What are you cooking right now?

So - we have the "what are you listening to right now?" topic and so I thought I would start a new cooking topic.

This is my current go to dish for fast and easy and fit for a guest

Spanish Fish

SERVES 2/3

INGREDIENTS

2 frozen fish fillets (Alaskan pollack is good)
1 yellow pepper
100 gram of Chorizo sausage
1 400g tin of tomatoes
a little olive oil

EQUIPMENT
Large frying pan
Oven-proof dish

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Defrost the fish
2. Slice the sausage so it is little circles like pepperoni
3. Prepare the pepper. Remove all seeds and stalk and slice into thin strips
4. Set oven to gas mark4
5. Put a little oil in the frying pan and gently fry the chorizo sausage.
6. Once the sausage is coloured, add the pepper strips
7. Continue to gently fry for 5 minutes or so.
8. Add the tomatoes. While the tomatoes are simmering, prepare the fish fillets
9. Slice the fillets into chunks about the width of your thumb.
10. Tip the tomato/pepper/chorizo mix into the ovenproof dish.
11. Arrange the fish strips on top of the tomato mix.
12. Put in oven and cook for twenty minutes.
    

SIDE DISH
Goes great with plain boiled rice and steamed green beans.

That looks particularly nommy!

I had Karen pasta for dinner tonight, which was left-overs of lunch that I had with a friend -

Ingredients -

Enough pasta for 2 carbi-vores. (i.e. probably a bit more than you would normally do)
Lots of sliced mushrooms (I think I had 500g?)
Some Onions - sliced - enough to completely cover the bottom of the skillet. I use frozen chopped onions, so that way the onions cook with the garlic and basil without getting dehydrated.
Garlic and basil - I use the garlic and basil in a tube, because then I don't have to add oil.
3 eggs. (1.5 eggs per person).
2 handfuls of grated tasty cheese (any smelly cheese will do)

Cooking Instructions:

1. Cook the pasta until al dente.
2. In the skillet put a squidge of garlic and basil goo - and add the frozen onions and mushrooms and cook them until they are all nice.
3. Add the cooked pasta
3. Make a hole in the middle of the pan and add the 3 eggs, partially cook the eggs, then mix it into mushroom and onions and pasta - so there's a nice coating on most things, as well as some cooked egg that isn't coating.
4. Add the cheese, and wait until it's melted. Give it a bit of a stir.

Take off the heat, pile into plates and eat.

Also is good with assorted meats - bacon, ham, tuna, salami, chicken. If you eat it without meat, it doesn't really cope with other veges.
If you add some meats - you can add associated veges - tuna and corn.
Also is good if you use potato instead of pasta - but you need to boil the potato first and then slice it into flat slices and let them brown in the pan before adding everything else.

"Carbi-vores" - love it! LOL!

I just made (and drank most of) a pot of dark French Roast 'pressed' coffee - black...
And now, I'm about to cook 'oats' for breakfast...

I do them in the nuker: 1 scoop (1/2 c) oats to 2 scoops water and a pinch of salt for 2.5 minutes.
Then - for DD and DH (who prefer the"Quick" oats - 'ABD'/AlreadyBeenDigested in my book) they just like honey and milk on top.
For me (I like the regular steel-cut variety TQVM) - I add butter, brown sugar, and a heaping 1/4 t. of cinnamon (or ginger - mmmmm!) with a splash of milk. Heaven.

Ummm....I'm ordering pizza, lol.

But I do cook I just don't usually use recipes. I just wing it. Unless I'm baking. I use recipes for some things, like lasagna, or other stuff that has to have certain proportions. But mostly I just throw stuff together.

My favorite dish is Polish noodles. There isn't really a recipe, per se, but this is what you do...

You need:

a medium head of cabbage
a bag of kluski noodles (I use Inn Maid)
a keilbasa

Shred the cabbage (I just cut it up into small strips cause I like it a little bigger), slice the kielbasa. Throw it together in a big skillet with just a splash of oil. Fry it till the cabbage is to your liking. Cook the noodles. Throw it all together. Salt and pepper to taste.

Well... I did stove-top mac-n-cheese (from scratch) with provolone for dinner tonight. After stirring for the good part of an hour it was STILL too grainy for my taste. Everyone else liked it - and it tasted fine; I just wish I could make it creamy like the packaged ones are. Anybody have a fool-proof tip/trick?

... the wine was good.

You do a butter and flour sauce Catherine?

