for flavor and also, that’s where a lot of a potato’s nutrients are, like protien and iron and vitamins B and C, just to name a few)

The reason for cutting them smaller (besides avoiding giant peices of skin) is so that there is less space in the pot between each peice for water to fill, so you use less water to cook them. That’s important because you won’t be draining any water, so you can’t afford to have too much water! For the same reason, just barely cover them with water when they go on the stove.

But! Before you do that, put the pot on the stove with some butter, garlic, and seasonings; let the butter start to sizxle just a little then put most of a single layer of potatoes in the pan and let the brown and sear. Turn them, brown them on all sides, get ‘em fairly dark (I forgot to get a pic here because I was worried I’d burn the butter).

Ready? now throw the rest of the potatoes in right on top, and add your water, give them a stir. This way, you’re boiling in some of that lovely fried potato/french fry flavor.

Okay, so, as they cook, you may need to add a little water, not too much! ideally the very highest piece of potato will be poking just above the surface. Now, when your potatoes are really really soft, mash them directly into the water. Just pull them off the stove, leave all the water in, and start mashing. Trust me. At first you’ll think there’s too much water. If you get them mashed and they ARE a little too liquidy, just put ‘em back on the stove. You’ll have to stir often or constantly, but they will steam off additional water without losing any good stuff.

Now add some salt, and taste. Right?! And you haven’t even put in any cream or cheese or anything yet.

Speaking of which, you can use like, a third of the amount of butter or cream or anything, and they will still taste better than usual. So they taste better AND they are higher in nutrients AND lower in fats and salts! That’s a lot of win — enjoy your potatoes!

GINGER SLUTS

I use breadcrumbs for making meatballs and breading fried food and other such things and it's hard to find g-free breadcrumbs that avoid my other allergens, so this is what I've been doing to get around that for the last few years.

Turn bread heels into breadcrumbs

Make stock from the bags of veggie and meat trimmings that I save when cooking

Check for any open bags of veggies or fruit that are getting freezer burned; if there are any open bags that are getting freezer burned, make plans to turn the veggies into soup and fruit into pie. (Basically any vegetable can be a 'cream of' soup no matter what has happened to the texture and any nearly any fruit can become a compote - for fruits that aren't good for compotes, like bananas, I consider whether I want to make them into ice cream or use them in a smoothie or thaw them and make quickbreads)

Check for any meats that have been in the freezer a long time, if so rotate them so that the newest frozen meats are toward the back and the oldest are towards the front and *write on a calendar on the fridge* when I will cook them and what I will use them for. If any are getting freezer burned, they become soup.

Easy things to make from your freezer findings:

Cream-of-Whatever soup - good for veggies and chicken. Thaw your freezer-burned ingredient and chop into small pieces (unless it's chicken, in which case you'll shred it after it's cooked in the broth). Sautee some onions and garlic with oil in a large pot (and celery if you want to). Add your freezer-burned veggie (this is good for one type of vegetable, like green beans or spinach or squash, at a time rather than a mix of vegetables) and sautee for a few minutes, then add seasoning to taste (different seasonings work with different veggies but I find that salt, pepper, paprika, bay, and parsley will go well in most freezerburn soups) and heat for a couple more minutes. Add broth or stock if you have it, water if you don't, and bring to a boil. Let boil for thirty minutes then check for flavor and add seasoning/salt as needed. You can use tamari or soy sauce instead of table salt for a stronger umami flavor. Let boil for thirty minutes and check again for flavor. Once you're close to the flavor profile you're aiming for, add half a cup of heavy cream, then reduce by about 25%. If you want to, you can add sour cream for a tarter flavor profile, or you can make a vegetable starch slurry to add for a thicker soup. Check seasoning one last time, serve on its own, use as a casserole ingredient, or serve over rice. If you find cream-of-whatever soups boring, play with the seasonings - adding curry spices to a cream of spinach soup rules. Soup is, literally, what you make of it. Do whatever.

