Cooking: putting it all together

[tubin]

I have lots of cool cooking toys... er, I mean appliances. I know a variety of cooking techniques and can successfully produce a number of tasty meals

Comments

[la_directora]

I never got my grocery list laminated. That's smart. :) But I did develop an Excel spreadsheet (yes, I are a dork) with my list of staples on it and room to add that week's few unique items. I haven't shopped that way in a while, and am planning to go back to it. Having that list of staples helped me (a) to plan meals around healthy items, and (b) to remember to plan meals around what I already had. It was healthier AND thriftier. :)

[tubin]

I have just spent quite a bit of time browsing the menus4mons site - thanks for the reference.

I think part of my problem is insufficient freezer space. I can have frozen meals stored for quick use or I can have frozen stock ingredients (eg meat and frozen veggies) but I don't seem to have space for both.

Maybe another freezer would be a good purchase?

[la_directora]

One of my FAVORITE things about the new Ikea kitchen I put in last year was my "staples drawer". It's a 30" wide deep drawer that is filled with canisters that hold all of my grains/beans staples. That drawer contains (at this point all organic, I think):

flour - whole wheat and unbleached all purpose

rice - long grain brown rice, short grain brown sweet rice (great for sushi), Basmati, sushi rice, Arborio/risotto

dried beans: black beans, pinto beans, black-eyed peas, red lentils, garbanzos

other - coarse corn meal, steel cut oats, pearled barley, oat bran

[tubin]

I have a 5 foot long kitchen space which currently has decrepit rolling carts under a countertop. I have been thinking of your kitchen re-do and how nice a set of Ikea cabinets would be in that space.

How large are the individual containers in your staples drawer? Will the flour container hold an entire bag of flour?

[la_directora]

I decided to provide you with some visuals. :) Here is the drawer, before I started filling it:

[tksan]

I don't keep much of a pantry but I do always have canned sardines in olive oil and couscous around. For the fridge, I nearly always have a bunch of italian parsley around - keeps quite a long time. Those items + some red pepper flakes & lemon juice & olive oil = dinner in < 10 mins.

[tubin]

I see a lot of recipes with small quantities of anchovies mixed into pasta and veggies. K informs me he'll never eat anchovies "because I don't like all the little bones". Wonder if he'd do better with sardines? Seems like they'd impart a similar fishy, oily flavor but would be less spiny and less salty.

[tksan]

Try get the anchovy paste - keep in the fridge. No bones, and in the right amounts adds richness but not fishiness.

[rikibeth]

What you want to do is to write down the things you make most commonly, and what ingredients those take, including condiments, and make that the heart of your basics.

For improvisational cooking, the things you want to have on hand are Starches (rice, pasta, potatoes, couscous etc.), Fats (olive oil, canola oil, butter), onions and garlic, your spice rack, and, ideally, supplies of chicken broth and heavy cream. With those things around, adding Protein Of Choice and Produce of Choice, you can make damn near anything.

[tubin]

Several people have mentioned couscous. Clearly I need to learn to cook with it.

[rikibeth]

Easy. Just pour boiling wateron it.