Who else hates to cook?

[ApK]

Though my wife does most of the family cooking, I like to cook, if I stay within my limited skill set.
My biggest problem is time management in the kitchen. I can't seem to handle getting multiple components of a meal done at the right time.
My second biggest problem is we have a really small kitchen (when in doubt, blame the facilities).
But for the stuff I'm practiced at -- French omelettes, turkey scallopini Marsala, seared scallops with parmigiana risotto, fried pickles-- I rock.

ApK

[BearMountainBooks]

Anyone who can make seared scallops with parmigiana risotto rocks!!!

[Tarana]

Issy, you have my sympathies. My sister also hates to cook, but also has the complications of being a caregiver for hubby and our brother. Reduced her angst a lot when I spent a week with her working out about 30 menu ideas. Chopping veggies can be done the day before or day of. Reduced a lot of her stress not having to think about what to make for dinner and getting it done in 45 minutes or less. Yes, she gets rotisserie chicken - because I'm bringing it. We visitors always bring a meal so she has just one less thing to concern herself about and can just visit.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Chopping veggies can be done the day before or day of.

My wife's face lit up when she found our supermarket's produce section had containers of freshly chopped mirepoix.

Dishes that require lots of chopping (Latin style chicken and rice for example) usually get scheduled for weekends, so I can help.

[Cinisajoy]

At Tarana and ApK,
This makes chopping easy. Literally a whole tomato, onion, pepper, and other veggies in under 10 seconds. Cleanup is easy too.
https://www.amazon.com/SHINKODA-SK-3...s=p_36%3A-1500

For quick french fries and bigger foods, you can't beat this
https://www.amazon.com/Ronco-FS10020...ds=veg+o+matic

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by issybird

A flurry of recent posts in the So what are you doing RIGHT NOW? thread has me wondering. Am I the only one?

I really can't stand how dinner always seems to be rolling around, again. If it were just me, I have three go-to dinners: wine and cheese, wine and nuts, wine and olives. Unfortunately, I also have to provide fodder for someone else, some of the time. All I can say is, we eat a lot of rotisserie chicken.

In my defense, I'll say that I'm not a picky eater and will happily eat whatever someone else is willing to put in front of me. I'm also a willing hand when it comes to clean up. I'd just much rather not have to produce the meal.

I love to make dinner. I often make sushi in the weekend, even though it takes about 2,5 hours.

Getting everything out and cleaning up: half an hour
Making the rice: about 1 hour (much of it is waiting)
Making the actual sushi: 0.5 to 1 hour, depending on how much I make

The one thing I hate is to cook for others. I just... hate it. Most people I have ever cooked for always seem to have one of three problems:

1. "I don't want....", and then they start picking at the meal, taking bits and pieces out, putting them aside on the plate, or just not eating part of it.

2. "I want...", and then they go ahead 'seasoning' the meal with whatever they see fit; and often using A HELL OF A LOT OF IT.

3. Can't eat normally. I have had people over to eat, and then they manage to stuff their face (I can't call it something else) with 24 pieces of sushi within 15 minutes or so, or eat an entire meal within that time. I could just murder you.

Sometimes, people combine two, or all of these. They should be shot, I tell you, SHOT!

If I cook, I like to prepare a meal for me, myself and I, and eat it all by myself, at a *normal* pace, or make it for someone who can actually appreciate a meal that is a bit more special than cooked potatoes, some canned vegetables and a piece of meat, made within 15 minutes.

And here comes the kicker... the one that you probably don't believe. I also love to do the dishes. When I cook, or do the dishes, or even when I need to do something that is boring, I just go... somewhere. Like some sort of Zen experience or something. I just shut down completely and do the task, and use that as a moment of peace and quiet.

If you have the guts to call my name at that point or otherwise disturb me, you will startle me to such a degree that I will be *very* annoyed with you for quite some time.

By the way, this one takes the cake: I can't actually cook. Give me some random ingredients, and I'll get water to burn, botch the vegetables, and grill the meat into charcoal. I *MUST* have a recipe, and a timer.

[Cinisajoy]

I think I will start a new thread.

At Katsunami,
Even following a recipe is cooking.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

I love to make dinner. I often make sushi in the weekend, even though it takes about 2,5 hours.

