Men Over 30: What's one recipe or dish that you'd consider your go-to
I’ve never been much of a cook, but it’s something I’d love to try and get better at. I’ve got a growing family and as much as freezer food is serving them now, when they’re older I’d like to be able to cook them something genuinely nice.
Start it in the morning with mostly fresh ingredients. Put extra sharp cheddar and sour cream on it to serve.
Some ingredients that I like: stew meat ("steak"), onion, mushrooms, garlic, habenero, lime juice and cans of kidney/garbanzo/black/great northern beans.
Tater tot hot dish
Soups (secret is to start with beef stock and add things you like. Just heat it on the stove, very quick and easy.)
Fried rice. You make rice to be part of some other dish, then the next day fry the slightly dried out leftover rice in the fridge with soy sauce and an egg and whatever else you have onhand that would go well with it (garlic, onion, cabbage, tomatoes, etc).
I’m going to go with pancakes. They’re simple, quick and you almost always have the ingredients on hand. And somehow, people are always genuinely happy to be served good pancakes. If you want to spice things up, you can branch out to crepes and waffles. Crepes are even easier than pancakes, but you have to have something to go in them. Our standard is strawberries, nutella, walnuts, and whipped cream, but I also love savory crepes (I don’t make them though).
I’ve been making this pizza recipe for a couple years now. The downside is that you have to prep the dough the day before, but the end result is really good.
Otherwise, Japanese curry is so easy and consistent using curry tablets.
A basic spaghetti bolognese is relatively easy and very tasty. Also learn how to make a curry, it’s very easy and allows for almost infinite variation in veggies, meat spice combinations, etc… I would also advise you to learn how to make a basic soup, because that also allows for infinite variation once you know the basics.
Both curries and soups are also quick to make. Both can be done in 30 minutes (at first it will take longer of course, but with practice it will go faster).
Store bought tortillas. Canned or crock pot beans. Chopped lettuce and tomatoes. Shredded cheese. Avocado mashed with salt and pepper, and lime when I remember. Sour cream. Salsa for those who want it. Can be enhanced by adding taco meat by browning some ground beef and adding taco seasoning.
Want to impress impress at a family gathering with a relatively simple dish?
Potatoes are stupid versatile and easy to get right.
For me, my goto in this area is:
Get a pack of Yukon goldens. You could do baby reds, but don’t get Russets for this. They don’t saute well.
Preheat a saute pan or skillet to medium, cut each potato into a half or a third (bigger ones to a third) and rinse.
Mix potatoes in a bowl with about a tbsp of vegetable oil or butter and liberal seasoning of choice. There’s this parmesan-garlic blend I like, but it’s pretty hard to go wrong on the seasoning because potatoes work with basically anything.
Throw the mixed potatoes into the saute pan, add about 1/4 cup of water and cover. Cook for 10 minutes or until the potatoes are lightly seared and tender. ‘Tender’ means no resistance when stabbed with a fork.
Stir occasionally with a spatula so that they don’t stick to the pan. Add a little water when you uncover to stir, the steam is important.
Put it on a fancy plate and bam. The compliments roll in.
For a meal, add onions (or really any vegetables) and choice of protein. My goto is chicken thighs cooked separately in a cast iron.
Marinate the chicken in Italian dressing overnight in the fridge, sprinkle some salt and pepper into a pan with a small amount of the marinated liquid and cook on medium heat until you feel the chicken is done.
I use store boight fettuccine noodles but I do make the Alfredo sauce from scratch with heavy cream, garlic, cheeses, etc
And usually the thick garlic bread you pop in the toaster/oven on the side
I’d like to get a proper side dish that I can make alongside it but haven’t found anything that fits my personal taste.
So far the only complaint I have recieved was from a recent gall bladder removal patient had some bathroom troubles because of the chicken I think.
My first suggestion is to learn to cook and use a whole chicken.
