The *OFFICIAL* Culinary Thread

[Fire Marshall Bill]

This one is great for either a side dish at potlucks or grill outs. I call it loaded mashed potatoes. It is about as easy as it gets to make and is very good. It's also very cheap.

Ingredients

2lb bag of frozen Southern style (cubed) hash browns
2 cans of cream of mushroom soup
16oz container of sour cream
1 bundle of green onions
3oz bag of bacon pieces (Not bacon bits. This is cooked, crumbled bacon found where the uncooked bacon is.)
8oz bag of shredded cheddar cheese

Defrost the potatoes. When I dice up the onions I go almost all the way to the white. Mix everything thoroughly in a large bowl. Spread into a baking pan. Bake in the oven at 350 degrees for 70-80 minutes. Should be a golden brown on top. That's it. Very easy to prepare.

Caution: it's very, very hot for a while. There's a lot of water in those ingredients and when it's done cooking you'll even notice the edges will having bubbles rising through from boiling a little.

This is a fun recipe to play with. I've added a can of corn into the mix before. It makes it much sweeter. Also, chives go really well with the mix, as they do in most potato dishes.

This is clearly not a dish for the calorie conscious. If you want to use low fat/fat free sour cream and cheese, that'll help a little.

 

[Slice]

I came back from a hotel stay recently, where we made a ton of bacon to make a bacon plate out of. With some steaks and ribs on top, we crumbled extra bacon and put some cheese on it to melt. Simple, effective, epiccccccccccccc

 

[HBsam31]

Here is another slow cooking recipe that I use often especially during hunting season. I use a deer roast, but a beef roast works just as well. Again it is really simple and really cheap.

1 deer roast or beef chuck roast. (Cost about 8 bucks)
1 bunch of carrots (peeled and cut into managable but not quite bite size pieces)
10 whole red skinned potatoes (quartered)
1 bunch of parlsey
2 cloves of garlic (minced)
any other veggies of choice
salt and pepper to you liking
2 12oz cans or boxes of beef stock (I usually make stock, but I know everyone won't want to do that)
2 8oz jars or Heinz beef gravy (or gravy of choice, but Heinz is awesome)

I like to sear the roast in a pan with oil to get that nice deep brown color, but you dont have to. Add all ingredients to the crock pot and cook for about 5 or 6 hours. Like I said this one is very simple, but again you can feed a family of four on this for about 16 dollars tops. Next week I think I am going to do some grilling recipies as the season calls for it. I love to slow cook all year around, but for the sake of this thread I think I am going to mix it up a bit.

 

[The Butcher]

Just a heads up to all my fellow Americans that today is National Doughnut Day. Krispy Kreme, Dunkin' Donuts, Tim Horton's and a few other places are giving away free donuts. Dunkin' just requires you buy a drink to get one, while Krispy Kreme is just handing 'em out. Grab few disguises, get a free dozen, and be the most popular guy in the office for a day.

 

[HBsam31]

Last week I said I would do something having to do with grilling so I was thinking, and instead of doing something that you can eat I decided to do something that makes your food taste better. This is a basic brine for all meats. What a brine is (incase you don't know) is a salty water solution used to uniformly season your meat. Chefs will do it so that a weak cook doesn't over or under season something using regular salt and pepper. I am going to give you a basic recipe for brine and then the amount of time each type of meat needs to be soaked for. You would then take it out of the brine and put it on the grill. Here we go.

Basic Brine

1 gallon of water
1 cup of kosher salt
1/2 cup of sugar
any other type of seasoning that you would like to add

You want to simmer all of this in a pot until the sugar and salt is dissolved and then cool it down in the refrigerator.

Here are the times to soak your meat.
Boneless chicken breast 2 hours
1and 1/2 inch pork chops 2 hours
whole chicken 4to6 hours
porkloin 4 pounds 12 hours
Fish 1 hour for thin fillets 6 hours for thick cuts like a tuna steak

I recommend giving this a try. It really gives your meat some great flavor, and it also helps it to stay really moist.