Day 62-- 6 tips for beginning chefs

Happy August!  It's been exactly two months since I started to learn how to cook things beyond Mac and Cheese and oatmeal, and I've definitely learned some things along the way.  You have to understand, when I started this summer I didn't even have a cutting board, let alone a can opener, or flour, or butter, or mixing bowls... It's been a journey and here are some tips for beginning chefs as I learned the hard way. 

Tip #1: Don't buy all of your supplies at once.

You must know this: cooking is going to be damn expensive at first because you have zero supplies.  For example: your first batch of French toast is going to cost about $19, but once you own flour, sugar, vanilla extract, and keep butter and milk in the fridge, your French toast is going to cost about  $.75 a batch. 

It's tempting just to get all of your food supplies in a hurry, but don't.  You're just going to get discouraged that you spent a bill and can only make two meals out of it.  Buy things bit by bit. 

Tip# 2: Soaking a pan in Coke will help with burnt bottoms.

Coke is strong enough to remove rust from engines, so it'll do wonders for your food-burnt dishes.  Fill your pan or pot with enough Coke to cover the area and sit overnight.  Use muscle to scrub.  Repeat if necessary.

Tip#3: Timing is everything--check the recipe card

Timing really is everything when it comes to cooking.  This is especially important with side dishes and chopping so that everything finishes at the same time.  Want potatoes with that?  40 minutes, so typically start them first.  Want broccoli with that? 10 minutes.  Want garlic bread with that?  5 minutes + 2 minutes for cutting and putting on the spread.  Time to chop an onion?  Using the restaurant way about 5 minutes.  Want bacon, eggs, and toast?  Bacon is 4-5 minutes, so start first.  Toasting bread, 3 minutes. Eggs are 2 minutes, so do after you start the toast.

One of the best purchases I've made were these little dipping cups that I stuff with fruit or salad and stick in the fridge as the rest of the meal cooks.  Also, during the lulls of waiting for the oven or heat, or food to sizzle, or meat to broil are the best times to do dishes.

Tip#4: Buy good steaks.  

I don't care how well you season, marinate, or cook it, if the main dish is steak for steak's sake, buy a good steak--top sirloin or filet mignon.  Steak is a treat and should be treated as such.  And if it's between a bigger steak and a smaller one, go with the smaller one.  People like finishing their plate. The exception is when the dish includes steak, but isn't the main idea, like a steak burrito, or beef stew, or fajitas, ect.  In those cases, no worries about poorer quality of steak because the other stuff is so yummy. 

Tip #5:  Vary a little from the familiar in starting off

Try adding a little fresh basil to your pasta sauce tonight, or maybe add chopped onion to the ground beef to make hamburgers, ect.  Just a little change is a good way of starting off for a new chef.

Tip# 6: All-purpose flour vs self-rising flour vs bread flour, kosher salt vs salt, baking powder vs baking soda

All-purpose flour is just regular flour.  Self-rising flour is flour with baking powder and salt added.  You can make self-rising flour by adding 11/2 teaspoons of baking powder and 1/2 teaspoon of salt for every 1 cup of all-purpose flour.  Bread flour is wheat flour that containing a higher percentage of the protein gluten than other flour.  This gluten makes the flour far more elastic when kneading and is typically used for chewy breads that rise while cooking, like pizzas and pastries.   From personal experience, if it calls for bread flour, you must use bread flour or it's just not going to taste good at all.

Sea salt, regular salt, and kosher salt are pretty much the same thing as far as composition goes.  The biggest difference is texture.  Regular salt/table salt is really tiny and fine in size, whereas kosher salt and sea salt tend to come in larger flakes.  Sea salt isn't as processed as table salt, so it still contains flavor from minerals of the sea.  Kosher salt is usually preferred in cooking because (1) it too isn't as processed as table salt so it can a bit more flavor, (2) due to the surface area, it absorbs moisture better in things like meat, and (3) because it's bigger than normal salt it's easier to pinch up if you're measuring just with your fingers.

Baking power and baking soda are both leveling agents in making flour rise.  Baking powder contains baking soda, plus cream of tarter and sometimes cornstarch which helps preserve it.  Baking soda works far faster, so once you add it to a mix, you must bake it quickly.  It also has a more bitter taste, so it's often used when baking things with sweets to counteract the taste (like cookies).  Due to the tarter, baking powder can rest a little longer (thus it's usually preferred with cooking).  You can't substitute baking soda, but you can substitute baking powder by simply mixing two parts cream of tartar with one part baking soda.

Good luck, and happy cooking!