Getting everything out and cleaning up: half an hour
Making the rice: about 1 hour (much of it is waiting)
Making the actual sushi: 0.5 to 1 hour, depending on how much I make

The one thing I hate is to cook for others. I just... hate it. Most people I have ever cooked for always seem to have one of three problems:

1. "I don't want....", and then they start picking at the meal, taking bits and pieces out, putting them aside on the plate, or just not eating part of it.

2. "I want...", and then they go ahead 'seasoning' the meal with whatever they see fit; and often using A HELL OF A LOT OF IT.

3. Can't eat normally. I have had people over to eat, and then they manage to stuff their face (I can't call it something else) with 24 pieces of sushi within 15 minutes or so, or eat an entire meal within that time. I could just murder you.

Sometimes, people combine two, or all of these. They should be shot, I tell you, SHOT!

If I cook, I like to prepare a meal for me, myself and I, and eat it all by myself, at a *normal* pace, or make it for someone who can actually appreciate a meal that is a bit more special than cooked potatoes, some canned vegetables and a piece of meat, made within 15 minutes.

And here comes the kicker... the one that you probably don't believe. I also love to do the dishes. When I cook, or do the dishes, or even when I need to do something that is boring, I just go... somewhere. Like some sort of Zen experience or something. I just shut down completely and do the task, and use that as a moment of peace and quiet.

If you have the guts to call my name at that point or otherwise disturb me, you will startle me to such a degree that I will be *very* annoyed with you for quite some time.

By the way, this one takes the cake: I can't actually cook. Give me some random ingredients, and I'll get water to burn, botch the vegetables, and grill the meat into charcoal. I *MUST* have a recipe, and a timer.

I love sushi and make it frequently in the warm months. LOVE it. I don't know how long it takes to eat it as I usually only make a couple of kinds. I make a California roll with real crab, arugula, avocado and cucumber. Sometimes I make it with chopped sauteed shrimp instead of the crab (a little honey and soy in the pan with the shrimp). I also do the raw salmon to go with the rolls. I've tried various bits with the salmon, but plain with the dab of wasabi between it and the rice is my favorite. On rare occasions I will do the raw tuna, but finding a good quality of tuna is difficult and usually requires a trip to a special seafood store.

I am the opposite of you. Give me a recipe and I will surely botch it. Give me ingredients and I will figure out some way to a meal!!!

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

I make a California roll with real crab, arugula, avocado and cucumber. Sometimes I make it with chopped sauteed shrimp instead of the crab (a little honey and soy in the pan with the shrimp). I also do the raw salmon to go with the rolls. I've tried various bits with the salmon, but plain with the dab of wasabi between it and the rice is my favorite.

You had to, didn't you?

I hate talking about ingredients, especially with regard to sushi

I am the opposite of you. Give me a recipe and I will surely botch it. Give me ingredients and I will figure out some way to a meal!!!

Mwhaa When I started living on my own, my mom thought I was some sort of idiot who would die within the first month.

Now she just wonders where I 'learned to cook like that, as I have never had any practice.' Well, I just follow the recipes, and I find out how long each ingredient takes to prepare. Then I order them from longest to shortest time needed, so they are all done at the same time. I set my timer on when to start with the next ingredient, not to how long an ingredient needs to cook/soak/prepare/whatever.

[Blossom]

I think you have all scared Issy off with all that cooking and work talk! I'd just rather read and eat. Tonight's Dinner is Egg Rolls, Crab Rangoon, Lo Mein, Sweet and Sour Chicken and Fried Dumplings. Yep. Take Out! My favorite dinner....zero effort.



Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

You had to, didn't you?


Now she just wonders where I 'learned to cook like this, as I have never had any practice.' Well, I just follow the recipes, and I find out how long each ingredient takes to prepare. Then I order them from longest to shortest time needed, so they are all done at the same time. I set my timer on when to start with the next ingredient, not to how long an ingredient needs to cook/soak/prepare/whatever.

Not me. I barely use a timer--pretty much only for baked goods in the oven. Even then I eyeball the results. Get done on time? If they are done, I start serving them or I put them in the toaster oven on "keep warm" until the other stuff is done. I'm not a perfectionist in the kitchen; I'm essentially there to eat! I fling food into the pan while I'm still chopping other things. I may or may not have a salad started whilst the stuff in the pan cooks. Once the salad is done, we are likely to eat it while I finish cooking the other parts. Husband cooks too. He is often outside grilling the main meat while I am inside making sweet potato fries/chips. Just yesterday the pasta salad was done long before the pork chops so we had a bit of the salad while we waited for the grill to finish its job. Then we had more with the pork chops and katsu sauce (the katsu sauce was from a jar so no prep needed). Dessert was peanut butter chocolate chip cookies--I put those in after we were done eating while we did the dishes. When the timer beeped, I checked them, decided they were a little soft so left them in the oven, but turned off. They were cooled about five minutes after we finished the dishes so I served them up on a plate.

