MCE,

Never presume we wouldn't be interested in recipes or pics. We always want both recipes and pics.

I don't care how rudimentary you think the food you're making is. At worst, you'll end up with some constructive suggestions on your recipe or plating or something.

Yeah I just realized I start eating whenever I read this thread and then have a cig lol,

Crash and others you are my hero. I am actually thinking of learning to cook a few things, I mean I'm about to be 24 and it's sad that I cannot even make something very basic, or operate some of the things in the kitchen.

Thanks Lounge, will let you know if I make some progress.

Found some of these mushrooms today in the forest

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macrolepiota_procera

and made some nice Schnitzel from it



All of these mushroom types can be eaten, so no real chance of getting toxicated and they really have the texture of a veal cutlet and a very nice taste that is unusual for mushrooms.

Could only find 2 today, but usually you can find lots more if you have found one and they grow up to 30cm in diameter... so you can feed a lot of people.

I've been out of town for a week and the next month will be insanely busy. Just read through what you guys have been doing and it looks awesome. Keep it up!

Looks great. Chanterelles are still a month or two away here. Can't wait.

Mushroom picking popularity really varies regionally, as do the dangers. Most mushrooms are easily identifiable and as hard to tell apart from undesirable ones as an apple vs. a watermelon. Others can be deceptively similar. For example, there are mushrooms in California that are deadly poisonous, and can closely resemble an edible straw mushroom from S.E. Asia. (Amanita phalloides v. Volvariella volvacea). If you are new to picking or new to an area, go with a knowledgeable local. It could save your life.

anyone here have a link or your own easy instructions on an a+ baked mac (for my 5yr old son, his favorite)
not a cook here, and we usually just buy his fave in fastfoods but I wanted to learn how

I would recommend cooking to anyone. It's a great hobby with really nice benefits.

If I were just starting, I would do pasta, I would do steak, and I would do chili. I'm not saying they're easy to do, but they're certainly not rocket science, they're things with a little room for error and interpretation, and they're also things you will do over and over for the rest of your life.

Red curry prawns





Homesmoked mackerel





With fried roe bread and chive-guacamole





Spicy shrimp salad (serving in a melon shell is ******ed btw)

Very nice! I love the heck out of mushrooms.

Good idea, especially the chili. By pasta I figure you probably mean sauces? If so, highly agreed there too. Chili and pasta sauces are two items where you can go pretty far off the mark and still have something delicious and feel you didn't waste a dime.

I'd also add soup to the mix. Some kinds of soup are a little fussy, but most leave you plenty of room to improvise or do things less than all that well and still come out with great results. And they have two huge virtues. They can be a great way to clean out your fridge of any stray meats or vegetables almost at random and come up with something that tastes great. The other virtue is that they can start with a simple sautee of some veggies, which even an imbecile could do, and with some stock or cream, a little spice, and a star ingredient that can be picked almost at random, become a flavorful full meal quickly. A recipe is nice, but cooking decent soup is generally a very simple and forgiving process.

Yeah, this was my point. It's a great way to learn how different flavors can work together, and which aspects of cooking you can be more liberal with, and which have to be more closely monitored.

I mentioned steak because let's face it--you have to learn to cook some meat at some point. I guess I could have suggested chicken breast, but that would make me a hypocrite because I have almost no use for the stuff myself, except as it applies to chicken parmesan or chicken salad, really.

It cannot be a bad idea to learn how to put a steak in the pan and cook it to an edible heat and consistency with a little salt and pepper on it. All the rest can follow.

Cookie,

how many hours per day/week are you cooking, you seem to buy and cook for about 3 hrs per day...

same question for others.

I would really like to cook good stuff every day, but the main reason i do not is the shopping and not the cooking...

It varies a lot. Today I did a lot of cooking because I was dumping money at a mad pace in poker, cooking is decent stress relief.

I can shop 1 minute walk away and like 15 min drive to a Metro store, 7 min drive to a fish store etc, so shopping isnt that bad.

Will provide pics if I get wine recommendations for the pasta al forno I'm making tomorrow. Half of the bottle goes in the sauce and other goes in me.

Recipe: onion, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, ground beef, tomatoes, basil and wine goes in the sauce. Penne, bechamel, mozz and parm, sauce in the oven.

Speaking of chili, does anyone have a good recipes?

Friend made some for me a few weeks ago and it was awesome.

For me, chili is just a logical process, but it's not carved in stone, either in order of ingredients, method, or the ingredients themselves.

It goes:

Sweat onions (and maybe peppers)

Add meat to lightly brown. Ground beef or ground turkey is basic, but, of course, you can do pretty much whatever you like.

Add tomatoes (a combination up to you: paste/sauce/whole/crushed, depending on the consistency you're looking for. If you use whole, be sure and sort of pop them open). Hold some back so you can adjust consistency later if you need to. Simmer this and stir it until it's all together and a consistency you'll be able to work with.

