OT: Does anyone else here enjoy cooking?
rickdugan
Verified and Certifiable Super-Reviewer
I could always grill well, but lately it's gone to another level with marinades that I've been developing. I've learned that for many meats to truly absorb the flavors, they have to marinate for at least 24 hours. Kuddos to the Food Network for that, which is on pretty much all weekend in my house.
I'm also learning that everything is better with sauces and gravies. My beef and chicken gravies are getting stupid good and my red sauce has been excellent for a long time, but recently I've added a variety of cheese sauces to my repertoire. I have also made dishes like beef stroganoff and alfredo recipes for the first time.
Otherwise I just keep improving on the margins. Again I credit the never-ending Food Network shows for a lot of it. My coatings for oven baked meats have picked up more spices, I've learned better broiling techniques for some meats, I've been expanding into a variety of seafood with poaching or wine reductions, etc., etc.
When I add all of these new things to the what I could already do well, I'm starting to become a respectably decent cook. And no motherfuckers, I may sound a bit gay saying all of this, but I'm still straight, lol.
Shit, tonight just for shits and giggles I whipped up a batch of chocolate chip cookies for the kiddos. My baking repertoire is definitely much more limited, but I have a few go-to items that I'm looking to expand on.
Tbh I don't have a lot of time to indulge in anything beyond the basics during the week, but I wonder if I shouldn't have been a chef in another lifetime.
Anyone else enjoy cooking?
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I make my pizza from scratch (no more frozen dough or store bought sauce) too.
PreCOVID I was usually making ground beef tacos or crock pot frozen meatballs and my wife was always rolling her eyes. Not anymore!!!!
Best kitchen purchases:
Sous vide
A really good knife set
Air fryer (hey, everyone likes French fries and IMO this thing is the best option if you don’t want to mess with lots of oil)
Worst kitchen purchase:
Instapot - never had much use for it
Marinating meat for too long changes the texture. Plus marinades sauces and spices should enhance the natural flavors already there.
Yup. Generally no more than 24-36 hours for chicken and other delicate meats. Beef can stand up to marinating for a longer timeframe, especially cheap cuts with a lot of connective tissue. I will never marinate a high end steak - salt and pepper should be plenty for a high quality steak.
I’ve caught quite a few fish lately and am having fun grilling salmon and lake trout, smoking lakers and making walleye dip. I’ve done a lot of experimenting with garden veggies I’ve grown as well as making jam from wild fruit I’ve gathered. And that got me baking homemade bread again.
Prefer brines for white meat and I'm not a huge fan of marinades.
A good fryer with a drain spout for filtering is an amazing purchase. There are just some fried items that an air fryer can't replicate.
Sharp knives are a must have.
Chefs knife/santoku
Filet knife/boning knife
Paring knife
Carving knife
Scales are great for baking.
Kitchen aid stand mixer with all of the attachments:
Grinder
Pasta sheeter
Dough hook
At one time I was cooking for a family of 7 but now I'm mostly just cooking for myself. So I stay with the basics. I can only eat so much left overs. I each breakfast or lunch once or twice a week and dinner out a restaurants only on special occasions. . I don't very often eat at strip clubs.
Heaving, the key to both is not to overwork them.
Here's a simple fish approach if you like salmon: Fill a frying pan with 1/2 of an inch of olive oil and put the heat on higher medium. While the oil is heating, season the salmon fillet liberally with salt and pepper. When the oil is ready - usually after about 10 minutes or so (which you can figure out by flicking a drop of water in and hearing it crackle) - put the salmon in skin down for 4 minutes, then flip and cook for 3 more minutes. Voila.
I can no longer eat unseasoned vegetables, and almost all of them are better stir-fried in a little olive oil along with your favorite seasonings. Zucchini and Summer Squash with some toasted sesame oil and a pinch of cayenne.
Learn how to roast garlic!
A tiny bit of fresh habanaro or ghost pepper goes a long way. I make a double (4lbs of meat) batch of chili with <em>half</em> a ghost pepper, sans seeds, and it's bloody awesome. Jalapenos are too bitter for me unless they've been smoked dried into chipotles.
