Geekfood Mk2.

[HereComesPete]

Berk - try the blind finch recipe? Yaaarrrr!


Possibly do meat tower - steak with black pudding, egg, salsa and cheese on top. You can add extra layers of meat product if necessary.

I make this with a bordelaise/chasseur to go on top.

*caution - this will stop your heart for a short while*


Friz - pearl barely? wassat then?

I do love pearl barley, slow cooked in stews and soups or cooked quickly and mixed with a bit of butter to provide a firm and chewy alternative to rice. honey and lemon glazed pork fillet goes well with pearl barley.

Sol (ya bandy pegged bilge rat!)- Cottage pie/shepherds pie is easy and filling. Also try sossij casseroles. Stir fries use a lot of rice and veg, stop the scurvy setting in. you really can cook anything you want and the extra time you'll have allows you to perfect good recipes at lower prices.

Turkey is a good source of cheaper white meat.

And if all else fails, baked beans.

[Sheriff Fatman]

Any 5punkers like to help me compile a short list of cheap easy to cook nutritious food? I'm off to uni in a week :3

Buy this.

It's a pr0's book but don't let that put you off. It will teach you to make just about everything from the most basic sauce to posh dishes that will wow the laydeez after you have lured them back to your student hovel.

Learning how to make the basics will be cheaper in the long run and allow you to add/remove ingredients to your taste. Don't stick to learning particular recipies; you'll quickly get bored of them and never learn how to cook properly

[buzzmong]

Amblin Friz - pearl barely? wassat then?

And you had the audacity to call me a mong yesterday

[Dr. kitteny berk]

What sherf said.

It's certainly better to know how to cook, rather than knowing how to do recipes.

On the other hand, if you know how to do certain things, you can make many things from them with only a few different ingredients -

Cooking stewing meat is a good example, that'll let you make pie, hot pot, stews, chilli (I don't use mince, long story) and probably other stuff I forgot. they all start with browning stewing meat, sautéing onions, adding herbs/spiced and then cooking the lot in beer and beef stock until bored.

Same with minced beast, 1 method, a million variations.


Also, I'd suggest picking up a digital thermometer, they run maybe a tenner and are a very, very good way to avoid undercooking meat, and saves you from overcooking food to death.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

Oh, The bumper book of food is fucking awesome too.

It's bloody massive and has a lot of classic stuff, aimed squarely at foodies and proper cooks, but has loads of method stuff in, and a fair pile of recipes.

Maybe slightly overkill, but I like it.

[friznit]

Really Fucking Simple Pie - I make a variation on this at least once a week. It's fast, piss easy to do and feeds 4 (or 2 students). Also, for some reason people are always more impressed by things covered in pastry. Fuck knows why.

Basically what Berk said:

Put Onion & Garlic in a frying pan until slightly less than raw
Add meat until brown all over
Tip in can of equivalent meat based soup or broth
Add stock cube, dash of white wine vinegar, beer/ale for red meat, white wine for white meat, herbs etc
Throw in chopped vegetable matter (carrots, peas, tin of black eyed beans are all good)
Simmer for a while so it all mulches down a bit
Put in pie dish, place ready made pastry on top (Just Roll Puff Pastry comes frozen in a red packet and takes 30 secs to unfreeze in a microwave)
Cook in oven until it looks edible.

Pro Tips:

Too watery - mix up a teaspoon of arrowroot, cornflour or if all else fails, regular flour with some water and add it to the pie mix to thicken it up. Or just leave the top off the pan and let it simmer down.

Too salty/strong - couple of spoonfuls of natural yoghurt or creme fresh is great for calming it down.

Too bland - add cheese. My favourite is beef with a load of stilton, but it can be very rich. Boursin garlic cheese is good for chicken based pies.

If you're worried about presentation, keep the peas out so you have some green on the plate. A green salad can be just lettuce and cucumber, and dressing is balsamic vinegar and grainy mustard mixed up with some olive oil.

I often buy a bag of cheap chicken bits from tesco, bung em in the oven and eat half of them with plain rice (adding nothing at all), and then use the rest to make a chicken & bacon pie.

[friznit]

Oh and also, toad in the hole is another student staple. Looks good, cheap and easy to make:

Batter mix (same stuff as pancakes and yorkshire pud):

Couple of handfuls of flour
2 eggs
Dash of milk
Mix it up, preferably with a whisk, but a wooden spoon will do
Add milk/water until it's around the consistency of single cream
Add 2 teaspoons of grainy mustard if you have it
Put in fridge

Cook sausages in oven until about half way done
Turn oven up to nuclear temperature
Give the batter mix another stir then pour it on
Wait 20 mins
Eat.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

Ended up doing the ramsay red wine sauce with the steak.

also perfected my cooking a wall of cow method

Find cast iron pan, make hot.

Sear cow (i sprinkle sea salt over cow, then oil before cooking, pepper burns, less nice)

Once cow seared on all sides, stick thermometer into the middlest bit, set the alarm to go off at 58c

Cover cow filled cast iron pan with a couple of layers of foil.

Stick in oven - 150 is good, 190-200 will work, but you might lose a bit of moisture.

Wait.

When thermometer beeps, pull meat, leave it to rest (warm plate covered with foil)

Residual heat should get it up to ~60c, which is rare*.

Once you're bored of resting it slice thickly (least 20mm) and serve.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/kitteny_berk/3934287765/" title="mmmm, cow. by Kitteny Berk, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2548/393 ... aca899.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="mmmm, cow."></a>


*and as cooked as it needs to be, 63-64 should be your target for medium rare, which is a bit more suitable for the uneducated. any higher and you might as well go to burger king.

