Same here. Any recipe for which that isn’t good enough is way too persnickety for me to be making. (I don’t bake)
I don’t thaw meat on the counter, but mainly because that requires way more advance planning than my cooking normally does. The microwave is the normal way to thaw stuff. If I’m really on the ball, maybe I’ll do it in the sink under running water.
I don’t do garnishes. For that matter, I don’t pay much attention to the appearance of anything I cook. I have eaten many things that were yummy, but look like vomit or diarrhea. I don’t care. If that sort of thing bothers you, I advise you not to eat at my house (just like I advise people who are allergic to cats or messes not to visit).
I not only make chili with beans, I don’t use meat in mine. I keep kosher, and I like to put cheese and sour cream in my chili, which rules out meat.
I wash mushrooms. It has been scientifically proven by Harold McGee and Alton Brown that they don’t absorb much water in the process. It has been scientifically proven by me that brushing off each individual mushroom is an enormous PITA.
I use nonstick pans whenever possible, because they’re easier to clean up, and cleaning up is the part of cooking that really sucks.
As for the mushroom thing, urban legend. The amount of water that can be absorbed by a mushroom is negligible. So…they’re the ones breaking the rules about washing their veggies, not you!
And people who put beans in their chili don’t know beans about chili! (Actually, I like beans in my chili just fine…I just thing that’s a clever saying).
I measure by eye and feel…except when it comes to baking. And, while you can get perfectly satisfactory results by guesstimating when it comes to baking, don’t fool yourself by believing that there’s not a difference in the end…!
I don’t measure anything. Measuring is for n00bs.*
I serve my pork medium. Well-done pork may as well be sawdust for all the moisture, flavour and texture it provides. No thanks.
I make almost everything from scratch… except mashed potatoes. The homemade stuff is good, but it’s much too time consuming compared to instant.
I don’t drain ground beef. No one should… except maybe the dumbass who was too cheap to spring for lean beef in the first place (in which case they deserve to be pouring good flavours down the drain, the phillistines)
Baking is an exception to this rule, but in my mind, baking and cooking are two entirely different things anyway. The former relies of complex chemical interactions to give edible results, whilst the latter is more forgiving. Chemistry is an unforgiving bitch… so I play nice when baking and measure everything most carefully.
I don’t treat raw meat like it’s toxic waste. I’ll not only thaw it on the counter or in the sink, but I will occasionally even taste raw pork or raw chicken to see how a marinade is taking.
I hardly ever measure anything, I’m pretty good at eyeballing amounts.
I cook and eat blood rare hamburgers and steaks.
I habitually overcook pasta because I’m too lazy to stay on top of it and pounce when it’s al dente.
I use lots and lots of salt.
I use MSG. MSG is great for making flavors pop and I’m not convinced that it does a body any harm.
You beat me to it. You are not supposed to bake potatoes with foil.
The No Beans In Chili rule came from the Serious Chili Heads: More Insane Than Most Texans! As in gathering in Terlingua, cooking up road kill & quenching your thirst with Bad Tequla. (Sound like fun?) Plenty of Texans are glad to cook up a pot of ground beef, canned beans & canned tomatoes–properly spiced, of course! Just the thing for a cold evening.
I wish to hell you could convince my wife to use pectin when she makes jam.
“Use pectin!” I say. “I’ll go buy some pectin. Please!”
“If you’re not going to use pectin, then at least let it boil until it sets.”
Instead she relies on her grandma’s recipe and turns a bunch of strawberries into syrup, then wonders why the jars of strawberry jam hang around forever.
I don’t sift flour, but I live in Canada and all the flour comes pre-sifted. When I lived in the States, I had to sift because the flour was all clumpy and weird.
The house I’m buying comes with the bad boy on the top right. The version with 4 burners and the raised griddle. Oh boy.
