T-bone! That's a picture of breakfast, not dinner! You are right. Allow me to explain ...
My favorite meal of the day is breakfast, so I know what I like for breakfast. As for lunch, my preferences vary, but I'm usually in a hurry to simply grab a bite and head back to work. It's not a big deal. But I do have a meal issue that is hard to solve.
The problem, friends, is dinner. I'm not sure when it became a problem. I don't remember ever going to bed hungry as a child, or as a single guy feeding myself, or even at any point in my dating life. However, when it comes down to feeding two adults in the same household every night, we find ourselves facing the recurring brick wall of WHAT ARE WE GOING TO HAVE FOR DINNER?
You may be living it or have heard of the woes that is cooking for two. It's not the cooking that is the problem, it's the deciding what we're going to cook. In advance. You know, before we are so hungry that we'd eat the soles off each other's shoes. Add to this our limited budget, and eating frequently at restaurants is not an option. (Besides the fact that "what are we going to have for dinner" becomes "where are we going to go?" in those cases). Eating out never proves healthy for our waistlines, either (unless BIGGER is considered healthy).
THIS IS THE PARTICIPATION PORTION OF OUR PROGRAM.
I ask you, quite simply: "What's for dinner?"
If you are inclined, you may leave a comment here or send an e-mail with your home-cooked dinner suggestions. Even better, if you have a favorite recipe or know the source of a recipe, please include that information as well. Even better than that, if your suggestion is something you are planning to have this week, cook it and take a photo of the finished product. Attach that photo to your e-mailed suggestion.
Let's make it a contest. Here are the rules, although others may be added if issues arise:
1. I prefer to learn only about dinners that you've eaten at some point in your life, even if it has been awhile. Anything you wouldn't touch with a 10-foot fork is something I won't want to pass my lips, either.
2. I would urge you to include a recipe with your suggestion, even a simplified one. The best recipes will be those with fewer rather than more ingredients, and containing things that are readily available at typical grocery stores.
3. Your suggestion need only be a main dish, although side-dish suggestions are welcome. Include complementing beverage choices if you like. And desserts. But the extras are not required.
4. Feel free to submit more than one suggestion.
5. If entries are hard to compare, I will categorize them, choosing the best from each category. Then one winner overall will be selected.
What are you playing for? This, like my dinner plans tonight, are a little vague. I will give the winner a choice between a few Texas-themed items (such as a jar of REAL Texas salsa, or a Texas T-shirt, etc.). That is something to be determined between the winner and moi. However, no matter how entries are submitted, I plan to share the best ones here and possibly in a homemade cookbook that will be offered exclusively to Texas T-Bone readers. Don't you feel special? Oh, and the contest ends next Monday, 10-20-03. Void where prohibited. No purchase necessary, and all that.
Have a great day, one that is full of discovery and wonder ... just like ol' Christopher Columbus had in 1492. I wonder what he had for dinner that day! Do I want to know?
Does it come with an invitation to dinner too?
-d
I'm the queen of the crock pot:
10 skinless, boneless chicken breast
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
1/8 teaspoon celery salt
1 teaspoon paprika
1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup (I use cream of chicken, kids and I don't like mushrooms!)
1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of celery soup
1/3 cup dry sherry
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Directions
1 Rinse the chicken breasts and pat dry. Season with the lemon juice, salt, pepper, celery salt and paprika to taste. Place in a slow cooker.
2 In a medium size bowl mix the mushroom and celery soups with the sherry/wine. Pour mixture over the chicken breasts and sprinkle with grated Parmesan cheese.
3 Cook on low setting for 8 to 10 hours, OR on high setting for 4 to 5 hours.
I serve it with noddles.
-d
What a great idea! I'll be on that one...
T-bone, I know you guys drink Soy Milk -- any lactose intolerance concerns -- or special dietary considerations?
:)
Anything we should particularly avoid?
Any ingredients are fine for cooking (we are able to use plain-ol' milk in recipes). Hit me with your best shot! I'm getting hungry here.
Sorry I can't be of much help, T-bone. As a single girl in NYC, my dinners are often either: (1) eaten sitting at a bar and accompanied by a Cosmopolitan; (2) picked out of a salad bar and put into a little styrofoam container; (3) ordered via late-night delivery to the office; or (4) come frozen out of a box. Terrible I know. This is why I run - to maintain my girlish figure.