Day 61--Muse and Rage Against the Machine concert review

Somewhere after 5 and a half hours of LA traffic, missing the entire set of Lauryn Hill and half of Rise Against, and discovering that our seats were 3 rows from the back of the motherfucking back of the Coliseum, my boyfriend and I sat on the concrete steps high enough to watch the Downtown LA at sunset.  We laughed about it all as he drank his $9 beer and I munched on my $3 M&Ms. 

The sky darkened and Muse's green laser lights flooded the field. 

I'm a Twilight-soundtrack-roadtrip Muse fan, meaning, if their songs are nestled between some other good shit I'm going to rock out in my car, but I wouldn't listen to them by themselves.  To me, Muse = Coldplay + harder drums + glam rocker voice + more allusions to the stars and moons.  But I'll tell you this: they really do care about putting on a spectacle show.

The green laser lights that covered the whole 100,000 person Coliseum were awesome, and the use of shooting steam to act as intense columns were a sick visual to end one of their songs.  Singer Matthew Bellamy was giving it his all, and he and his fellow guitar mate Christopher Tony Wolstenholme had a nice report with the light show illuminating them as opposing forces with their sound.  

Still, in the crowd setting of black leather jackets and fishnets, it was suddenly very obvious to me that they are not rockers--they're alternative hipsters playing with louder toys.  They tried their best to be edgy, but if you actually listen to them, they're just louder in earnestness.  I enjoyed them, and if the happen to be in a future lineup, I wouldn't mind seeing them again, but I wouldn't seek them out.

Despite what the poster says, LA Rising was first and foremost a Rage Against the Machine show, and the crowd was buzzing as they waited for them to take the stage.  The lights dimmed and video reel played of their history in the 90s as being anarchists metal heads unhappy with the state of the world, and how they've grown into more political activism through the years.  The music started and the whole field turned into circles of moshing.

My first thought: holy fuck, who is that lead singer?  I have never witnessed such a ferocious whirlwind of energy from a performer.  He spit in the mike fucking hard, he ran across that stage fucking hard, he jumped in the air fucking hard, he brought this ball of fire to the crowd and they fucking ate it up.  

Before this show I knew all of 3 Rage songs and nothing about them.  I didn't realize that they were one of the first front-runners of the rap-metal sound and were a part of the Rodney King grunge/metal/rap scene during the riots of LA.  I might not particularly like the shrill of the Zack de la Rocha's voice, but I can respect what they as a band mean to LA and that energy of pissed-off Americans under the system.

I may never see Muse or Rage Against the Machine again, and I sure as fuck won't be heading back to the LA Coliseum again, but if you're a fan of either bands, you will not be disappointed with the heat and spit of Rage and the earnest anthems of Muse.  Be sure to bring a black shirt. 

   

Day 58-- Spiced orange incense and life updates

This room still smells delicious from the vanilla candles and spiced orange and sandalwood incense. I'll leave it to your imagination as to what I was up to this afternoon with the bf ;)

Today has been a real nice shade of lovely.  I applied for a hotel job a little bit ago, I finished a book before breakfast, I'm not stressed about the internship interview next week, I bought a bar of my favorite dark chocolate, and I still have a few hours in the day to do some online fall fashion homework.

During my daily walk I thought that maybe it's time for an general life update versus my stand-alone posts as of late.  Here is goes:

Job/career: 

Two weeks ago I updated my Cafe Resume and applied for a coffee shop job near-ish by.  Never heard back. Last week I bought two writers magazines and a publishing reference guide for freelance+publishing suggestions. This weekend I updated my Publishing Cover Letter and Publishing Resume.  On Monday I applied for an internship with a San Diego book publisher.  I heard back immediately and have an interview next week.  And today I applied for a hotel job and will apply for more by the end of the weekend.

My current thoughts are: (1) pursue book publishing, (2) get a flexible part-time decent paying job like hotel reception where I can eventually get benefits, travel perks, and an easy state-to-state transfer next year if I'm still working there. (3) Freelance my fiction and news articles by mid-Fall.  (4) pursue magazine writing as internship.  (5) By Spring decide for sure if it's books or magazines that I want to seriously pursue, and probably move to Oregon.

Exercise via yoga and jogging:

I've been super good with my walking.  I walk about 1-2 miles everyday, and when my boyfriend joins me we sometimes go for about 2-5.  I've jogged exactly once in two months, but I've enjoyed walking far more.  I've decided to sign up for yoga on the 1st.

Diet:

As you may have been reading from previous posts or the FOOD tab, I've been getting into cooking.  I cook a meal about 2-3 times a week--always with meat and veggies.  I need to get much better with my fruit intake though, and I might start up a vitamin routine when I find a vitamin tablet I like.