Actually, most people would argue that the true crime would be to eat a steak well done. Since most Bad Things live on the surface of whole cuts of meat, most food safety freaks are pacified so long as you sear the surface at a hot enough temp to kill the bugs
Now bloody hamburger… that’s a whole 'nother story, because all the nasties that were on the surface have been ground up willy nilly into the mince. The great big book of Food Safety definitely preaches that Burgers Must Be Well Done Lest Ye Ingest E.Coli (much to my dismay, because a good burger loses much goodness if cooked past medium).
Oh, I have no desire to prompt some sort of Board-Wide Bean War or anything. I dont even like chili, you could make it with string beans and Legos and I wouldnt eat it anyway.
I just had always thought beans were a basic ingredient. It’s like if we were talking about raisin bread, and somebody said they made theirs without raisins.
People are funny about their food. I know a guy who owns a place that has been open for more than 80 years and is locally famous for its hot dogs.
If you ask for ketchup on your hot dog, this guy will go ballistic. He will refuse you service. There isn’t a bottle of ketchup in the place. He insists that ketchup does not belong on a hot dog, and takes it as seriously as someone else would a religion. Seriously.
I feel the same way about beans in chili, but like Emeril likes to say “There is no food police”. If you want to put strawberries in your chili, or on your hot dog, and you and your family enjoy it, then knock yourselves out…
At a guess I’d say because wife uses grandma’s recipe and is therefore the resident jam-maker and if Barbarian made it himself, or worse just went out and bought a jar, feelings would get hurt.
Sounds like a man after my heart. Is he from Chicago, by any chance?
I don’t generally drain my beef, either. I do, however, only buy unsalted butter. I don’t get the point of salted butter (and I generously salt my foods). It’s just so much easier to control the amount of salt when you add it yourself. (Plus I like the big grains of kosher salt on my buttered bread.)
My mum hates asking me for recipes - she’s the type who needs everything exactly measured and precise instructions. My recipes go; “About a handful or two of diced potato, or kumera (sweet potato, I think, maybe yam), chuck in curry power until it looks right. Add water if things get dryish. Apple, if you’ve got them, or raisins, or whatever’s in the pantry. Something green for colour.”
The thing that annoys her most is, her grandmother cooked the same way, with similar good results and she (mum) missed out on all her favourite childhood recipes because Granny simply couldn’t write them down (“Just put in enough flour till it looks right! That’s how much flour!”
The only thing I’ve seen that’s made my jaw drop is the instant potatoes.
Folks, instant potatoes are crap. Potatoes aren’t exactly difficult. You cut em up and boil them. They are potatoes. They don’t take a lot of effort, it’s not like making Beef Wellington or Lasagne Bolognese.
If you don’t want to take the time to cook potatoes then fine, but why would you bother making freeze dried potato porridge if you don’t want to bother making potatoes?
It reminds me of whatsername, that “semihomemade” person on Food Network. Yeah, I’m all about saving time and effort. But she’ll do crap to deliberately crappify recipes. Crap like “dream whip” (and don’t get me started with cool whip(sweetened frozen whipped crisco)) instead of whipped cream. It’s EASIER TO MAKE REAL WHIPPED CREAM than to make dream whip! And if it’s too hard to pour cream into a mixer and turn it on, at least get the spray whipped cream in a can, at least that’s real dairy!
He is descendent from Italian immigrants and his grandfather originally settled in Chicago. He always says that his dogs come with “mustard, chili, and onions; I can add extra or leave some off.”
When someone asks for relish, he repeats the above. If someone asks for ketchup they get shown the door. I mean, honest to God, really, they get tossed!
He knows me and I always ask for ketchup when I go there and he unloads on profanities, but lets me stay. Now I live a thousand miles away, but I still mess with him when I go back.
Let’s see: significantly faster, cheaper, takes up less space, and they do in fact taste pretty darn good. I eat instant as much as I eat real mashed potatos, and while there’s a difference it’s not all that big of one. Couldn’t tell you the nutritional differences, though, normal potatos might have a leg up there.
I keep real potatos when I want them baked, of course. They haven’t quite convenience-ified those.