That's a pretty typical style dinner for us. When we have company, we're more formal, but not by much. I tend to serve an appetizer or finger food to keep everyone occupied while I finish cooking or get everything in order. Everything in order can mean various things...

I can be a real stickler for organization on some things (travel plans, for example.) But when it comes to cooking and gardening it's more like a random number generator. Anything can happen! Here's a blog post I did a long time ago on me following a recipe (the post happens to have a link to a fiction book that I was reading at the time, and it's an associate link so if that puts you off, you've been warned.) I started out intending to follow the recipe, but yanno. Things HAPPEN.

http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/hob...n-improvision/

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

At Tarana and ApK,
This makes chopping easy. Literally a whole tomato, onion, pepper, and other veggies in under 10 seconds. Cleanup is easy too.
https://www.amazon.com/SHINKODA-SK-3...s=p_36%3A-1500

For quick french fries and bigger foods, you can't beat this
https://www.amazon.com/Ronco-FS10020...ds=veg+o+matic

You get nostalgia points for even mentioning the Ronco Veg-O-Matic ("It slices! It dices! It even makes french fries!"), but do you actually use and recommend both of those things?
I'm tempted to shun such gadgets and focus on improving my knife skills, but I'd probably get that first thing if you say it's that good.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by ApK

You get nostalgia points for even mentioning the Ronco Veg-O-Matic ("It slices! It dices! It even makes french fries!"), but do you actually use and recommend both of those things?
I'm tempted to shun such gadgets and focus on improving my knife skills, but I'd probably get that first thing if you say it's that good.

You might try a salad shooter. My mom loves hers and I've used it when I'm visiting. Personally, I'd rather just chop things, because I hate cleaning up the pieces of machinery, but chopping is part of my routine. The salad shooter DOES save time with shredding cheese (especially if you need quite a bit or are shredding it for alfredo or other sauces where you need it small). We just upgraded her to the "professional model" from the regular model:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Presto-Profe...gAAOSwuhhXU1pf

The regular model is smaller and only has two blades/types thingies. Those blades handled carrots and cheese very well (That's all I ever used it for, but mom used it for many other veggies). She wanted one large enough to handle potatoes because she makes a thin-sliced potato rather than a french fry. She's only had it about a week but loves it. I haven't tried the pro model yet, but I did shred carrots in the other model for carrot cake (I think I still prefer a food processor to really beat the carrot into tiny tiny bits, but it does shred them well for cooking and it is nice for shredding carrots for coleslaw). Mom also used the smaller one for cutting up sweet potatoes, but she likes to hide them in dishes because Dad needs them for his dry eye, but he isn't about to eat sweet potatoes 3 or 4 times a week.

We have a manual type shredder for doing coleslaw and hashbrowns--very similar to the pro model as far as results from what I can tell. It's stainless steel and works well for me so we stick with that and chopping.

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by ApK

You get nostalgia points for even mentioning the Ronco Veg-O-Matic ("It slices! It dices! It even makes french fries!"), but do you actually use and recommend both of those things?
I'm tempted to shun such gadgets and focus on improving my knife skills, but I'd probably get that first thing if you say it's that good.

On the Shinkoda, it gets used at least 3 times a week. This week alone, it has shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes and diced onions. Last week it did onions, tomato, jalapeños.
Matter of fact, I own several. If I want scalloped potatoes, I use the slicer that comes with it.
I have even used it to shred cooked chicken.
Spend the $10. It is well worth it.

The veg-o-matic gets used when I want french fries.

At the risk of sounding like an infomercial, I think I will dedicate the afternoon to seeing what all I can do with the Shinkoda.

[Cinisajoy]

I just mixed up cake batter.
The egg beater is fantastic for egg whites. Use the blade for mixing the cake batter.
Waffles, crepes, pancakes. You could whip up in the Shinkoda.

It also comes with slicer and shredder blades. Both work great.
And a juicer. Also wonderful.
If you want easy clean up and don't want to drag out the big appliances, get this.
Next up will be a quick frosting.