Fashion:

Bad luck so far.  I now have an interview outfit and heels, but that's about it.  After trying on clothes after clothes I think I'm giving up on looking for summer stuff and focusing more on Autumn style.  My current wants are: a smart gray dress with pink heels, a tight blue flannel long-sleeve shirt with a snug blue or black v-neck sweater on top of it, knee-high socks with brown boots and short skirt, a short jacket/coat--preferably non-black/white/gray, and some v-neck t-shirts and gemmed tanks to have under a black suit jacket.

Living situation/making friends:

Still at the bf's, which has gotten much cozier.  I think the brownies and rice crispie treats I've been making might have something to do with it, haha.  I almost left to sublet for a month and share a room just to be somewhere new and not spend too much money, but no one liked the idea so I'm still here.  No new friends yet, but I met some cool people at a party last week. 

General outlook:

Good.  I feel like my life plans are still a bit scattered and hazy in my head, but they're slowly coming into focus and I'm liking how things are shaping up.  If I could nab the internship and a job in the next week or two I feel like I'll be right on track.

Anyways, that's what up on Day 58!

Day 56 -- Café Playlist

As you can probably tell from my recent posts, I've been in a very classic mood lately.  Classic movies, classic dresses, and yes, I've been listening to some very classy music.  Here's my café /rainy day/brunch mix:

1.) "Caramel" ~ Suzanne Vega

2.) "Pyro" ~ Kings of Leon

3.) "Redemption Song" ~ Bob Marley

4.) "Gatekeeper" (Full Mix) ~ Feist

5.) "Green Eyes" ~ Coldplay

6.)  "A Kiss to Build a Dream On" ~ Louis Armstrong

7.) "Girl From Ipanema" ~Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz

8.) "Everlasting Light" ~ The Black Keys

9.) "Holes to Heaven" ~ Jack Johnson

10.) "If It Hadn't Been for Love" ~ Adele

11.) "Koop Island Blues" ~ Koop

12.) "Fever" ~ Peggy Lee

13.) "Our Love Is Here to Stay" ~Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong

14.) "No Woman No Cry" ~ Bob Marley

15.) "Bang Bang" ~ Dispatch

16.) "Birthday" ~ Kings of Leon

17.) "Sleep" ~ Azure Ray

18.) "How Come You Don't Call Me" ~Alicia Keys

19.) "Flight Attendant" ~ Josh Rouse

20.) "The End" ~Kings of Leon

21.) "Bartender Song" ~ Rehab

22.) "Hearing Damage" ~Thom Yorke

23.) "Killing Me Softly" ~The Fugee

24.) "Trouble Sleeping" ~Corinne Bailey Rae

25.) "The General" ~ Dispatch

26.)  "All Apologies" ~Nirvana

27.) "VCR" ~ The XX

28.) "What's Going On" ~ Marvin Gaye 

29.) "Nothing Better" ~ The Postal Service 

30.) "Life in Technicolor" ~ Coldplay

Day 55-- Cat on a Hot Tin Roof movie review

There are two times I like to watch classic movies: by myself during a weekend brunch, or a dinner/dessert night with the boyfriend or the girls.  The powerful but slow-paced Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) is definitely a rainy brunch sort of movie.

Starring Elizabeth Taylor as Maggie and Paul Newman as Brick, these two forces of nature bring to life the Tennessee Williams play to cinema, and they do so with the ferocity of two actors clawing their way out of the muck of stereotypes.

Taylor embodies the sensuous and feisty Maggie with an earnest candor that earned her her second Academy Award nomination.  At this point in Taylor's career audiences were used to seeing her as a pretty face with a voluminous body.  Maggie was her further proof that she could actually act, and that Raintree County wasn't a fluke.  Newman was in a similar position in 1958, and with his brooding and emotionally ugly Brick, Newman found his ticket to better roles and more respect (he too earned an Academy Award nom).  It's the difference between Megan Fox and Angelina Jolie, between Mathew McConaughey and Brad Pitt.  The right movie changes everything.

And they did it with style.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof takes place on warm Southern day of Brick's father's (Big Daddy) birthday.  Three emotional thunderstorms are brewing as the liquor pours and tempers rises.  Brick and Maggie's marriage is in full destruction mode as Brick will not sleep with Maggie nor can stand being around her (for reasons unknown until later).  Big Daddy, a boisterous and callous man is coming to terms with his cancer and immediate mortality.  And the greedy eldest son and his meddling wife are embattled with family over the estate once Big Daddy is gone.

This is a simmering fight of mendacity versus the truth, love versus guilt, and will versus stubbornness. 

