Experimenting in the kitchen

How to Cook Everything, Revised Edition by Mark Bittman

I’ll write this up fully later, but I just wanted to share a couple of photos with you. I’ve been in the kitchen more than my silence might indicate, but mostly doing simply things like hummus. Today’s my first experiment in awhile.

Well, I call it an experiment, but like the cautious cook I usually am, I took Marc Bittman’s recipe for “Braised Oxtail with Garlic and White Wine” and messed with it as I cooked. For one thing, I used beef neck instead of oxtail. It looks just as (if not more) tasty than the oxtails I’ve had, but was astoundingly cheaper. If this works out, I may never go back to oxtail.

His recipe also calls for 4 ounces of bacon. I didn’t remember that before I started quick thawing the beef neck.… Continue reading →

Surprise! Dinner was delicious!

Tonight’s dinner was supposed to be vegetable risotto. I was still just going to throw it together, but I had PLANS.

However, Bill worked late and is about to go work some more. So risotto wasn’t going to happen, because it was going to take too damn long.

So, on the train ride home, I started trying to figure out some faster meal. The worst case scenario, in my head, was that we ate out. We have too many veggies in the house for that to work for me at all. We’ve been inundated by tomatoes, you see.

My train thought process went about like this (truly – all crazy thoughts included):

“We’ve GOT to use up some of those tomatoes. And didn’t we get like a pound of basil in the last share?Continue reading →

[112] Boneless Rib Pasta

How to Cook Everything, Revised Edition by Mark Bittman

This recipe is a very slight adaptation from the recipe “Andrea’s Pasta with Pork Ribs” in this book. Namely, the recipe calls for “6 – 8 meaty spareribs, separated” and we used about 3/4 lbs of boneless beef ribs.

As with just about any substitution we make on this site, it has to do with what we had on had when we made the recipe in question. In this case, I chose this recipe because I was trying to figure out how to best use that meat.

This is an older recipe that needed to be posted. We made it not too long after I returned from “Edible Institute 2011.”:http://www.metacookbook.com/archives/193-A-short-post-maybe-on-Edible-Institute-2011.html While I was gone, Bill had purchased some chicken and some beef for cooking himself some curry and some stir-fry, and then not gotten around to cooking those things.… Continue reading →

[109] Sherried Tomato Soup

Cover of The Pioneer Woman Cooks by Ree Drummond

I made this soup based entirely on the name and the photos in the cookbook. It’s right next to the cornbread recipe, which is my new always & forever cornbread recipe (unless I have to make some other recipe to advance the challenge, I suppose), and it taunts me every time I go to make cornbread.

That’s more often than you might think, actually. We’ve become a little obsessed with “her cornbread”:http://www.metacookbook.com/archives/123-67-Skillet-Cornbread.html because it’s delicious.

I have to admit, I rarely am motivated to try something just because it sounds or looks good. Obviously, that’s a pivotal part of the process, but it doesn’t usually start there. Usually, it starts because I have an ingredient I want to try or use up, or I have a method I want to learn more about, or I’m “desperately seeking a vegetarian meal”:http://metacookbook.com/archives/211-Whats-the-longest-youve-gone-without-eating-meat.html… Continue reading →

[43] Meat Sauce, Bolognese Style

How to Cook Everything, Revised Edition by Mark Bittman

This was the second in a set of three recipes I made on Monday. It was also made because I wanted lasagne.

This recipe takes a long time to make. It’s well worth it, I’d say, but it’s important to be aware of that. If you forget, you end up like me, chopping shallots before you’ve had your version of morning caffeine. No good. It’s amazing I have all my fingers.

It’s really a simple story. I was planning to make the lasagne on Sunday, when I had plenty of time. But we slept in and then decided we’d be better off going for a walk and picking up some potting soil and pots for my new plants (thyme and lemon balm). After all, I would have plenty of time to make lasagne on Monday.… Continue reading →