Add kidney beans if you're using them (it's a matter of taste, but I like beans in my chili). I like to leave some of the packing water, as it's full of the starch from the beans and adds nice thickness (sort of how corn starch would in soup or sauce).

Spices. I like the following: salt, pepper, chili powder, coriander, cumin, paprika, garlic powder, cinnamon, marjoram, a bay leaf or two, onion powder, brown sugar, and cayenne pepper. This is totally subjective.

After you get the spices in, you need to reduce the heat to as low as possible to keep it producing a bubble from time to time. Cover it, and let it go for a bit, stirring from time to time and tasting from time to time (to adjust spices as you like). If the heat is low enough, and you stir it enough, this part can take as little as the time it takes to thicken, or as long as you feel it needs for all the flavors to come together.

I like mine very spicy, so I also like to add diced jalapenos toward the end.

The only way to learn this is to do it.

For god's sake, make sure you have some crusty bread and some butter around too.

bread and butter?

you mean cornbread, tortilla chips, sharp cheddar, and sour cream right?

I typically like to make an all beef chili and I start with a cheap cut like tri-tip and I cut it in to 1/2 inch chunks then mixed with salt, black pepper, paprika, cumin, chili powder, set aside.

I like to start with some bacon cut in to very small pieces, render it in the pan. then I add very finely diced onion and peppers (I like to use a mix of poblano and jalapeno). More jalapeno if you like it spicier. cook it on med-low until softened. salt and pepper the mixture. I then remove this mixture from the pot.

put in seasoned beef. Brown beef. add back the vegetable mixture.

At this point I like to deglaze with a bit of white wine. Then I add tomato paste and beef broth, bay leaves, oregano, brown sugar, as well as a can of chipotle chilis that have been chopped up along with some of the accompanying adobe sauce that is in the can.

This I will simmer until meat is very tender and onion/pepper bits are barely visible and then I will taste and readjust seasoning.

traditional method of thickening is to use torn up tortillas but using cornmeal that has been tempered is pretty good.

I really enjoy crusty bread and butter with my chili, but I think I am in the minority on that.

I did forget to mention the sharp cheddar and sour cream. Those are definitely necessary, possibly along with some chopped raw onion and Tabasco (I prefer the habanero, but really, any hot sauce you like will do).

As for the chili methodology, I guess my point was that as long as you follow the simple idea that you don't want boiled meat, you don't want overdone veggies, and you want to keep an eye on consistency and flavor, you can really just sort of start and see where it goes.

I suppose I should have noted that if using ground beef or turkey, your flexibility is higher, and if you're using chunks of meat (tri-tip is perfect), you need to be sure to keep an eye on texture and be attentive to the size of the chunks.

But just starting out, I would definitely try to keep it as simple as possible.

oh, another topping I like for finished chili is chopped green onion but I perhaps don't have a great love for the sharpness of raw white onion unless if its vidalia or something.

ground beef is definitely much more forgiving in terms of cooking time and I agree thats what I would recommend for starting cooks.

I really like varying textures in chili meat. I will usually use ground beef and diced pork.

I will also get almost all of my liquid that isn't tomatoes from onions and a bottle of dark beer.

Here's an interesting article about a premier knife maker much esteemed by the likes of Thomas Keller. His blades go for $300 an inch now.

this thread

So a friend of mine told me that he has a piece of truffle for me that was give to him but that he wont use... any idea what to do with it? Never had real truffle in my kitchen.

Funny thing is that i actually know the girl that gave the truffle to him, cause i spoke to her about her job a while back. Her job is to search truffle in romanian forests with her dogs.

I near enough do the same as rushmore, but always add two or three bell peppers (capsicum), 3-4 chopped chillies and beef stock. Other things i've used which worked:

-Red wine (gives it a richness)
-Sambal oelek (sp)
-Additional beans: Pinto, Haricot, Butter and Black-eyed (Black-eyed = not so good, butter and haricot particularly good)
-Smoked paprika/smoked bacon

Never thought about using cinnamon, will give that a go next time

Realized that I might not me that good a photographer. Still, pics!

Here I have browned onion, garlic, carrots, mushrooms and ground beef, put together. Added crushed tomatoes, cheap chilean red wine, beef stock and spices and letting it simmer for half an hour.



Then I mix the sauce, pasta beschamele sauce and cheese and put in the oven.


On the plate.

I've just tried making something I've never made before, in a style I've never made anything before.

Salmon fillets cooked on my gas BBQ wrapped in wet newspaper/baking paper with mint/coriander/parsley/chilli/lemon/spring onions.

It's on the BBQ atm. I feel like this is either gonna be really really good or really really bad.

Also cooking are some sweet potato wedges which I've also never made before.

Before pics:






Just looking at this photo now it looks like I used way too many herbs. The recipe was for a lot more so I tried to re-adjust. Eep.


Parcel ready to go on BBQ hotplate.

Results to come!