Plays are hard to translate onto screen, and despite the best acting of the main and supporting characters, this movie has the restricted feel of only 5 set changes and 6 characters (not including the annoying children).  It also has the unfortunate of saying a lot but not saying anything profound or surprising.  This is a portrait of a family where none of members particularity like each other.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is brilliantly acted, but it's a slow burn that will quickly lose short attention spans.

Do yourself a favor and the next time it's raining out and you're nursing a cup of spiked coco, check this movie out and prepare for the slow dazzle of hot emotions in a tight space and time. 

Day 54-- Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs and Cheesy Potato Skins recipes

Prologue:

Sunday nights are my favorite cooking nights, since my boyfriend and I tend to make a big meal to eat before or during True Blood.  Tonight's menu was Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs and Cheesy Potato skins.  He took care of the beef kabobs and I took care of the potato skins.  If you chose to cook them together as a meal like we did, pay attention to the cook times and start the potatoes first.  For that reason I'm listing them first.

Cheesy Potato Skins

Prep time: 5 minutes + 10ish minutes later

Cook time: 40 minutes + 5 minutes

Total time: 1 hour 5 minutes

Servings: 3-4

Ingredients:

4 brown potatoes (try to use rounder ones)

11/2 cups sharp cheddar cheese

3 slices of bacon

1/4 of a red bell pepper

1/2 of an onion

1 clove of garlic

3 teaspoons of butter

Directions:

1.) Pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees, after washing your potatoes, place them directly on the rack and cook for 40 minutes.

[at the 30 minutes mark, start the beef kabobs.  They should take about 30 minutes start to finish]

2.) As your potatoes cook start chopping up your 3 slices of bacon.  Place in a pan around minute 30 of your potatoes cooking.  While that cooks, chop up your 1/4 of red bell and half an onion (use the rest of them for either kabobs or an omelet in the morning).

3.) Once the bacon is done add the onion, bell pepper, and garlic to the pan and cook until the veggies are soft and cooked all the way through.  Meanwhile, grate your cheese to make about 1-11/2 cups worth.

4.) Once you can stick a fork through a potato without resistance take them out and place on a cutting board.  Cut them all in half and let cool for a little bit.

5.) Once the veggies and bacon bits are cooked bring the pan over to the cutting board.  Cut the halves of the potatoes in half.  Scoop out about 3/4 of the inside of the wedges, and squeeze them a little to make better boat shapes.  *CAUTION*  Will be fucking hot.  Anyway.  Butter the insides with a tad bit of butter inside each wedge.

6.)  Spoon in the veggie/bacon mix into each potato skin and add the cheese on top once done.

7.) Stick back into the oven until the cheese is fully melted.  Done!

Beef and Bell Pepper Kabobs

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 15 minutes

Servings: 4 kabobs (2-3 people)

Ingredients:

1 pound good steak, preferably top sirloin.

1/2 of an onion

1 green bell pepper

1 red bell pepper

salt and pepper

4 wooden or metal skewers

Directions:

1.) Cut into the bell peppers and remove the seeds.  Dispose of the top.  Once done, cut the bell peppers into rough 1 inch squares.  We prefer the red and green bell peppers for color sake, but feel free to use orange or yellows instead.

2.) Cut the onion layers into rough 1 inch squares as well.

3.)  Cut the steak into 1 inch squares and generously season with salt and pepper..

4.) Get out your skewers and alternate sliding down meat, sliding down onion pieces, sliding down peppers, sliding down meat. (this is called "threading" in cooking terms).  You should have about 4 pieces of steak per skewer.

5.) Get out a large frying pan and drizzle some olive oil.  Place the kabobs in the pan and turn occasionally until cooked.  Done!  

Review:

Kabobs are an excellent way of mixing things up for dinner.  They're attractive to look at and even more delicious to eat.  As I mentioned in a previous post, when it comes to steak, pick the good stuff.  I don't care how much you season or marinate, you can't hide a bad steak.  If you're making steak, pick some motherfucking good steak!  You deserve it!  Yummy.... 

I'm glad I tried the cheesy potato skins.  I used medium cheddar cheese, which wasn't quite right, therefore I recommended in the ingredients list to use sharp cheddar like the recipes I've seen online.  The bell pepper and bacon added a real nice flavor.  Cheesy potato skins aren't fooling anybody--they aren't healthy.  But when's the last time you made them at home?...Haha, didn't think so.  I can't wait for left-overs tomorrow! 

Overall I really loved dinner, loved my boyfriend cooking next to me as we listened to Rihanna and Kings of Leon, and loved the latest True Blood episode.  Does Eric have to get his memory back?  I prefer the new Eric.  But that's a whole 'nother entry.  Peace out and happy eats!