But I would venture to guess that Columbus probably had hardtack/seabiscuit during his days on the Atlantic. Oranges, someone give us oranges!!
I call dibs on the first round of cookbooks.....my wife and I face similiar problems every eve.....seems like you stepped into my world. I'll dig around for a recipe or two.....it's been a while since we've done ANY cooking though!
ooh ooh! i'm soooo excited about this one! i compiled a book of favorite recipes that my mom (a fantastic cook) makes. look for an e-mail during the next few days with recipes that are inexpensive, easy and feed you for a while.
I don't have any recipes because I usually do not make anything from scratch. But, as a single guy, I usually do cook every night, but nothing difficult.
The crock pot is great b/c you can throw it on and leave it basically unattended for most of the day. I'm a big fan of make a baked ziti, a lasagna, fajitas, or something where there is sure to be leftovers and we can eat it during the week. If you make a batch of ziti, and some fajitas on sunday, that usually gets us through till thursday if you're good about eating left overs.
Man those waffles, eggs and bacon sure did look good.
Yeah, these food visuals are killing me. Why am I always hungry after reading your blog, T-bone??
PEPPER STEAK
1 1/2 pounds round steak (cut into little cubes)
1/8 teaspoon chopped garlic (or powder if its all you have)
1 small chopped onion
1 chopped bell pepper
2 cans tomato sauce
1 stick butter
1/4 cup cold water
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 Tablespoon corn starch
3 Tablespoons worstershire sauce.
Cooked Rice
In skillet melt butter, add beef and garlic, cook on medium heat until brown.
Add onions, peppers and tomato sauce, simmer 20 or so minutes til vegetables are tender.
Mix together water, corn starch, sugar salt and worstershire sauce add to meat and stir until it thickens slightly. Simmer 10 more minutes.
Serve over rice.
We usually have this with a salad and rolls.
I have the winner.
2 pounds of country-style pork ribs or pork butt roast.
1 bottle STUBBS "Spicy" BBQ sauce. TEXAS BBQ sauce! From Austin! Go! Buy it now!
At least 1 more bottle, total, combined, of ketchup, worcestershire, or remaining ends-of-bottles-of-bbq sauce. This is a "clean out the kitchen" recipe.
Hamburger buns.
1 large sweet onion, sliced into rings.
1) Put half of the onion rings in crock pot.
2) Throw meat in crock pot.
3) Dump sauce mixture into crock pot.
4) Cook on low for 8 hours.
5) Throw the rest of the onions in.
Splorp onto buns or eat with a fork. Serve with a small salad or corn on the cob or other BBQ-friendly vegetable.
We just had this last night.
BBQ. Mmmmmmmm. Also works with beef.
I am glad I did not discover your blog last monday, on Yom Kippur. Your pictures are making me hungry!
OK, here we go.
What you'll need - 2 1/2 lbs boneless chicken breasts, 1 package of dry Good Seasons Italian Dressing, 2 Table spoons of water, 2 Table spoons of oil and a Zip-lock bag.
Combine all ingredients in the zip-lock and let marinate in the refrigerator (you may want to "mix" them a little by hand). The longer you let them marinate, the better.
Broil for 6 minutes on each side.
Serve with whatever you like with chicken.
Yes, I know that's a lot to eat for two, but they are good as leftovers (to solve that quick bite to eat at lunch issue if you are willing to brown bag it).
It's easy, it's quick and it's yummy.
First of all, if you ever leave the PF, I will leave Grendel and we can have breakfast for dinner every single night.
Second... easy, cheap dinner:
Cut up an onion. Cut up a couple of zucchini or summer squash or combination of the two. Add some mushrooms if you want. Some garlic, maybe. Then toss in a can of crushed tomatoes and salt & pepper. Oregano? Sure. Maybe parsley. Whatever you like. Like crushed red papper maybe. Serve over pasta. You can switch it all around and use artichoke hearts or eggplant or whatever. The possibilities are ENDLESS.
PS. If I win, Grendel would appreciate some actual Texas salsa or picante. He misses it.
Oh yeah. I should have added that you saute the onion in a bit of oil and then add the veggies. I forgot that you have to sometimes tell people to cook things. Simmer the whole thing on medium heat.
