(Bi)Weekly Dinner #1

So my friends and I have all decided not to get the meal plan for a number of reasons, biggest one being that it’s way too expensive for practically the same food everyday. However, this does pose a problem for us…how on earth are we supposed to eat (we also happen to be poor college students)? Aside from stealing free food from the numerous club events that go on every other day at our school, we have decided to band together once a week (or once every two weeks, we haven’t really decided on which yet) and pool our resources to come up with one amazing meal. This post is a little late, but for the meal that we had on Saturday, we threw together a bunch of food that we had in our refrigerator and a bunch of seasonings that happened to be in our cabinets and came out with a simple two (three including rice) dish family style meal. We also were fancy and had cheese and crackers before dinner and apple pie and ice cream after dinner.

So, I don’t really feel the need to explain how to throw stuff together in a pan and cook it, but I also feel like it’s an important skill to know. Therefore, I’m just going to tell you some basic things to throwing things together.

First of all, if you’re cooking for a vegetarian (which we were), obviously, do that stuff first. With vegetables, it’s important to know which ones to put in the pan first. And, generally, you want to make sure you have oil in the pan. If you’re using garlic or onions, those go in first. (I honestly might be making this up, but I’m pretty sure this is the reason way) That releases the flavor from the garlic and onions and allows the flavor, which is now in the oil, to seep to the rest of the food, creating a delicious aroma. If you don’t like garlic or onion flavors…start liking it. If you’ve ever read Holes, you would know how good they are for you (well…onions at least).

Then you put in the harder vegetables like carrots. If you plan on frying potatoes, it’s a good idea to have had them boiled previously and then cut or to julienne them. (Julienne is a term that I recently learned. It’s a cut in cooking which cuts the vegetables into thin strips and allows the vegetables to cook faster.)

Finally, for vegetables, you add the softer ones, such as squash or white mushrooms. They cook pretty much in no time at all. You just have to toss them around once or twice and presto.

If you’re cooking with meat, always cook the meat first. I like to marinade my meats in rice wine, soy sauce, salt, pepper, sugar, and minced garlic. All these ingredients can be found at any Asian supermarket and I think Trader Joe’s. There’s no real measurement to how much you add of each ingredient. It’s all based on preference (though at a later point in time I may try to measure it out for you).

After you’ve done all that, add the spices, i.e. salt, pepper, soy sauce, oregano, basil. I like to add a bit of practically every spice that I have into all the food that a make, though obviously a bit more of one than another depending on what I make. But, you know, all personal preference.

Obviously, make sure that everything is cooked throughly before you eat/serve it. Tasting your food while it’s in the process of cooking is a good idea, but be wary and don’t burn your tongue otherwise you won’t be able to taste anything at all…

Then, eat and enjoy!

I also apologize for the rambling nature of this post. I have a couple other things that I also want to post, but I don’t want to go out of order, so bear with this one and the next couple will have some recipes!