Kitchen Adventures

[IrishAyes]

Well, this has aspects of 'Frugal and Energy Efficient Living' in addition to the Cooking forum, and I couldn't quite decide where to drop it. Not the latter because there might be real chefs lurking there and I'm a little afraid of the real McCoy, devoid of proper technique as I am. You see, I'm only an extemporaneous cook who goes by experience and inspiration, and I haven't measured ingredients for nearly 6 decades. During my salad years I devoured cookbooks, watched Julia Child and Graham Kerr (he was my heart throb back then) faithfully, and then proceeded to ignore most of what they had to teach. Or at least set it on its ear.

The reason I'm so full of myself this morning is that my latest kitchen adventure turned out extra well. I batch cook and freeze stuff out of habit, because during my working years I had no other choice. Today it happened to be a cross between bread and cake. When I buy bottles of condiments like barbeque sauce and salad dressings etc., their traditional use never empties the container fast enough to suit me. I don't like anything that's been opened more than a few months ago even when refrigerated.

So this morning I looked at the remains of some mango salad dressing and decided, time to use it up or throw it out. I mixed almond flour,yellow corn meal and sugar with salt, pepper,baking powder and baking soda, and cinnamon. Then I added real vanilla, eggs, milk and butter, plus the remains of the mango salad dressing. Anyone with enough kitchen experience knows how to judge the consistency of batter. Baked two big pans of it, and I swear the result was at least as good as anything I've ever eaten.

I've always found baked goods versatile and forgiving. You can throw all sorts of special ingredients in there and never get bored, seldom disappointed. Often I use beer or nuts or fruit, you name it. If I feel southwestern, I'll add beans, peppers, onions, cooked corn, whatever falls to hand. Anything approaching my personal notion of expiration dates. Since there are no kids around to finger lick the batter bowl, I fill it up with water and give it to the dogs. Don't even have to wipe it out before throwing it in the dishwasher. The bowl, I mean, not the dogs. Best of all, I only have to use paper towels on the baking pans and I'm done with the whole business for several weeks.

Did I mention, I'm incredibly lazy also?

BTW, it occurs to me that a little mango would really taste good in scrambled eggs. I always add vanilla to nearly everything. A friend got mad at me once because I refused to tell her the secret ingredient to what she claimed were the best scrambled eggs she'd ever had. It was a short dash of rum. If you want to add a rum flavor and don't have any, just double the vanilla.

[Arcanetrance]

1. Speaking as a real chef as you put itit sounds like something I'd like to try. All great dishes come

From experimenting. Also technique can only take you so far there's no substitute for natural ability and talent

[IrishAyes]

2. Thank you. Let us know how it turns out.

It's really easy to know what flavors go together, and you can wing it from there. And I don't really discount whatever stuck in my subconscious from all that reading and watching true chefs. I just don't remember most of it consciously. There's a good program around noon on NPR weekends, where a caller tells the lady chef what's in their larder and she tells them (and the rest of us) how to use it.

But not in my wildest dreams do I imagine I could get on, much less win the Hell's Kitchen competition. Luckily it doesn't bother me too much because I gave up cable, and the best antenna in the world hardly picks up 2 networks here.

It occurs to me just now that the mango batter might make a good coating for baked fish or meat, too.

[Arcanetrance]

3. I had a chance to audition for hells kitchen I turned it down

It's all fake on there from Gordon Ramsey screaming and yelling to the predictable screw ups

[IrishAyes]

5. Well, hell's bells, I might've fit right in! I can't stand to have anyone in the working portion of

my kitchen, although they're quite welcome to sit at the table and keep me company. But operationally I could teach the Soup Nazi a few tricks. I think part of it comes from having had to deal with my ex's overbearing relatives. The mil walked into my kitchen early on and announced she was there to teach me how to cook! When she'd never seen me work before and had never eaten anything I'd made. But I was young and little, and she was big and older, and way too bossy to suit me. I happened to be cutting vegetables and told her not while I have a knife in my hand, you won't. We never did get along.

The first time she did come to dinner, she looked at the food, then at her precious mama's boy son and said these exact words: "I told you that you couldn't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear."

It infuriated me to the point that I gathered up the tablecloth on all four corners, dragged everything off the table and threw the whole mess into the backyard, then laid out paper plates, opened a can of beans and went around pouring a little onto each plate. By that time the room was dead silent, because it's never been wise to box me in a corner. Then I sat down in my chair, picked up the plastic spoons I'd passed out, and said, "Let's eat."

Of course she burst into tears and played the victim, but I was glad when she ran out the front door, never to return.

[Arcanetrance]

6. Lol wow I love it that's gotta be the greatest thing ever done at a family dinner

[IrishAyes]

7. Thanks, it cost me my entire set of precious china and crystal, but the warm glow remains.

[Arcanetrance]

8. I'm sorry about the loss of crystal and China but that must have felt great

[panader0]

9. Yer a real corker you are.

[IrishAyes]

10. Well, at least you understand why I'm so ill suited to the corporate world.

As a little girl, I had a rubber dolly whose head could be made to swivel right and left. I discovered that if you kept turning the head, eventually it popped off. Then I really loved my dolly because she became my partner in crime. Adult: "What's your dolly's name, little girl?" Marie Antoinette. "Why... why did you give her such a horrible name?" OFF WITH THEIR HEADS! and I'd pop dolly's head off and run away laughing. Mom used to warn visitors not to ever ask me the doll's name because I simply couldn't be broken from that habit. No amount of punishment overcame the sheer delight of surprising and horrifying adults who were dumb enough to walk into my trap.

Between Mom's Montessory leanings and many long stretches at the family home in the mountains, I probably grew up a bit feral. It never caused me trouble as an Army brat because we all knew how and when to behave like little angels. At church, parochial school, and around senior ranking officers. Civilians were fair game.

[TreasonousBastard]

4. Speaking as someone who knows real chefs...

and learned a lot from them...

You did what good cooks have done for millennia-- know your ingredients and have a sense how they work together. Every dish we enjoy today was once an experiment.