Prog Chefs Unite!!!

Ah May 5th.  A day in my country where we celebrate our neighbors independence day by having Mexican beers, margaritas, Tex-Mex food, or those of us with more genuine tastes in food Mex-Mex.  

On the menu today authentic.  I'm making baked green rice and a new one for me, marinated zucchini salad.  My honey is making scallop ceviche and salmon in tequila cream sauce.  No alc (I have to be a good boy these days.) frozen margaritas which is basically ice and limeaide in a blender. 

Irrelevant details!   Its a foreign  holiday and therefor just cause for eating foreign food.

Babi Pangang and Indonesian cabbage stir fry here today. I've been in an Asian cooking mood for over a month now.  The kitchen is stocked with fresh ginger, chillies, lemon grass, limes, garlic, shrimps, noodles, rice, pork... 

In my home situation I can blast the music while I cook. So I'm dancing around whilst I cook. Well its not real dancin... its prog fan dancing so it more like an epileptic fit set to music.  In any case it's a hell of fun. Any of you get to enjoy the tunes while chefing?

if I had a good sounding system in or near my kitchen, then yeah

This week we've been cooking meals from "Jamie's 30-Minute Meals" book, which seem to take us about three quarters of an hour to cook with two of us sharing the tasks, and then it all seems very rushed and stressful. We've even watched the appropriate TV programme relating to the meal-recipe in the book and then tried to follow his instructions but to no avail. From the boy's website the key to these recipes is undoubtedly "It’s about being organised"... and that's not how we cook so that's never going to happen. However, having cooked a meal once it should be easy enough to adapt it to our way of cooking, because they taste great and we certainly will be cooking them again.

Edited by Dean - May 16 2012 at 04:24

Dean wrote: This week we've been cooking meals from "Jamie's 30-Minute Meals" book, which seem to take us about three quarters of an hour to cook with two of us sharing the tasks, and then it all seems very rushed and stressful. We've even watched the appropriate TV programme relating to the meal-recipe in the book and then tried to follow his instructions but to no avail. From the boy's website the key to these recipes is undoubtedly "It’s about being organised"... and that's not how we cook so that's never going to happen. However, having cooked a meal once it should be easy enough to adapt it to our way of cooking, because they taste great and we certainly will be cooking them again.   So far this week we've done beef hash with baked potatoes and a leaves and butter-bean salad, and an unbelievably good chicken and mushroom pie with french-style peas&lettuce and carrot mash. Organisation and reading the recipe about a dozen times is essential for that recipe as various ingredients and tools are needed more than once through the cooking - and working in a tiny kitchen like we are we've developed a habit of putting things away after we've used them, which gets irritating when you have to get them out again for the third time, we also found that because there are no precise timings in his recipes the peas and carrots were cooked long before the pie was, but a quick note added to the recipe to relax for 5 mins and drink a glass of wine between putting the pie in the oven and starting the two veg dishes should fix that.   Tonight is going to be 'wonky' pasta with salad - looking at that recipe it seems stress-free and do-able within 30 mins as it's not a million miles from the spaghetti carbonara we normally cook and we know that the food has to be served quickly once the raw sauce is added to the hot pasta (or you end up with pasta in scrambled egg).

^me too.

^Er...I think this time you missed the point. Even if I did the full meal I would not try to do it in 30 mins. But basically I take ideas from the programme more than a full dinner.

Edited by Snow Dog - May 16 2012 at 05:12

Speaking of "point"... knives.

Sorry - terrible segue, but I keep meaning to raise this subject on this thread

A good knife is a cook's best friend in the kitchen, so do you have a favorite knife you tend to use all the time?

I have to admit, I've a bit of a kitchen knife obsession (cue Vicky - "you don't need any more knives!!!"); although my knife draws are full of ones I've picked up over the years though, I always tend to go back to the 3 Sabatier Lions I obtained 10 or so years ago; always keep an edge, just need an occasional couple of strokes with the steel (don't talk to me about 'knife sharpeners' - hawk...spit!) & they're back to razors again.

Now, despite Vicky always extolling the virtues of knife buying moderation, she did recently treat me to a seriously good set of Japanese knives she was offered at a knock down price... only used them a few times so far, but very impressed & can see them possibly taking over from my beloved Sabatiers