Quick and Easy one-pot Meals

Cuisine Food & Drink
21

[quote=“elektronisk”]Sandman - your “Sandman Coq Au Vin” sounds good but those pies look awesome! Did your wife come up with the pie crust designs? Very creative.

Has she made any meat pies? If you used boneless chicken and browned it first, you could probably use your same chicken recipe to make a nice pie.[/quote]
Well, we’ll maybe have another thread for more complex recipes – the one above is more like “coq au vin avec les multiple shortecuts.”
But the pies? Yeah baby! Fruit, meat, veggies, if you can name it, she can put it in a pie – the Christmas pie is actually chicken, mushroom, leek and potato and is killer. I’ve had New Zealenders coming to actual blows in my house over who would get the last slice, and Kiwis know a good pie, believe me.

You know how some people just have “a knack” with pastry? She’s got the knack – she can make a batch of pastry, we both make a pie rolled from the same batch, but mine’s like leather no matter what I do, while her’s melts in your mouth. Its really unfair.

22

Paella: a somewhat random dish made with whatever you have to hand.

Have a drink while contemplating starting.

If you want to be really smart, start by boiling some prawns in 5 cups of water while you slice the veggies. Use the unpeeled ones that still have heads. Pour the water through a sieve into a jug or bowl.

Fry some sliced red, green, and or yellow peppers in a flat pan with lots of olive oil. Put them to one side, keep the oil in the pan and add more if necessary. Have a drink.

Fry up some sliced or diced chicken, pork and add a big splash of paprika. Add oil if necessary, you want to have plenty for the next step. Put the meat to one side when finished. Once you get the knack it’s acually quite easy to drink while doing the meat.

Fry an onion, and garlic if you wish, keeping it nice and oily. Add a tin of tomatoes and mush everything up together. Cook for a couple of minutes. Use those minutes wisely. Have a drink.

Add two cups of uncooked rice, and stir together with the onions and tomato. Add the five cups of water. If you didn’t cook prawns in the water, or even if you did, then add a cube of chicken stock and stir it in before pouring over the rice.

As it comes to the boil, kind of poke it around a bit with a spatula, but don’t actually stir. Add a few strands of saffron. Cover, and simmer for 5-10 minutes. Relax for 5-10 minutes and have a drink.

This is a good time to pull the heads off the prawns and throw them away, unless you’re the kind of person who eats them. I leave the tails on for decorative reasons.

When the rice is part-cooked, add the cooked meats and prawns. Just poke them into the rice. You can use whatever you have kicking around in the fridge. Mushrooms, miscellaneous veggies, old bits of cooked sausage, ham, pork, seafood, but it is vitally important not to believe anyone who tells you to use squid. Yu still have a couple of minutes left in which to have a drink.

Depending on the variety of rice it should be ready in 12-15 minutes. The longer the rice grains are the better. Taiwanese sticky rice is bad. Thai jasmine rice is good. Basmati is maybe too good as you’re going to drown the natural flavour with all the other stuff.

When it’s almost done drop the strips of peppers on the top, artistically. You now have your last oppportunity to have a drink before serving. Go ahead, reward yourself. When it’s ready (taste the rice), garnish with that green stuff, looks like a little bush, whose name escapes me.

If you’ve done it really well then the bottom layer of rice, close to the pan, is all crispy and golden. You’re unlikely to do it well because most burners in Taiwan can’t supply a low heat evenly over a flat-bottomed pan, and you can’t really make paella in a wok. Or can you?

Anyway, serve with gusto. The whole thing takes less than 30 minutes to make, including drinking time. Did I mention to drink alcohol while cooking? You might try adding wine to the water for the rice/prawns too.

23

Nice one Loretta, although I’ve never had much success with paella for some reason.
Tip: Once you’ve cooked the prawns, pull the heads off, put the tails aside but return the heads to the water and simmer for a good half-hour with a bayleaf and maybe some onion and carrot. This gives you time to open the second bottle and have another drink or two before you get into the cooking and it also gives you a very tasty stock to make your rice with.

24

Excuse me while I go off on a paella tangent for a minute. Mods, split or flounder if you see fit…

[quote=“Loretta”]Paella: a somewhat random dish made with whatever you have to hand.
…
Depending on the variety of rice it should be ready in 12-15 minutes. The longer the rice grains are the better. Taiwanese sticky rice is bad. Thai jasmine rice is good. Basmati is maybe too good as you’re going to drown the natural flavour with all the other stuff.
…
If you’ve done it really well then the bottom layer of rice, close to the pan, is all crispy and golden. You’re unlikely to do it well because most burners in Taiwan can’t supply a low heat evenly over a flat-bottomed pan, and you can’t really make paella in a wok. Or can you?[/quote]Looks like a nice recipe Loretta and I will try it out.