Take a whole, air-dried chicken, remove the gizzard package (if present) and season liberally with a poultry seasoning blend (or whatever—salt, pepper, garlic powder, rosemary).
Bake, starting at 450 for 10-15 minutes, then at 325 for an hour and a half.
Eat the legs and thighs, reserve the breasts to us as an ingredient for chicken-anything—pasta, salad, or chicken salad sandwiches.
Boil the carcass for several hours with some more seasoning, onion, carrots and celery, then strain, reserving solids and broth.
Over the broth pot, rinse the solids with cold water, cooling them and getting everything tasty into the broth.
Pick the meat off the bones, skim the fat off the broth and recombine (or not, for stock).
Boil excess water away, until it tastes like bland chicken, then salt until it tastes good. It’s ok to use some bullion to add flavor, too.
That gives you a base that you can use to make any chicken soup. Simplest is to throw in some fresh veggies and cook for 10-15 minutes.
My current favorite cooking channels are Alex’s and Ethan’s .
The classics that I learned from are all public TV shows:
Make rice, but use chicken broth instead of water.
Take a large pan, and heat it on medium with a bit of oil in it until it’s hot and the oil kinda shimmers or ripples (past flows like water, before it smokes)
While it heats, cover some chicken breasts in salt and pepper. Slice an onion into discs.
Turn the heat up a bit, wait a few moments and then put the chicken in the pan. Turn the heat back down in a few moments. (You’re compensating for the chicken dropping the pan temperature. When the pan gets cold it makes the meat stick more, but you also don’t want things to be too hot, lest you have burnt on the outside and raw in the middle) Cook on both sides until it’s browned (a mild tan color with places that are a little darker). Don’t flip it too much, and it should take something like 5 minutes per side.
Dump a can of diced tomatoes into the pan. It’s going to sizzle a lot. If it’s a pre seasoned can that’s cool, otherwise add a bunch of oregano, pepper and some salt.
In the gaps around the chicken put the onion slices and pepper them generously. Put a lot on the pan to hold the steam.
Gently stir occasionally to keep the tomatoes from going funny, and flip the chicken.
Something like ten minutes later, the chicken should be done and you can check it with a thermometer. The onions should be edible. This recipe is generous to overcooking so try not to, but don’t stress.
Once the chicken is done, put a bit of butter on it, a little on each of the onion slices, and some more in the tomatoes. Replace the lid to melt the butter, call it ten seconds.
Remove the chicken and plate. Leave the lid on the give the onion a few more minutes to sit.
Put the rice in the plate.
Return to the pan and serve the onion.
Stir the tomato to incorporate the butter, and portion it out over the chicken and rice or whatever looks good.
All told, maybe half an hour and it looks fancier than the work that went in. Steamed broccoli also goes well.
Another good one is to cut chicken into thirds, and put in a bowl. Coat in oil. Coat in pepper, salt, and whatever seasoning powder you have on hand. Let sit for a few. Bake at 400 for like, 20 minutes or until it temps. Serve with anything, but a blend of butter, water, and whatever seasoning you put on the chicken makes a good sauce. You’ll need to really whisk it to make it incorporate, a little electric whisk is a good idea.
Get premade Greek flatbreads (small, like for a gyro), put a few spoonfuls of pizza sauce on them, cheese, garlic powder, pepper and some toppings (sparingly for plant toppings, generous for pepperoni and friends because of the moisture). Bake at 400 for 10 minutes for four, eight for two, and you’ve got super easy personal pizzas.
You want to cut the quantities in half, the batch is absolutely huge if you do the recipe as-written. It basically cooks enough chicken cacciatore for an entire team of firemen.
It’s a flexible and forgiving recipe, though. You can play around with it, do substitutions, etc.
Costco short ribs in the instant pot. With the random Asian spices I have in my pantry. Freezer to table in 50min. The instant pot is my favorite tool.
Farro is great. For a side dish I tend to cook it in spiced broth (chicken or beef depending on the main course) instead of water. Another one you might like is kamut.
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