My only gripe is that my house doesn't have gas, so I'm stuck with an electric range. But, cast iron mostly doesn't care.
One of the best investments I made a few years back is to buy a large high quality dutch oven, which I now use to cook all my beef roasts and stews. I brown the meat in the dutch oven on the stove top, then deglaze it with some beef stock to keep all those brown bits in the same pot, add some seasonings, garlic and onions and then transfer it to the oven to cook at 250 for about to 12 hours (for a pot roast). When it has about 4 hours left I add the potatoes and carrots. The best part is, when the roast and veggies are done, I can move the pot back to the stovetop, remove everything but the liquid, and then convert it into a gravy. Aiyee!
My dutch over broke from being dropped on concrete about 15 years ago, and for a variety of reasons, I didn't replace it. At a garage sale about 5 years later, I found a set of two cast iron ones. One is a large (8qt, I think?) camping version with the top able to hold coals, and the other is a smaller, more typically kitchen sized, 4 or 5 quart, ones. They were both rusted to hell, but I got them for a dollar. Took me a week of alternating vinegar baths, scrubbing (a wire brush on a drill is your friend here), and baking dry on my grill burner, followed by re-seasoning to get them back, but now, while not yet <em>quite</em> as good as my old one, they're both still awesome.
I also have a skillet and a griddle that my grandmother gave me before she passed. (Boy, was my aunt pissed off when she found out they were gone after she died! 🤣🤣) That's where most of my bacon, eggs, pancakes, burgers, and steaks are cooked.
The Sous-vide is excellent! I got one a few months before the pandemic hit, and it’s helped my cooking considerably.
Over the fall and winter I use the crock pot to make stews and chilis - which are great - and surprisingly simple. It’s just a bit of prep and then it is good in several hours.
I cooked more when things were locked down more, but lately I haven't had the time. It can be relaxing and while my talents haven't improved all that much, the quality of the food and service at mid-tier and quick-serve type restaurants at least in my area is still way, way down, so comparatively my food is better than what I can get by going out. Higher end restaurants still provide quality dining options, but I'd have to make other sacrifices financially if I wanted to eat at those places for the bulk of my meals.
But really, I'm lazy as fuck about cooking. I like to buy a lot of stuff pre-made or pre-prepared or already cut/diced up. I'm also a pro when it comes to using the microwave. I try to maintain a Paleo diet, but I hate food prep so much.
SJG
For example, I want the fat on my rib-eyes and bone-in pork chops to be crispy and delicious and I don't think that a couple of minutes of reverse searing at the end will accomplish that. That why I grill or cast iron the steaks on high heat for short bursts and broil the chops after coating in my own seasoned bread crumb mixture. Juicy and delicious WITH crispy fat.
Even with boneless chicken breasts I want that crusty sear. After marinating them for 24+ hours I don't have to worry about them drying out in high heat, but it does take some work to get that crunchy sear on the outside. My grill is a very good tool for that.
For tougher meats, like cheap cuts of beef, I stew or braise low and slow to render the connective tissue. Often I'm cooking those in liquids that will be used for a stew or gravy, so again no desire for sous vide. Cheaper cuts of pork are cooked low and slow in seasoned chicken broth.
Many of my other dishes, like roaster chicken, meatloaf, a variety of baked pasts dishes, etc., require an oven.
I'm glad that the appliances add value for some of you, but I don't see myself buying them. I'm also getting ready to give away my air fryer and Instapot to make room for a deep fryer and maybe a pasta maker.
Shadow I couldn't agree more with these sentiments. I have both charcoal and gas grills. I much prefer to cook on charcoal and often do on the weekends, but I don't always have the extra time on weekdays. Sometimes it's really nice to just fire up the girl and 15 minutes later (including warmup time) have a couple beautiful rib-eyes cooked and resting. Waiting 30 minutes for the charcoal to ash over and be ready isn't always an option for me.
