The Food N00bs

Leftovers

by Kal

Mmmm, leftovers.

A simple adventure in dinnermaking

by Kal

Tonight, I didn't want to cook, I wanted to eat.  The urge to simply throw together some nachos was strong.  I'd been convenience-eating all week, though, thanks to some deadlines requiring me to burn the candle at both ends, and nothing aside from laziness stood in the way of a decent dinner tonight.  And I already had two chicken legs defrosted, so no excuses!

I really wanted to just throw them in a pan, but I reminded myself that a few moments spent in preparation pay off big-time on the plate.  I rinsed the legs, dried them thoroughly, gave them a thin coat of oil and a kosher-salt-and-pepper massage.  I oiled my stainless-steel skillet and fried the "presentation" side of the legs till the skin was nice and brown.  I turned the legs over, added big handfuls of sliced carrots and broccoli florets, slapped a lid on, and stuck it in a 450-degree oven.

At this point, my roommate's shy little kitty came over, stood up on her hind legs, placed a paw on my thigh, and meowed plaintively.  When she can't wait for the food to even finish cooking before she's begging for leftovers, I know I'm on to something good.

I had some baked beans and corn left over from a previous meal, and decided to add those to my plate as well.  Though I associate chicken and baked beans with mashed potatoes, I couldn't imagine that I'd miss them with all the vegetable action I had going on -- and I didn't.

Total cooking time was about 45 minutes, most of which I spent writing, since this dish doesn't require a lot of supervision.  I'm getting braver about letting my developing intuition determine when a dish is done, and although I still check with a meat thermometer when we're talking about things like poultry, I'm more often right than not now.  This dish in particular smelled divine right as it reached the safety zone.

The result was a good, hearty, flavorful meal that was much healthier than nachos.  I am still amazed at what can be accomplished with just a few really good ingredients.  Not so long ago, I would have drowned this in garlic (from the jar, even!  I've learned so much) and onions and maybe a little ginger or even barbecue sauce.  But it's so good just with the salt, oil, and pepper drawing out the flavor of the chicken and then infusing all those veggies.  I'm not sure that will ever stop being startlingly beautiful for me.

On-the-fly teriyaki

by Kal

I don't know what specifically goes into teriyaki sauce, but lately I've been sauteeing various teriyaki-friendly meats and vegetables in the following unmeasured sauce:

Plenty of soy sauce
A couple of glugs of mirin (cooking rice wine)
A small drizzle of sesame seed oil
A small dusting of the spicy spicy red chile flakes (OK, if it's just me, a large dusting)

This tastes really, really good and knocks the socks off commercially-prepared teriyaki sauce.  Granted, it doesn't come out as thick, but it's so tasty I don't mind.

Also, when filling flour tortillas with the mixture, I sautee in my cast-iron skillet, remove the mixture, then fry the tortillas very briefly in the still-juicy skillet.  This softens them up nicely and provides an additional layer of yum.  (Sorcha, this is yet another reason why I'm glad you convinced me to buy the big skillet -- the tortillas fit perfectly.)

Simple dinner

by Kal

An author friend of fellow foodie/author Jonathan Reynolds, upon seeing the elaborate dinner Jonathan had made, said to him, "Oh -- so this is how you don't write."  The opposite is true -- I've been busy with more writing projects lately, and so my cooking has simplified tremendously.

I had to share tonight's dinner, however, because I could not resist individually placing each broccoli floret on the plate.  I may be distracted, but I'm still a foodie.

A Blessed Bourdain Event, Redux

This just in! Food N00bs sources report that Anthony Bourdain and Ottavia Busia, aka "the Italian girlfriend," were married on April 20. The same source has revealed the name of their daughter: Ariane.

Who are these mysterious "sources", you ask? Well, let's just say that the N00bs know some people and...*sigh* Okay, you got us. Sorcha has a subscription to Entertainment Weekly and it was in their "events" column. We're N00bs, after all - you were expecting maybe some kind of culinary Deep Throat?

Don't answer that.