Tell us what you have cooked lately (that's interesting)

That’s just silly. I’ll eat savory pies. I just won’t eat minced meat.

Make it yourself and create to taste.

Also, I often add milk to anything store bought because it’s just too thick and strong for me.

What if I told you that where I come from, we put cheddar cheese on Apple Pie?

I think alcohol is a great way to ruin good egg nog, personally.

Egg Nog is okay. In my family it’s mostly a vehicle for alcohol at Christmas. My grandma made it herself, but now we get the crappy store bought. I agree with @Nesrie, it’s too strong and needs to be thinned out some.

But pork rinds I have a soft spot for. I’m southern. It’s like saying, “do you like the skin on your fried chicken?” Hell yes I do. And I like pork skin too, deep fried until crispy but airy.

It’s pretty tasty with a decent dip. I’ve had it before with an Asian dipping sauce and it was the bomb

To each his own I guess.

I’m all over savory pies and turnovers though.

This sounded weird the first time I heard it, but then I considered that I’ve eaten apples with cheese since I was a kid, so I could see it working.

I have yet to try it though.

How do you put the cheese on the pie? Is it supposed to melt?

That’s like saying eggs are a great way to ruin a good omelette. Virgin eggnog is a sickly, child-friendly imitation of the original beverage.

I’ve seen it two ways. One is to shred the cheese and bake it into the pie crust. The other is to put a slice of cheese on the slice of pie and stick that under the broiler for just a few seconds (just enough to melt it, but not necessarily enough to brown it).

A bunch of my friends here in NC are New England transplants, and they recently all went nuts on FB about how good this was. Consider me intrigued (apples with cheese is a solid combo–e.g., a turkey sandwich with swiss and green apple, plus a little pesto)!

Soooo freakin’ good. I love me some good pork rinds, no lie. They’re a great road snack, too. Moderate amount of protein, plus no carbs to make you sleepy down the road. My gf and I split a bag of 'em every time we drive home to TN.

Yes, the girl who won’t touch tuna steaks because they look “too meaty” fuckin’ chows down on some deep fried pork skins. You win some, you lose some!

As a child I preferred my eggnog cut with plain milk. As an adult I switched to bourbon. Definitely an upgrade.

I just made some beef vegetable stew, and nailed it.

Tonight, on not-terribly-appetizing theater:

“Chicken Chasni,” a BIR specialty, featuring a fairly standard onion-garlic-ginger base, with loads of oil, but only turmeric and cumin added as spices, alongside tomatoes. The resulting paste gets blended up with a mixture of sweet mango chutney, spicy mint chutney, ketchup, cilantro, and chicken stock, then poured back into the pan, where chicken meat is added in. Finish with the juice of 1-2 limes and an alarming-sized portion of heavy cream.

In my case, to spice it up a little, I did the chicken tikka style, marinating in yogurt, spices, and lime, then roasting it under the broiler till just starting to blacken at the tips. The yogurty coating enhances the natural tanginess of the dish nicely, and complements the creaminess, too, really, so I think it’s a great fit.

End result is a very rich dish that doesn’t feel overwhelming thanks to its inherent sour-sweet notes. About the furthest thing from authentic Indian cuisine you could manage (that’ll be tomorrow night, thank you please), but it’s fuckin’ delicious as shit.

Served over spiced brown basmati rice, with a frozen paratha on the side. Yummo!


edit: @Timex, the stew looks lovely! Looks like some greens in there? Would love to know what all it is.

I’d hit it.

The stew spice base is mainly a berebere core, with some zataar, and some of those knorr vegetable stock packets that are in the little plastic mini tubs. (Which, by the way, are extremely good things to keep in the pantry for this kind of thing. They have a nice deep tomatoey flavor. Similar to tomato paste, with some other tones). Also salt, pepper, garlic.

I carmelized some onions, then added the spices, carrots, celery, garlic, in the pot of my pressure cooker. Added some Chuck roast, and potatoes. Cooked for around 45 minutes.

Then, in my cast iron pot, I browned some mushrooms, then made a roux in there. Added a bunch of kale (which is the green stuff you see), and a cup of a wild rice. Oh, and a can of corn, because as I’ve explained, I love corn.

Added the contents of the pressure cooker to the pot, a bit of extra water. Cooked for another 45 minutes like that on a low simmer, and there you have it.

The end result of the cooking with the pressure cooker and then in the pot is that the meat is extremely tender, with the connective tissue (which in Chuck, is quite a bit) has totally turned into gelatin, and melts in your mouth. But the meat still is holding itself together, and hasn’t disintegrated into loose fibers. The wild rice adds some different texture, as it’s chewy.

Lousy analogy, since you need eggs to make an omelette. I should add that egg nog is also a good way to ruin any perfectly good spirit of your choice.

Johnny Marzetti
from Cook’s Country Best Lost Suppers

You cook a package of rotini in a big pot while working together a sauce in a skillet that starts with onion, green pepper and celery, adds in garlic, oregano and red pepper flakes, then ground beef and italian sausage (removed from the skin), then finally canned tomato sauce and diced tomatoes. Stick the rotini in a 13x9 baking pan, cover with a cup of Italian cheese blend, pour the sauce over it, top with another cup of Italian cheese blend, then cover with tinfoil, stick on a tinfoil lined rimmed baking sheet (to catch any spillover), and bake at 350, first covered for 45, then uncovered for 10. It’s now cooling on my stovetop as we speak, and will be in my gullet as soon as it’s safe.

Please feel free to come to NC while it’s cooling and also put it in my mouth.

Sounds great, except for the celery. Celery is a blight that should be annihilated from the face of the Earth.

It uses two ribs worth. It’d be pretty easy to just leave out.

I’ve always loved baked pasta dishes like that.

Me too. If only they were better for me.