Cooking Pet Peeves

I love to cook! I like being in a kitchen, turning on the radio and just making something yummy and awesome.

I enjoy making food. I really like it when I have people enjoying the food that I made. I appreciate feedback.

However, I have some pet peeves . . . (I talked this over with Turtle and Zeroman, and they agree.)

I hate cooking with people who do not know their way around food or the kitchen. (They can’t even wash a simple dish. I don’t mind serving them, but they can stay out of the kitchen if they do NOT want to learn.)
Or people who think they know it all, because they have watched two cooking shows, but try to serve raw chicken. (The Food Network is amazing, I have so many show I love on there, but you need to know the basics first because imitating someone else’s cooking style.)
Picky eaters. . . (I hate cooking for hours at a time for someone to nick-pick my food. I think you should learn to cook for yourself)

Cooking is an exploring science. (Yes, most who know the kitchen, may not measure, but I always suggest taste as you cook, especially herbs, seasons, and sauces. Even the most studied chef will experiment with seasons, meats, veggies, and flavors.)
Baking to me is precise science. (You really need a recipe and to measure to get the brownies, cookies, cakes, or pastry exactly the way you need them. Measuring cups and spoons are baker best friends.)

If you don’t like to cook, then find friends who do.

If you are picky on your food, find people who are just ask picky.

Leafy Salads

I knew if I just posted “Salads” that someone would say there are so many out there. . . (from leafy to protein like chicken or tuna to potato and pasta etc.) I love many different salads.

However over the weekend we made an awesome leafy salad. . .

I had few salad mixes. . . it ice-burg lettuce, Kale, greens, spinach, shredded carrots, and red cabbage. We added tomatoes, mushrooms, green pepper, and shredded pork and shredded cheese.

We have a south-western ranch or Italian dressing.

When I go to a restaurant, I don’t mind a simple salad before my main meal. However when I am at home everything is in my leafy salads. . .

I love fresh spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, sprouts, snap peas, black olives (sliced), shredded cheese (prefer white cheeses), sunflowers, flavored croutons, and whatever else will work. Plus I will cut up lunch meat or cube or shred chicken. My salads usually become a huge part of the meal. I even love having bacon in my salads.

Whenever I make a salad and my family is home, I usually end up making them salads too. I like to think of myself as a creative salad. . . I’m not sure if I am to master level yet. LOL

Growing up, whenever I would visit my grandparents for dinner, they could always have some kind of salad with dinner. My grandma got me into sprouts, poppyseed dressing, and adding chopped nuts in salad. I love the crunch and freshness.

I try to eat salad at least once a week.

Easter Dinner (Happy Ham Day!)

Happy Easter! Or Happy Ham Day!

Over the weekend, we have been cooking ham and other goodies to celebrate the holiday as we have done in past traditions.

Sandwiches. . . growing up we joked because we would make our sandwiches “Bleed” as we had an egg Easter bread, beet horseradish sauce, ham and cheese.
Cvikla s Chrenom – Beet and Horseradish Relish (http://slovakamericankitchen.blogspot.com/2014/04/cvikla-s-chrenom-beet-and-horseradish.html )

Easter bread: Paska (https://dcslovaks.org/slovak-easter-traditions-paska-bread/)

Easter Cheese: Veľká noc Cirák (https://slaviccooking.com/slovak-easter-cheese-cirak/)

We kept it simple (we didn’t make Cvikla s Chrenom, Paska, or Veľká noc Cirák but do remember them as a kid.)

We made three hams (actually my friend and my brother made the hams.)

I focused on the sweet potatoes with marshmallows.

What is awesome is that with ham. . . there are so many things you can do with the leftover. . .

You can add it to scallop or augrutin potatoes.
You can add into bean or split pea soups.
Add it to Mac N Cheese
Yes of course you can just keep it simple and make a bunch of ham sandwiches.

Note: Ham has a lot of salt, so make sure you drink a lot of water to get a lot of the salt out of your system.

This ham is addicting that I’m dealing with a stomachache from eating too much. So I am taking a nap now.

Beef Stroganoff

I had sliced beef pieces, mushroom, sour cream and egg noodles. So I spiced everything up and made beef stroganoff. I marinaded the beef with ground pepper and Worcestershire sauce.

(I currently cannot handle onions with my stomach, but I have seem people add onions, and pepper to it.
I’ve also seen people use hamburger with it, but I prefer beef chunks.)

However it a hit a spot and it was eaten so fast, that I forgot to grab a picture.

It is so easy, but I usually never have the left over sour cream. (We had steak tacos Sunday and fish taco Monday, so I had left over sour cream today.)

Noodles are one of my comfort foods.

Busy Weekend

Theme: Bacon

Zero, Turtle and I got another change to work in the huge kitchen again. Saturday we made so much. It was a really nice night, and we accomplished so much.