[HereComesPete]

And you had the audacity to call me a mong yesterday

Meh, I just woke up and had read a post from amblin scant seconds before that. It's changed now.

And you were a mong yesterday, just because I made a slip up doesn't mean you weren't being special.

[Sol]

Cheers guys!

My parents bought be a *not so bad* student cook book with a horribly grating name but i think i might have to invest in one of those listed.

And that pie sounds sexellent, cheers friz

[HereComesPete]

But the name is sooooo hip an trrendeh! You'll be the envy of all your new friends! Or you could tear the front cover off and save your retinas.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

Only thing I see in friz's recipe I don't like is the soop, IIRC that sort of thing escaped from the 50s (I imagine handed down recipes and old cookbooks caused it), it tends (IME)

Anyway, it's evil, don't do it, stock (from a cube*), beer, mirepoix**, thyme, bay leaves and time result in a whole fuckload of flavour, as does some worcestershire sauce for a bit of umami.

I'll try to write a few recipes up this week.

*kallo organic FTW, knorr etc are too salty
** french for onion, carrot and celery, makes tastiness happen

Also, berk protips:

Forget making your pie with the lid on it, make the stewy part of it until it's cooked in your preferred method (pan, pan in oven, slow cooker) then made the lids using puff pastry cut into rectangles, stick them on a lightly oiled baking sheet, eggwash, lob them in the oven. Serve pie, place lid on top, enjoy properly cooked delicious pastry.

Potatoes are great for thickening things in a reasonable hurry, chop them fine and stick them in your stew like item (cornflour + cold water works too, but spud's nicer)

If it's lacking flavour, thyme is good.

[Lateralus]

Oh, The bumper book of food is fucking awesome too.

It's bloody massive and has a lot of classic stuff, aimed squarely at foodies and proper cooks, but has loads of method stuff in, and a fair pile of recipes.

Maybe slightly overkill, but I like it.

I have that book too. Overkill doesn't come close, but it is very good. However, who needs a whole fucking chapter on foams?

[friznit]

I agree soup is lazy, but it's the piss easy method and makes a perfectly edible pie in under 5 mins prep time and is more likely to be foud in a student house than bay leaves and thyme . Otherwise, what you said is much better ofc.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

I have that book too. Overkill doesn't come close, but it is very good. However, who needs a whole fucking chapter on foams?

me!

[Dr. kitteny berk]

I agree soup is lazy, but it's the piss easy method and makes a perfectly edible pie in under 5 mins prep time and is more likely to be foud in a student house than bay leaves and thyme . Otherwise, what you said is much better ofc.

Indeed, but by my reckoning there's maybe 10-15 herbs/spices you need to make damn near anything, just picking them up as you need them works well, can get 90% of stuff from a small somerfield or co-op, too.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

I'm sure people will have stuff to add to this, but it's what came to mind for me.

Dried stuff (keeps for ages)

Basil: Tastes italian, goes well in tomato sauces and perking up shitty pizzas
Bay leaves: See thyme, tastes different, does the same job.
Cayenne: Spicy thing, makes stuff have heat, not overpowering, quite distinct taste.
Cumin: Pretty much curry flavour, also good in chilli and on potato wedges
Five spice: Makes stuff taste a bit chinesey, often containts Onion, Star Anise, Garlic, Black Pepper, Fennel, Ginger, Cassia (tastes like cinnamon) and Cloves
Oregano: Another one for tomato sauces, classic in italian and mexican, so good in chillis etc. also, parasites don't like it, which is handy.
Thyme: Makes stuff taste rich and awesome, great in stews/pies/chilli, also awesome in sauces, good with sheep based products.

Stuff worth buying fresh:

Garlic: Wards off vampires, attracts the french. the finer your chop it, the garlicier it is, if you just smash it or slice it, it's nice and sweet.

[Lateralus]

I'm sure people will have stuff to add to this, but it's what came to mind for me.

Dried stuff (keeps for ages)

Basil: Tastes italian, goes well in tomato sauces and perking up shitty pizzas
Bay leaves: See thyme, tastes different, does the same job.
Cayenne: Spicy thing, makes stuff have heat, not overpowering, quite distinct taste.
Cumin: Pretty much curry flavour, also good in chilli and on potato wedges
Five spice: Makes stuff taste a bit chinesey, often containts Onion, Star Anise, Garlic, Black Pepper, Fennel, Ginger, Cassia (tastes like cinnamon) and Cloves
Oregano: Another one for tomato sauces, classic in italian and mexican, so good in chillis etc. also, parasites don't like it, which is handy.
Thyme: Makes stuff taste rich and awesome, great in stews/pies/chilli, also awesome in sauces, good with sheep based products.

Stuff worth buying fresh:

Garlic: Wards off vampires, attracts the french. the finer your chop it, the garlicier it is, if you just smash it or slice it, it's nice and sweet.

I think we've done something like this before, but stuff I'd add to that list: Fresh Ginger, Chilli Powder, Mixed Herbs, Paprika, Turmeric, Coriander, Garam Masala, Rosemary, Cinnamon (ground and sticks), Chinese 5 Spice, sea salt crystals and black peppercorns (both for grinding fresh when needed).

That's the minimum I'd usually have in, but have a few others like mustard seeds, coriander seeds, smoked paprika, dried chilli flakes, thai mixed spice and a few others I think. I gave up looking for a spice rack, and instead have a small shelf-unit on the wall.

[Lateralus]

Also, it might be old, but I find that Delia's Complete Cookery Course is one of my most used recipe books. Loads of great recipes for classic dishes, and generally pretty straight-forward too.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

sea salt crystals and black peppercorns (both for grinding fresh when needed).

I consider the peppercorns a given, and decent salt's nice, but not essential.

Though, Maldon salt FTW