Chili - good for freezer burned meat. Thaw your meat and dice it into approximately half-inch cubes. Coarsely chop two large onions and sautee in oil in a large pot. Add as much minced garlic as your heart desires, and a can or two of diced chilies (or fresh chilies if you've got them) if you want a spicier chili, and heat with the onions until the onions are starting to be translucent. Add your diced or ground meat and brown in the pot with the onions and garlic. Add your chili seasoning if you're using a packaged mix; if you're using your own spices use chili powder, cayenne pepper, paprika, black pepper, white pepper, and cumin, then whatever else sounds good to you (I like to add mushroom powder and I'm heavy-handed with the cayenne and cumin). Add two cans of kidney beans and two cans of pinto beans (unrinsed, keep the fluid), a can of crushed tomatoes, a can of diced tomatoes, and half a can of tomato paste to the pot. Stir until incorporated and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce to a simmer, test for flavor and adjust seasonings - at this point I usually add tamari or salt (because you're retaining the liquid from the canned beans do NOT add salt before tasting). Allow to simmer for up to an hour to allow the flavors to blend, serve with chopped raw onions and shredded cheese; this will rule if you put it over pasta.

Compote (liquidy, for serving over ice cream or mixing into yogurt) - put frozen fruit into a pot on the stove and add enough water to just cover the fruit, add one to two tablespoons of sugar per cup of frozen fruit. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then turn heat to low and reduce volume of the mixture while stirring frequently.

Pie filling (thick, should set with a gel-like consistency after it cools) - put frozen fruit in a pot and add set a low heat; as fruit thaws, add 3/4 cup of sugar a quarter cup at a time, stirring into the fruit. Add up to a half cup of water as needed to thin the mixture to a stirrable/pourable consistency. Add 1/4 lemon juice - or more for flavor - and bring the contents of a pot to a low boil then remove from heat. If the mixture is too liquidy, you can add a couple teaspoons of a starch slurry to thicken it. Bake in your pie shell and allow to set for a minimum of 4 hours before cutting. (Stir gently at all parts of the process; the fruit will dissolve if stirred too vigorously).

300gr bacon, beef or chicken. A meat of your choice. These go specially well. I prefer chicken tights. Diced

1 medium onion, diced.

Garlic minced (i used 2-4 pieces depending on size)

300gr carrot, cleaned, peeled and diced.

3 sticks of celery, washed and diced.

800gr potato. Washed, peeled diced in quarters.

1 head of broccoli.

8 cups of stock of your preference. I recommend using the bones of the beef or chicken, but veggies stock works too for a vegetarian or vegan version.

3 tablespoons all purpose flour.

1 cup whole milk. (Almond or rice milk work fine for a vegan option)

½ cup heavy cream. (Skip it for a vegan option)

Salt and black pepper to taste.

½ teaspoon paprika, use the spicy one to get the warmth up a notch in winter.

1 tablespoon fresh chopped coriander. Optional.

1 cup diced gouda or manchego cheese. Optional but really ties all together.

Make sure you have all your ingredients ready and at hand for this one to make sure it comes out nice and tasty!!!

In a pot put water and the bones to prepare your stock (chicken, beef, veggie) You can use premade or bouillon cubes, just make sure its 8 cups worth of broth. In a different pot boil the potatoes until soft.

In a big pot put some butter or olive oil to fry the onion, when it turns a little transparent add the garlic, move constantly.

Add the celery and diced carrots, moving constantly.

The carrot will get a little brighter in color, add the diced meat. Salt and pepper to your taste.

Meanwhile, blend the potatoes with enough stock so your blender wont have trouble blending. If you have a food processor, it’ll be easier.

Ad the remaining stock to you big pot with the veggies and meat, add the broccoli chopped in bite size pieces. Add the paprika and taste for salt and pepper. Let over a medium fire for 10 min.

Separate 3 tbsp of the stock to mix with the flour, set aside. This will be a thickening agent.

Pour the potato mix on the big pot, move to integrate and taste for salt and pepper.

Add the milk and heavy cream. Move with a laddle. Have a final taste and let over low fire for 5 min.

Serve hot and decorate with a pinch of coriander and some cubes of cheese.

ENJOY!

Notes:

I personally prefer to use chicken, love how it goes with potatoes and veggies. Also the tight is very tender and flavorful. With beef you have to be careful not to overcook it or it’ll get gummy and hard to bite, so make adjustments.