I can also control the heat a bit better with gas, which helps with things that I need to start cooking using indirect heat. Bone-in chicken and ribs come to mind.
Charcoal all the way though. It's all I use. When I make tacos I always let my meat marinate overnight. Then always use a charcoal grill for everything.
With steak I prefer a cast iron skillet. A tiny bit of oil.. and just season it with a bit of salt pepper and a pinch of paprika.
This is why we can't have anything nice, there's always a shithead looking to spin someone up
Man the food is going to be damned good here this weekend. I am going to grab some of those steaks for a quick dinner cook-up near the end of the week and I smell a Sunday roast coming, complete with pan gravy, homemade mashed potatoes and maybe some fresh green beans. Those rib roasts always give off a ton of good juices for gravy. They also have a lot of other sale meats that are going to give my grills a real workout this weekend. I am excited, lol.
I do all my bbq on a smoker, but I have a buddy that does brisket, pork butt and ribs in the sous vide. In order to break down the fat, those meats are in the sous vide bath a long time, sometimes 48 hours or more. He likes it because it’s a consistent and good result. Brisket can be especially unpredictable but I’ve gotten comfortable enough with it that I’m not especially inclined to sous vide it. It’s another way to cook. That’s all.
Yes the beef has to be labelled 100% grass fed. Legally if it just says grass fed it only has to be 30% grass fed. You are right usually grass fed is a gimmick cause tne label says grass fed when its only 30% or 50%. With 100% grass fed they csnt lie.
Cows are meant to eat just grass. It creates higher quality milk and beef. When they’re fed corn and wheat its so they can fatten up quickly and so they output a higher liquid volume of milk which is of lower quality. It changes the fatty acid profile of the milk or beef fat when theyre fed corn or grain.
Icee because their burger costs like $9 for a double burger and each patty is maybe 3oz or less. Yeah the size of the patty is standardized so every single portion is small and pricy. Same price, same size patties.
That's how you wound on here
I said this:
Restaurants are so greedy I haven’t seen any restaurant using grass fed organic beef besides elevation burger. And their portions are small and they are a bit more pricy.
I was referring to elevation burger specifically. I never said all restaurant portions are small and pricy.
There was some concern a while back about how growth hormones were used in milk cows and the potential impacts on the milk itself, but the major dairy manufacturers discontinued the practice 15+ years ago.
But I suppose that it was inevitable that this thread, like most others, would eventually jump off the rails to Troll Town.
There is some difference in taste depending on the livestock type and cut, but often the taste isn't vastly different. I mostly go for legit grass-fed to avoid toxins, hormones, antibiotics, etc., that can find its way into a lot of supermarket meats and accumulates in the body over time.
I buy all of my meat (and eggs) at a local small farm that has a good reputation and does 100% grass fed and pastured livestock. I don't fully trust things labeled "grass fed" at the supermarket, but that's just me.
Yes, it's more expensive, but it's a choice I've made based on research and feedback from knowledgeable people I know. I also like supporting my local small farmers.
Interestingly, though the price of meat has gone up by orders of magnitude at the supermarket, the price increases at my local farm have been much more modest. The price gap between supermarket and local farm has closed considerably.
If there was any compelling evidence out there to suggest that this was remotely true, I'd be on board with you. But thus far everything that I've read is anecdotal.
Why I prefer finished beef over unfinished beef is the flavor. I have found "grass fed" beef to be leaner and a bit gamey.
Also grass fed in itself only means 30% grass fed or more. There’s an amish brand of milk that explicitly labels their milk as grass fed for half the year only. Theres some milk and beef products explicitly labelled 100% grass fed. Those are all legit. If they just say grass fed or pastured without a number mentioned, it’s likely just advertising and the minimum or a little more.
The requirement for grass fed being only 30% of the year makes you wonder what these regular milk cows are being fed. It seems like they could be grain or corn fed year round otherwise why wouldn’t costco for example label their milk grass fed if it meets the 30% threshold.