Putting on my pedant’s hat, though, I have to say it wouldn’t be recognised as paella by the Spanish, though. For them paella is a not-at-all random dish made with very specific ingredients and technique. For a start the rice is actually a mid-length variety, NOT long-grain. And it should be cooked in the proper special pan just for paella. There’s neither mushiness nor crispyness and I don’t remember any tomatoes being involved. Of course you need some decent saffron (the msot expensive spice in the world, made from crocus stamens).

But even if one has all these elements and does a reasonable job of it, it will still not be good enough for paella purists.

I have had delicious paella cooked by bona fide Spaniards in the authentic manner but other Spaniards also eating it have just shaken their heads and said “this is not the real paella”.

Anyway, at least one thing we can get right is the pronunciation. It is a dish from the south-east of Spain. There, as in most of Spain and indeed most of the Spanish-speaking world, the double l is pronounced like the soft French ‘j’. Ignore the books that tell you this dish is pronounced ‘pie-elya’ or some such. The only people who speak like that are some people from north-central Spain.

25

Sandman, the answer could be that while your misses has perfect pastry palms (and the warm heart those goes with them), yours might be hot and sweaty. Try clasping a cold beer every couple of minutes next time you’re pieing.

26

last night I bought a big chunk of pork, an onion, a couple of potatoes and a big carrot.

I used the roasting pan that came with my 1000 dollar toaster oven thing.

I put the pork in the middle, fatty side down. I chunked up half an onion and the rest of the veggies. put them in the pan. dumped some salt and pepper and other spices I had lying around. mostly on the pig meat.

put water in the pan up to the limit andcover with a piece of tin foil.

put in oven at about 3/4 the heat setting. leave in there for an hour and a half. or until it’s cooked to your liking. I like it a little pink in the middle and a little crispy on the outside.

on the side melt half cup butter, half cup flour. pepper, salt. mix it up like a paste. put in fridge

take out of oven, take the nice veggies and meat out, put on plate. Put the juice in a sauce pan.

3/4 heat in saucepan, whisking or stirring rapidly, adding the flour, butter paste a spoon at a time. stir it a lot. Soon you have some gravy for your meat and potatoes.

serve and eat.

ok it was two pots but I like gravy. 3 pots? steam some broccoli in your rice cooker.

A variation of this uses finer chopped veggies, chunks of beef. potatoes on the side and lots more water. Make the whole damn thing in your rice cooker for beef stew. put the potatoes in late! Use the same flour and butter gravy paste.

The secret is to be prepared to wait. Cook slowly! have a beer!

Figure out the spices by yourself!

Ta- dah! Meat and potatoes!

27

I finally found an oven! Got it at Hola in Neihu. 3k, but discounted to 2100NT. Don’t know why? Didn’t ask.

Made a baked ziti tonight with pork lion cuts around the edge.

THAT’S what I’m talking about!

whoohoo.

Gonna do that chicken recipe soon sandman.

jdstoked!

28

Simple breakfast:
3 sheets matzoh 2 eggs
Kosher salt,
Fresh ground pepper
Grape or raspberry jelly, Butter

  1. Break matzoh sheets into quarters and cover with very hot water for about a minute then drain well
  2. Beat eggs with salt & pepper and add softened sheets, and break sheets into smaller pieces
  3. Melt butter and small amount of oil in large pan and add egg mixture
  4. Cook over low heat until lightly golden on one side, then flip and cook the other side
  5. Remove to a plate and serve with a little jelly on the side

Simple lunch:
2 pounds chicken thighs
1-cup soy sauce
1/2 cup white vinegar
1 tablespoon fresh ground pepper
2 tablespoons brown sugar
5 garlic cloves, minced
3 bay leaves

  1. Combine soy, vinegar, pepper, brown sugar, garlic and bay leaves in the bottom of a large pot.
  2. Place chicken skin side down in pot and bring to a boil.
  3. Immediately turn down to a simmer and cover with lid
  4. After 30 minutes, remove lid and turn chicken over and simmer for an additional 20 - 30 minutes
  5. Serve with steamed rice
29

made a pastafazool (sicilian dish, lol) the other day, can’t be much easier.

fry some garlic in an ample amount of olive oil, then add diced onions, fry until golden, add celery, fry a bit more. add a few cups of water and then two cans of white kidney beans (any white bean will do) WITH juice. salt and a bit of black pepper. boil and let simmer until beans are soft, add soup type pasta, very small elbows or shells probably best. serve with parmesan and red or black pepper, just like grandma used to make

30

Spaghetti Sauce:

Big jar of spaghetti sauce (I use Fresco and prefer just the tomato one)
Red pepper paste
Use Kraft Parmesan Cheese

If you want to add anything chunky just add a couple of those skinny hot peppers (I use the green ones) and kimchi if you can find it. Chopped garlic works too but not necessary.