VEGAN: could also skip the meat, cheese and heavy cream for a vegan option.

I make it for my younger sister and she loves it. Instead of meat i add some diced, toasted nuts when served. Cashew, pecan and pistachios work nicely.

You’ll have to use 5 tbsp of flour to thicken up the broth a tid bit more without the heavy cream but you can still use a vegan milk.

You can totally skip the coriander, but it adds another dept of flavor.

Do try it with the cheese tho, i promise it’s GODLY. Gouda and manchego are my fave, the melt nicely and have a strong after taste, but i guess any cheese that melts could work.

Finally, if you are like me and like spicy food you can add chopped chili. Serrano and arbol chiles are my go to’s, freshly chopped sprinkled just after serving my bowl.

Hope y'all give it a try and if you have any doubts do ask!

Substituted spinach for broccoli because my partner is not a fan of the latter and used chicken and bacon. Gonna try it again with a nice Italian sausage in place of the chicken next time.

Hi! I’m so lucky I was raised pretty vegetarian and my parents went vegetarian/vegan LONG before I ever did, so you are fighting a much tougher battle! But shifting to whole/less processed foods is such a beautiful goal :)

I’m going to “gift” (hope this works for an unlimited amount of clicks lol) my favourite / practical / monthly use recipes from NYT Cooking that I subscribe to!

And for protein I still eat eggs, but I try to source them as ethically as I can. Lots of tofu, lots of edamame, lots of Greek yogurt, lentils, beans, & seeds! LOTS lol! I love food. Food is the best.

Source: beth_thefirstyear on Instagram

I have four muffin tips for making bakery style muffins at home.

Tip number one:

Rest your batter for 15 minutes in your mixing bowl after you make it. This is gonna allow the starch molecules to swell and absorb, creating the thicker batter and the thicker batter is known for doming!

Tip number two:

Fill your muffin holes with at least six to eight tablespoons of batter. That’s like a heaping half cup okay. You want them super full so they’re gonna create that dome.

Tip number three:

Kinda goes along with tip number two. You’re only gonna fill every other hole in your muffin pan. And why we do that - that’s so the muffins that are baking can spread and dome without running into their neighbors. Because when they run into their neighbors they get like square edges but we want perfect dome circles.

Tip number four:

You’re to bake your muffins at a high temperature initially. That’s gonna be 425*F for the first seven minutes. And then keep them in the oven and lower the temperature to 350*F for the remaining bake time. Starting the muffins off at a high temperature initially allows the muffins to rise rapidly and it sets the outer surface of the muffin, producing a dome shape.

Figure out what you hate about it and work around it.

Hate the texture of raw meat? Don't cook with raw meat, or handle it with food service gloves.

Hate standing on your feet for hours in a kitchen? See if a bar stool will work for your counter height and cook while sitting.

Hate not knowing how the food will come out? Find one low stakes thing to practice and refine that one thing. Once you've got that one thing down and can make it predictably, move on to a second thing and build from there.

Hate having a million things going on at once that need your attention? Look for simpler recipes, like slow cooker recipes or one-pan baked dishes. Don't bother trying to make a meat and a vegetable and a side dish all finish at the same time, bake a casserole with meat and vegetables in it and you're all good.

Hate the way your cooking tastes? Think about what foods you like when they're not coming from your kitchen and try recipes that aim to taste like that. There's no point in pounding your head against a baked chicken recipe if you hate baked chicken but you love pork chops. Find a couple pork chop recipes and try those instead. (Also try simpler, or more basic recipes - a lot of cookbooks have very flavorful show-stopper type main dishes that are overwhelming if you try to eat like that all the time. Skip the pesto pizza with shaved prosciutto and goat cheese AND the recipe for the hearty midwestern tater tot casserole with three kinds of canned soup and instead find a recipe for a basic roast and some simple mashed potatoes).

Hate cooking frequently? Find some foods you like that you can make in large batches to portion into individual servings that you can stick in the freezer. Alternate between those frozen meals throughout the week and only cook on weekends.