And it doesn't take that long, and requires little watching. Great for last-minute meals. The Crock Pot thing is great, but requires PLANNING and knowing that you want something like 25 hours ahead of time. I'm just not that decisive. :)
As a single girl in the city, who only cooks for herself, i can tell you that i think pasta is by far the easiest thing to make.
pasta with tomatoes and mushrooms, dump some pesto sauce on the whole thing.
pasta with garlic. pasta with spinach and olive oil and feta chees on top.
pasta with beans.
or salads. big huge salads with avocado, croutons, tomatoes, cheese,peppers. whatever. easy stuff.
or my favorite-grilled cheese with tomato soup.
I'll put on my thinking and cooking cap though.
Recipes are forthcoming...
Just don't make fun of me! I tend to either make "comfort food" (especially on Sundays during Fall/Winter Football season) -- or else I eat like a college kid. Cooking for one can totally suck. And I sooooooooooo know what you mean when you're like, "what should we have for dinner?"
"I don't know, what do you feel like?"
...until you procrastinate and you have no patience - or blood sugar to wait long enough to buy ingredients, cook, etc.
By that time, you need food and you need it now!
I have this same issue -- just without the arguing... Hence the college kid diet. This is where one food item BECOMES the meal. A baked sweet potato? Soup? A couple of hard boiled eggs? Cereal mixed with soy yogurt (that's two, but in one bowl - and FAST)... Bowl of fresh or nuked veggies? Hummus and crackers?
This is typical weekday fare... but I'll find some wknd (Sunday Football) recipes for you...
T-Bone, what a great idea! You are going to need all the help you can get as the Cutlet grows up. It's really not such a big deal to feed two grown-ups, but when there's a kid waiting to be fed all hell breaks loose :)
If you love breakfast, make breakfast for dinner. Really, there is no rule that you can't have pancake and eggs for dinner. I have a friend who, in a very Seinfeld way, likes cereal and milk for every meal. In fact, there are many places in the world that breakfast and dinner are the same sorts of light foods and lunch is the big hot meal with meat. Be a rebel and eat what you like.
matt and i eat meat for dinner...meat or eggs. we do all protein at night...sounds boring...but we just started cutting out carbs at night and we love it...helps you wake up a lean mean fightin' machine! so it's either beef, chicken, or pork for dinner. takes all of the "what in the hell are we gonna cook" out of our evenings.
I have this great recipe for an Asian style flank steak that uses ramen noodles. It's from weight watchers and it is sooo good and easy. Unfortunately, I can't find it :s
I am all for Homemade Gourmet. They make my life soooo easy! They have some cool stuff to make that takes only a little while.
Also, I am not sure if you have a Central Market near you, but they rock, too. (Ok, just looked... there are some in FW) They have already prepared foods for sale. They have this dinner for 2 for $12.99 that KICKS ASS!
http://www.centralmarket.com/cm/cmDinnerFor2.jsp
I have a TON of coupons for $5 off, so you and your wife could have dinner already made for $4/each! Let me know... I can throw some in the mail for you tomorrow.
dude. sloppy joes. anyone can make manwich and its cheap as dirt and it seems like youre doing something kind of fun.
tacos same thing.
Since winter is just about to start, I'll mention soups.
Vegetable soups - potato, carrot and leek soup, lentil soup, curried lentil soup with apple.
Chicken broth soup, to keep you warm on crisp days.
Goulash soup or lamb meat soup (traditional Icelandic fare, which unfortunately I do not know how to make, what with leaving all the cooking up to my husband).
When it comes to food, it doesn't take much to keep me happy, as long as it is made carefully and with love. A bowl of steaming soup and a piece of bread sounds just wonderful.
I'm the Queen of quick dinners and the crock pot!!! Yesterday I put a roast in the crock pot with Mesquite marinate and let it cook all day on low ~ then I fixed French Style Green beans mixed with Roasted Garlic/basil/onion and diced tomatoes ~ my famous potatoes ~ instant potatoes *follow directions on the box* - once they are finished mix in sour cream, sharp chedder shredded cheese, bacon bits and finely chopped chives. Mix thourghly and then place in a backing dish. Top with bacon bits, cheese, and chives and place in oven at 350 until the cheese has melted. Homemade sour dough garlic bread *gotta love those bread makers* and walah dinner was done. I would have taken a photo, however, I didn't read this until today. Another quick suggstion on dinners is pork chops smoothered with Cream of Mushroom soup. Place pork chops in a baking pan with cover *I have one of those small dutch ovens I think they are called*, season the pork chops with an all season salt, pour Cream of Mushroom soup *one or two cans depending on how many chops you are cooking*, add a litle bit of water, place in the oven at 350 for about an hour. Keep an eye on them though, because you'll have to add water once in awhile and each over cooks quicker or slower than others. Those are my suggestions. Hope it made sense.