I saw one of those master chef programs, where instead of doing butter and flour roux to make the base in, they tossed the cheese with cornflour and milk, and supposedly that made it a less grainy sauce. I'd have a look over the interwebs for that kind of recipe.

We had leftovers tonight so no real cooking here. (Leftover BBQ ribs, roast beef and tuna casserole- gotta use it all up!) BUT I did have to make a cheese sauce for the tuna casserole since it soaked up every bit of sauce that was originally in there.

I always start my sauces with the butter and flour. The big thing there is to make sure the sauce is smooth before you put anything else in it. So melt butter, throw in some flour and stir, stir, stir. Add milk, a bit a time and stir, stir, stir some more. Keep stirring and adding milk until it's the right consistency for whatever you're going to use the sauce for. Gravy? You might want it a bit thicker if you're going to put liquids in it to flavor it. Cheese sauce? You'll want it a bit thinner since the cheese will thicken it up again. Biscuits and gravy? However thick you want it to be.. throw in some salt and pepper and you're good to go. As long as you remember to STIR IT WELL before adding anything else and after, it should never be grainy.

Funny thing here is: this is the only sauce/gravy I can make with flour. If I try to make brown gravy with pan drippings or any other way, it's got to be cornstarch to thicken it up. Doesn't matter what I do/how I add the flour, it'll end up lumpy every single time. And I make some of the world's best gravy. (It's true- people have been known to lick their plates, lol.)

Actually - the recipe I have doesn't call for flour at all (Joy of Cooking - ancient!) Just butter, milk, cheese, and eggs. This is not low calorie! *mutter - it should be, for me* Oi!

Seriously, I stood there stirring for at least 45 minutes! S l o w l y bringing the sauce to a gentle simmer - to melt the cheese but not curdle/chunkify the milk/eggs. Maybe Provolone wasn't the right kind of cheese? But, it's what I had in the fridge. Oh, well... like I said - it had good flavor; and the wine was good!

I usually don't use a recipe either - it drives my mom nuts! She's a 1950's home-ec major *pffft* and MUST follow a recipe, or she has no clue what to do. Her stuff always turns out picture perfect, and tastes even better. Me? I'm a musician. I just 'wing it' *shrug* - hubs and daughter are artists too... they roll with it. And yes, the pizza guy does know our names!

If I try making any kind of 'gravy' with flour, it usually ends up with dumplings.
...I don't make gravy often

Not that I'm a bad cook, mind you - no one goes hungry around here!

Interesting fact: if you make a sauce with only cold ingredients you can just chuck the whole lot in the pan!!

No really. I made this recipe and called it Ru-proof Sauce (Ru is my best friend ever and non-biological sister)

Ingredients:

• 500ml COLD milk
• 40g butter
• 50g flour
• 50g grated cheddar cheese
  

Equipment
Saucepan
Balloon whisk
Internet lock

Method

1. Put milk flour and butter in the pan, set the heat to LOW and start whisking.
   DO NOT : go watch reruns of Star Trek (or something similar) for an eternity and return to pan to stare mournfully at burned horror
   DO NOT : go play mahjongg for an hour and return to pan to stare mournfully at burned horror
   DO NOT : leave the pan or stop whisking or leefish will beat you when she gets home and finds burned horror.
2. It starts to look thick - yay cos arm is very tired and you nearly hate leefish now
3. Add grated cheese to sauce
4. Whisk a bit more until cheese is not a blob.
5. Pour over cauliflower (or whatever) and bung in oven at gas-mark 4 for 30 mins and look proud when leefish eats it without beating you.
   

Lancashire Hot Pot

Hot Pot is traditionally made with diced lamb, but you could substitute any meat for it and even leave out the meat completely.

Feeds 4

Ingredients:
500g Lamb, diced (or substitute)
2 Carrots, sliced
1/2 Swede, diced
1-2 Parsnips, sliced
1 Onion, finely sliced or use leeks, cut into rounds

4-5 large Potatoes, sliced
Mint, salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Dice lamb/meat.
Fry off in pan till brown.
Dice/slice vegetables.
Add veg to lamb and simmer until the veg is soft.
Meanwhile peel and slice the potatoes and par boil for about 10 minutes.
Layer the potatoes over the meat and veg mixture, sprinkling salt, pepper and mint to taste between each layer.
Bake in the oven until the potatoes turn golden brown - about 30-45 mins on a high setting.

Goes well with green vegetables, eg beans, broccoli, cabbage