Hate cooking huge pots of food? Cook one-off meals with small amounts of ingredients - if you hate making a gallon of butter chicken, you might have a better time making chicken tenders.

I don't have much of a choice about cooking, so it's a good thing that I like cooking, but it did take a lot of getting used to to be happy cooking as much as I do.

My mother-in-law hates cooking and I suspect that's because she has a bad relationship to food, she never learned to use spices, and she felt obligated to cook for her family when she didn't want to, and then never took the time to improve her relationship to cooking, so now that she's alone in the house she eats a can of chili beans for dinner every night. BUT. She likes soup. And I've showed her a few easy soup recipes that require minimal prep (buy pre-sliced mushrooms, buy powdered spices instead of fresh, use soup stock instead of letting it simmer for hours, make a slurry to thicken it instead of waiting for it to reduce) OR that can be made by pouring cans into a crockpot and she does okay making those when she wants something different.

I find that a lot of people who hate cooking don't actually hate cooking, but they think that it's a lot of frustrating effort for a middling result. And in those cases, I say don't work as hard. Make less of an effort. The more you practice easy stuff, the easier it gets, and then the hard stuff starts to get easier as you build skill, and then it's not such a miserable, frustrating process.

But if you're trying a new recipe every time you cook and you're struggling with it and it doesn't come out how you want it to and you're stuck eating something that doesn't taste good and your kitchen is a mess when you're done - yeah. You're going to hate cooking.

There is no shame in using pre-made things, having frozen meals, microwave meals, canned sauces etc whatever the stores near you have.

I eat a lot of microwave dinners for lunch at work and at least where I'm living those tend to be pretty good nowadays. You can pimp them a bit if you want to or buy a side salad to go with it, but they are fine as they are. Same with frozen pizzas, frozen spring rolls are good, etc.

Boil some pasta and dump a jar of ready made pasta sauce into a pot and heat it up. Or rice and curry sauce. Heck, pasta, canned fish and ketchup can be a meal.

Its okay to not have any passion towards food and feel like it's just a "gotta do it to survive" -thing, and then do whatever is easiest.

Like I hate chopping onions and garlic, so I eventually went "fuck it" and started buying frozen chopped onions and canned crushed garlic. Foodie friends tend to faint on their couches when I mention it, but maybe I'm not a refined enough person or whatever because I genuinely can't taste any difference.

This is going to vary tremendously by your situation but I happen to be in a house that has a TON of storage and costs and arm and a leg to heat/cool AND I have a mother-in-law who keeps gifting me stuff she doesn't want that I would never otherwise buy, so I've actually through sheer random chance found an effective way to get around some of this.

It's separate appliances. It sucks! It really sucks! But using an air fryer heats up the kitchen less than using the oven. Using an electric kettle heats up the kitchen less than using the stove. Using an electric frying pan heats up the kitchen a LOT less than using the stove.

These haven't been super useful for me, since I'm generally planning on cooking for hours when I'm going to cook, but Large Bastard likes frozen french bread pizzas and he is in love with the air fryer that lets him heat them on the countertop without having to warm up a much larger space (the oven, and then the area above the oven where all the heat dissipates). His mom recently gave us her never-used electric frying pan, which I loathe and will not use. But it makes a quick quesadilla in a small appliance instead of heating up a cast iron pan and the range around it. I grew up with stovetop kettles, but Large Bastard got me an electric kettle a couple years ago and not only is it cooler to use than heating the kettle on the stove, it's much faster (so now I also use it to boil water when I need water on the stove for pasta or whatever; it's not just for tea or instant soup or coffee, it's for having the stove on for less time when making mac and cheese).

Whether these are effective for you is going to depend a lot on your use case. If it were just me in the house, I don't eat the kinds of things that make it better to use an air fryer instead of the oven, or an electric frying pan instead of the stove, but it makes sense for Large Bastard and the electric kettle makes sense for both of us (seriously; it's much much less hot than using a kettle on the stove for stuff like tea or instant soup, and it has enough opportunities to be useful that I don't begrudge it permanent counter space).