Spaghettio's and cheese pizza are my favs.
I like black bean tacos. Just use black beans instead of beef. Dont forget to add salsa to the beans.
If you want fast and easy - from the wise kitchen of my even wiser mother:
3 ingredients. Can be more if you need further protein or veggies.
Boil spinach pasta of any variety (see, this is pretty flexible.) Defrost a frozen spinach souffle (I use one from Stouffers, I'm not ashamed to say.) Mix the two together after cooked, in an over-safe pot. Add a little parmesean cheese, especially to the top, and broil for long enough to have a nice crispy top layer.
(Add chicken, sausage, vegetables if you ever choose. Sometimes I put chicken sausages on the George Foreman and mix them in in slices. Sometimes I eat it without anything additional.) Enjoy!
You could live off of this chicken salad.
Take a whole bunch of chicken breasts and boil them. Like a pounds worth. If you wanna get fancy, then marinate them and grill them, but boiling works almost as well. After they're done boiling, (you can just tell), set them aside and start chopping up whatever you have in the house. Then shred the chicken with your hand. Don't chop it. It will be better if you just tear it apart into tiny shreds. I suppose you could throw in anything but these things are essential:
1 red onion finely chopped
Lots of celery, chopped up
1 red pepper finely chopped (this cannot be substituted for any other color)
Lots of green onions
About 1/3 of a cup of TOASTED slivered almonds. If you don't toast them, it will be gross, and if you don't include this ingredient, the whole recipe is for naught
Celery seed, salt and pepper. Go overboard with these.
Hellmans/BestFoods mayonaisse, depending on how far East or West you live. It's the same thing. You CANNOT use any other mayonaisse because all others are sick.
Sometimes I kick in a little powdered garlic, but people sometimes complain about this.
If you follow this, you're gonna have the best chicken salad imaginable. I make it at least once a week and everyone always freaks out.
Don't put grapes in it, even if you're encouraged to, because that's the equivalent of using Miracle Whip or something else vile. Walnuts will take the place of almonds but nothing will take the place of Hellman's.
I call this Company Chicken, but I've heard it referred to as several different things.
You'll need:
boneless, skinless chicken breasts
bacon
Fat-free cans of Cream of Mushroom soup, Cream of Chicken soup, and low-fat sour cream (I hate the fat-free stuff).
1 jar dried beef (I think it's by Hormel)
I remove the fat from the chicken, but that's up to you. Fold the chicken breast in half, wrap with piece of bacon, and poke toothpick through to keep it folded.
The sauce depends on the number of chicken breasts. I usually use 2 cans of soup each (4 total) to a pint of sour cream for 6 breasts. Combine soup and sour cream. Mix to taste. I like mine a bit tart so I about half a pint of sour cream. I can't give you exact amounts because it's never the same twice.
Layer the bottom of a baking dish with the dried beef. Place chicken on top and pour sauce over the chicken. I usually try and cover the chicken. Bake at 375 or 400 till done. I think it takes 30 or 45 minutes.
You can serve it with rice or egg noodles.
I LOVE this stuff.
Howard
i took a photo of everything i ate one day last month.
--- snip ---
my favourite [english spelling] meal of all time is Cheese and Potato Pie.
Take a few potatoes
peel them nicely.
boil in a pan until cooked.
remove from water and mash with a masher (mash lovingly to preseve the flava [ghetto spelling])
grate some cheese on to it.
stir it about a bit.
put it in a baking tray
put a little more cheese on top.
grill for a few minutes until it's crusty.
eat with loads of ketchup.
--- snip ---
danger: i'm now allergic to milk so can't eat cheese. probably over did it when i was younger !
Does manwich sloppy joe sauce have a lot of carbs????