Boil the noodles and sauce seperately. Sauce takes hardly any time to heat up. After the noodles are done, put them in a pan and add the sauce. Stir around. Spaghetti is better fried after. Makes the sauce stick to the noodles. Nothing worse than runny spaghetti sauce on noodles. Although the red pepper paste might take care of this. Don’t use oil.

Taste is out of this word and you’ll want to eat more and more.

Enjoy!

31

Didn’t I have this in Vietnam one time? Part of a “cat cooked nine ways” meal. Don’t think they have lions there though. :wink:
Glad to hear you got your oven though.

32

Didn’t I have this in Vietnam one time? Part of a “cat cooked nine ways” meal. Don’t think they have lions there though. :wink:
Glad to hear you got your oven though.[/quote]

Had to read this three times before I got it.

You spelled loin wrong. :blush:

33

This sounds alot more difficult than it really is. The mixing takes all of about 15 minutes. The cooking takes about 1/2 hour. The eating takes . . . .

  1. Visit the local traditional market or any supermarket and pick up some yeast and flour of af any gluten content. I get my flour at the traditional market and get the middle gluten content but I’ve tried them all and really can’t tell much difference.
  2. Strip off rings and such and scrub up.
  3. Put 3 cups of warm (NOT HOT) water in a bowl with about 4-6 tablespoons of sugar and 2 1/2 teaspoons of yeast. Stir and let it set for a few minutes so that the yiest and sugar are disolved.
  4. Measure out 10 cups of flour into a large bowl. Put another 1 cup of flour near your mixing area as your going to need a bit more.
  5. Add 1/3 cup oil and about 2 tablespoons of salt to the bowl of flour
    mix the flour mixture with your hands
  6. Add about 1/3 of the water mixture to the bowl of flour and start mashing it around. Stress relief time. Add another 1/3 and mash it around. Add the rest of the water mixture and (yep) mash it around. It will still be a bit moist so keep adding a bit of the extra flour until it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the bowl.
  7. Wash the big bowl and grease it up with some butter, oil or shortning. Plop the big wad of dough into the bowl. Find a warm place to let it set for about an hour or until it puffs up to about 2 times it’s original size. Pull it out of the bowl and knead it around for just a moment until it goes back to it’s original size. Put it back into the greased bowl and let it puff up again. (about an hour)
  8. Sprinkle a little flour on a table or counter and put about 1/4 of the dough into a ball and roll it out so it’s about 3/8 inch thick. I use a wine bottle but any smooth round bottle or an actual rolling pin will work fine. Cut it into maple bar size pieces with a knife or use a small bowl, glass, etc to cut it into pieces that will fit about 4 to your pan of frying oil.
    Put a skillet of oil on the stove so it’s damn hot and the bread really bubbles away when you put some in the pan. Let it get golden on one side and flip to do the other side.
    The bread pieces will puff up much like donuts or maple bars.
    I like mine with honey butter.
    I also like to stuff them with a mixture of rice, spagetti sauce, olives and garlic for lunch the next day.
    Actual work time is less than an hour and you will have many nice size pices of bread suitable for stuffing with meats, cheeses, etc and it will last for days or until friends stop by.
34

Cook a cup of rice in your rice cooker. After it’s done, dump in a can of spaghetti sauce, a can of tomatos and a can of olives. Also add some fried ground pork and garlic. Just mix it up and enjoy. It is also good stuffed into the fried bread above.

35

Technically this violates the 1 pot rule - but this is quick and easy.

Fake “carbonara”

Take the ham that’s about to go bad in your fridge - chop and throw into frying pan with good olive oil. Fry a bit and then add minced garlic and minced, dried chilli peppers (dry flakes work too, adjut to the level of heat you want - key part is to fry in the oil to saturate it). While this is frying, grate some pecorino/parmisan cheese, chop some parsely. Fry until garlic begins to get crispy. Toss onto any kind of long pasta and serve with cheese and parsely sprinkled on top. Simple, but deceptively good.