ASIDE from all of that, in a way that might be more realistic for people who don't want a bunch of counter-top appliances (I don't blame you, I don't like them much myself); I do a lot of cooking at night when I'll be able to blow hot air out with fans and won't have to be close to the kitchen for several hours. I cook a lot between 10pm and 2am and then use a microwave if I'm going to heat something up during the day. Buuuuuut I also don't go to sleep until around 3 and I don't eat dinner until 10-11, so that works really well for my schedule but might not work for yours. I would be miserable here (southern california) cooking when most people seem to make their dinner (5-8pm) because it's still so hot at that time. BUT that can still be useful - you can hard boil some eggs before bedtime and save them for meals later in the week, or sacrifice one day of a hot kitchen to make stuff that you can add to other things later; bake a bunch of potatoes and grill some chicken and make a pot of soup on one day when you've got time to recover after, then re-heat instead of cooking because re-heating doesn't make your kitchen as hot.

has this ever been you: you have a nicely steamed vegetable, or maybe you want to make the best butter noodles, but you know that if you put butter on those it’ll just melt and you end with kind of greasy noodles or vegetables? don’t you wish it was instead a luscious buttery glaze?

introducing: beurre monté

you will take a small sauce pan, and begin heating it with 1-2 tablespoons of water (use very little water) and bring it to a hard simmer or boil

turn the heat down slightly, and add Butter. how much? however much you dare. (start with 3-4 tablespoons and go from there)

you are going to either whisk Aggressively or you can pick up the saucepan, still holding it over the heat, and swirl aggressively so the butter is skating around the sides of the pan

done correctly, you will have liquid butter that is still emulsified. you have made Butter Sauce. season it with a little salt, and toss whatever you want in it.

if you’re butter splits, i’m sorry. you didn’t agitate it enough to maintain the emulsion, and now you have melted butter.

you can use this knowledge to make other sauces by swapping out the water for another liquid. white wine becomes beurre blanc. red wine is beurre rogue.

you want to CUM? sweat minced shallot in a tiny bit of butter, add white wine and cook it out until it’s reduced by about half. then whisk butter in hard. a few flecks of minced thyme or fennel frond stirred thru, and you eat that with a nice seared fish? or scallop? or even shrimp? wow. you will Nut

your boxed mac and cheese game can also be elevated by cooking your pasta and making a beurre monté first, tossing your pasta in that and adding the cheese packet. wow. hey; you’ll cum

Anyway, she was super fucking homophobic and abusive to me when I told her I was gay, so here’s the recipe

4-6 lbs of Hamburger/turkey burger

1 pk onion soup mix OR ranch mix

1 TBs ketchup

1 Tbs spicy brown mustard,

1 Tbs bbq sauce

1 Tbs steak sauce

1 egg

mix, shape into a loaf in a big pan, and bake at 350 for 2 hrs (maybe 2 and a half if you’re feeling dangerous)

(6 servings)

-2lbs red potatoes

-1 cup butter (2 sticks)

-1 cup cream cheese (1 pack)

-Chives (optional)

-Salt & Pepper to taste

1. drop those bad boys (potatoes) in a big ol pot. U don’t even have to chop them just wash them

2. boil til soft!

3. Drain

4. Mash (usually they’re small enough you can use a fork if u don’t have one of those squashers) until its a pretty chunky mix

5. add the other stuff. Keep mashing

I did sports in college and the day before every tournament we'd go to Olive garden and eat as much pasta as possible. carb loading.

and literally every year the freshmen were like "you want us to eat carbs? Bc this was peak diet culture days. And yeah bc carbs make you strong the next day. You can do high intensity anerobic exercise for a long ass time after eating carbs. it was like having pasta superpowers

We'd be bringing sugary drinks to competition to keep up the energy and getting burgers and milkshakes after to recover. And all that was healthy af

Apparently the school they were in at the time had told them All About The Evils Of Carbs. And how they should be avoiding them all.

Carb loading has it's place definitely (I used to do it a lot pre-days where I knew I was going to be doing it a lot of heavy lifting for work). But honestly so does just eating carbs.

But we really need to get people to stop saying terrifying things like "pasta only fills you up with empty calories"

Because OP is right, it fills you with love and warmth (and most importantly pasta).