Cows being fed grain causes them to produce a lower quality, higher liquid volume milk which is exactly what many milk farmers want. Milk is just the liquid coming from the cows teat, so as long as there’s a higher volume of milk thats what the farmers want. The high volume sellers dont care about the composition of the milk. Grain fed cows die sooner than purely grass fed as well.
Local farms, family run farms are also things that dont mean anything as far as quality. The local family run farms can still use toxic pesticides, hormones, antibiotics etc. the usda organic certification is more valuable than the other things.
I thimk even organic meats are injected with citric acid solutions during processing, the justification is it has anti microbial benefits. I think they require meat to be treated. You can see this at work if you cook certain cheap ground chicken or ground meats and they lose 50% of their weight after cooking.
Whereas higher quality ones only lose 20% of their weight after cooking or less. Sometimes the animals themselves are injected with things to make them retain a ton of water so they have a higher body weight before being slaughtered.
I've noticed this as well. Even Walmart and Kroger have skyrocketed, but the farmer's market stuff is still pretty much where it was two years ago. It's gone up some, of course, because of other things, but as one of the guys at one of the most diverse stands put it, "we pay more for fuel, and other stuff we can't self source, but almost everything else we make or grow ourselves."
I frequent a co op thats good though
I’m not sure it matters as much on the west coast I think raw milk can legally be sold there.
And local, farm raised, etc doesnt mean anything cuz local farm raised can still be toxic. The things to look out for are organic, pesticide free, hormone free, antibiotic free, 100% grass fed or 100% pastured. Soy free, corn free, vaccine free. Etc.
Gods, I thought I was the only one who ever bought one of those. 🤣
One of my favorites.
LOL. My version is 20+ years old, all beat up after years of use and long distance moves. I bought it right after my first divorce, when I found myself in a new city pretty helpless from a cooking standpoint. I learned all of my beginning cooking techniques from that book, along with basic lessons about where different cuts of beef come from, how tough they would be and the best ways to cook them. It was one of the single best purchases I ever made.
Pizza Hut quality has dropped in recent years. We made the dough in the store daily from scratch and cut up fresh vegetables in the store every day. It wasn't fun cutting up a whole bunch of onions. That made my eyes sting.
(dang seri…)
I have a red sauce bubbling on the stove while a meatloaf cooks in the oven. Once the meatloaf is done, my homemade mac n cheese goes in. Some of the sauce will go in the freezer so I have it whenever I need something quick.
I have chicken wings brining in the fridge for buffalo wings later today. I've decided that it's going to be a football and deep fried food night, including the buffalo wings, mozzarella sticks and tater tots. The red sauce and other food are for later in the week, except that I'll keep a little out for dipping the cheese sticks!
And of course I have some pounded out chicken breast marinating in a modified Italian dressing mixture and some steak marinating in an Asian inspired homemade sauce. Two days for each.
After today, the only things I want to do between now and Thanksgiving are boil some water, reheat leftovers and fire up the grill for stuff already prepped. This is the only way I can make sure that we have good healthy food during the week as I just don't have a lot of time to cook on business days.
Anyway, anyone else cooking today? Anything good?
But I do have some tomatoes we canned earlier this year; making some sauce sounds like a good idea next weekend.
But my babies are the issue. They are fussy. They don't really like most simple grilled foods and sides that I default to. If I don't put stuff on their plates that they like, they won't eat enough at meal time and instead will supplement with crap when my attention is elsewhere. So I spend a fair amount of time on Saturdays and/or Sunday cooking and prepping for the week. Sides are a big challenge, hence the mac n cheese and pasta sauce. They'll eat grilled meat if it has enough "flavor" so the weekend is also when I do a lot of meat prep (marinades and brines).
Usually all of that gives me 5 days of good eating, starting on Sat and rolling to Wed. On Thursday they either get something I saved in the freezer (like meat sauce) or something simple, like roasted smoked sausage and some tater tots. On Friday the kitchen is closed and Grubhub comes - my treat to myself. Rinse, repeat. The life of a parent with younger kids.
A word of advice, Chicken Florentine is a good way to get kids who don't like spinach to eat spinach, and like it. 🤣