If you only have frying pan, make a fritatta and instead of using the oven to top off (if you don’t have one), just flip it over. If you want to “fake” the crispy top, then use a blow-torch.

36

  1. cook some sliced beef in oil, cook until juices evaporate

  2. boil one beef boullion (sp.?) cube in one cup of water

  3. add one can Campbell’s cream of mushroom soup, beef boullion soup mix, one cup of water, 2 tbsp. worcestershire (sp.? - goddamn beer!) and one cup of water.

4.bring the above mixture to the boil and add one cup of corkscrew pasta, cook until done to desired flexibility.

takes about 25 minutes

makes about 4 servings if served with salad and bread

37

My chicken curry recipe:

Ingredients:

2 cans coconut milk or equivelant rehydrated
one package chicken breast
one package small chicken legs
2 potatoes (more if you don’t want to eat it with rice)
equal parts oil and butter
half a large onion, chopped
package of baby bamboo shoots soaked in water
one package curry paste or healthy scoop of curry paste

finely chop the onion and chunk up the chicken breast and potato

put about 1/2 cup of oil in medium heat pot (I use a small wok)
add chunk of butter until it’s melted and sizzling a little bit
add curry paste, work it a bit so it mixes up
add onion, let it sizzle a bit and mix up the curry paste. stir it quite a bit should be runny consitency.

add one can coco milk.
add all chicken and potato and bamboo shoots
mix it up untill it’s bubbling around the outsides.
add the other can coco milk, turn to lowest simmer setting, stir it up

walk away for an hour or two, come back to say hello and stir it up a bit.
some of the potatoes might burn to the bottom of the pot but as long as you don’t scrape the bottom while serving it’s ok

Shut it down when you think it’s finished. let it cool a bit.
You can eat it on rice or by itself. You can buy those bread things that they make dan bing from, flash fry them in a little oil and pretend they’re naan bread. Buy the rice from the vendor downstairs if you don’t feel like making any.

You could make this in a rice cooker as well if you know how to cook with a rice cooker.

Honestly, this is my specialty and it takes me about 10 minutes of total work. Cook slowly, no rush, and enjoy the results.

38

Curry

This is how I make my curries. I use the same basic method to start and then change it to suit what I want to make.

Put some oil in the pan and set it to a medium heat.
Add some finely chopped garlic and cumin seeds.
When you hear a cracking noise add a chopped onion.
Add tumeric, ginger and paprkika in equal quantities. (When I made it at home I would add garam masala too but I haven’t found that here and it seems to be ok without it)

Then fry this up until the onions are starting to brown.

Now you can use this as the basic starter then add chicken, beef, fish or whatever. Fry the meat with the onion mixture until it is sealed.

Then you can add chopped tomatoes or stock depending on what you want. If I want a creamy curry, I will add a cup of chicken stock then some vegetable and cook for 20 minutes or so then add some plain yoghurt or coconut milk/cream.

Adding some (not too much) cinammon to the initial mix works quite well. Bay leaves and cardamon pods are good too.

Also, everything in this recipe can be bought in carrefour.

39

just made a pretty cracking pasta fagioli “pastafazool” with “hua dou” white beans from the market, thought i’d share. tried with tomatoes which is not how my grandma made it but i liked it

big bunch of beans, 100nt worth, hope that’s exact enough, lol
extra-virgin olive oil
few cloves of garlic
two cups chopped onion
cup chopped celery
cup or 2 dry red wine
salt
2 tablespoons or so sugar
water
2 small cans whole tomatoes, stick to italian, “kagome” good
pound bag of shell/elbow pasta

cook beans in 2 inches or so of water, not too much as you will add juice to sauce. cook until juice gets nice and dark brown.

fry garlic, then onions, then celery in olive oil. add wine, cook until alcohol boils off, few minutes. chop up tomatoes and add, with salt and sugar. cook fifteen minutes, until oil starts to separate from tomatoes. add beans with juice, and can or two of water depending on how much juice is left from beans. bring to oil and simmer for an hour or so, add more water when cooking as needed, when finished it should be slightly soupy, but not watery.

cook up pasta, drain and add to sauce. elbows or shells are good as they will hold beans. serve with plenty of grated parmesan and red pepper. mangia!

40

I bring my beef boullion in from Denmark and I keep the cubes frozen for shelf life.

Can you get them in Taiwan?