Zero made Mayo and BBQ chicken with homemade mashed potatoes.
The mayo chicken was creamy and really good with some black pepper over those mashed potatoes.

Then we got out the bacon. . .

Zero made two meatloaves . . . Plain BBQ glaze and cheesy stuffed bacon wrapped one.
I personally loved the bacon wrapped meatloaf just a bit more. (It was even better the next day.)

Turtle made a roasted chicken with bacon and green pepper stuffing.
It was really good and very juicy. I also didn’t realized that green pepper was that good in stuffing. I learned a few things this weekend.

We also got a bag gruyere cheese from a friend as they have extra. We took the cheese sauce with thinly sliced potatoes and of course bacon and made our own homemade au gratin potatoes.

We also made bacon saute yellow squash and french fries.

We had so much food left over. I didn’t have to cook on Sunday. We had left over for dinner and still some left. Yay.

It was nice that we put down the Internet and the phone and just focused on the food. Sometime we need to forget everything around us and focus on what in front.

By the way, I love bacon!

Lemon Pepper Chicken

Today, I took lemons and lemon pepper seasoning and put them in the boil water to cook the chicken thighs.

I pulled the thigh out when I felt they were cooked but not over cooked.

Then I took 1/2 cup of veggie oil, butter and infused lemons in it.

I fried the outside of the chicken thighs with the lemon oil. I fried the lemon halves.

I made the skin crispy.

It turned out really good. It was tart and with the grill marks had like a BBQ feel to it.

Blood Orange Tilapia

I made Tilapia fish with a butter Moro blood orange sauce.
It was a very simple meal cook the fish in butter squeezing the blood oranges over the fish.
Once the fish is out if the pan squeeze more oranges and put the pulp in the pan with the butter and fish juice.

Note: Do not put a juicy orange on your computer. (orange in color or blood . . . its’ a moro as there are several types of blood oranges) I just did this to show the color.

We had it over stuffing with side of Asia cabbage salad mix.

Baking: cookies and cakes

I love to cook, and I usually cook at least one meal 5-6 days out of the week on average.

However I also love to bake. Usually those around me have to exercise or they end up gaining weight.
I used to make a joke if I can’t lose weight, I will just make everyone else around me weight more.

Seriously I enjoy baking cookies. My favorite cookie to make and eat are my chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. (I’ll give you a secret, I use the “The Joy of Cooking” Oatmeal cookie recipe. I just add a lot of chocolate chips. ) They are soft, chewy, and or course have chocolate.

I also love to bake cakes. I prefer chocolate, but I have made layered cakes and even pineapple upside down cake.

I will be honest though I’m not that great at decorating cakes, but family are just happy that is edible, not burnt, and tastes good.

Pollack Fish with Lemon Sauce

Today I made with the planning of my brother Turtle. . . Pollack fish with lemon sauce and avocado and lemon rice.

Both dishes are very easy to make.
However with fish, especially as fragile and flaky as Pollack you need to focus and make sure you don’t over cook the fish. I only cooked each batch (which I had two batches I made for three people) for only about 5 to 7 minutes once the butter started to bubble and the pan was hot.

I cooked the fish in a fry pan with butter, fresh squeezed lemon, chives, salt and pepper.

cooking lemon pollack

After I took out the fish, I used the butter with lemon juice and made a sauce. I let the pieces of lemon cook in the sauce and added tablespoon of sugar and butter as it was a bit tart.

I cooked the rice (2 cups of uncooked rice to 4 cups water) and once the water was gone and rice cooked completely added 3 smashed avocados and 1/4th cup of the lemon-butter sauce. I also salt and peppered to taste.

Finished plate

lemon pollack (2)

It’s a simple, light meal great for a date night, if they like fish.

Chicken A La King

I am making Chicken a la King
It’s one of my mom’s favorite dishes.

My recipe is very easy. . . (recipe made for 3 to 4 people)

Chicken a La King

Pound of chicken (cubed or shredded as long as it’s cooked)

Two small cans of cream of mushroom soup

2 cans of milk (after emptying the soup)

Can of peas

Extra mushrooms or grilled onions (optional)

I usually put this over rice. However I using egg noodles instead of rice. (You can also put this over potatoes.)

Today I am getting creative.
I have an extra biscuit roll, so I taking the chicken broth making extra chive dumplings for a side dish.

Take biscuits cut them into small pieces

Cook them in boiling broth until they cooked through and tender (stirring every few minutes.) You can put the sauce from Chicken A La King or just add butter.

It’s a simple dinner and it’s easy way to get your family member (kids and adults) to eat their peas.

Note: the original recipe has peas, but I have replaced peas with corn or green beans in the past.