Tonight's cooking: C- (RL)

[thistlechaser]

When I bought Personal Trainer: Cooking, I decided to try to make one meal a week. Then if I liked that meal and it worked out well, I could repeat it again while trying a new meal for the week. Soon enough I'd be able to cook all my dinners!

I missed doing last week's meal because my supermarket didn't have items I needed to make it (and I hadn't written down a backup meal). So this week was the first week, and I picked something that seemed easy enough: Roasted Chicken with Herbs. Seemed simple! Chicken + two herbs and garlic, cooked in a pan.

It was only once I got started that things seemed odd. You're not supposed to adjust a recipe until you can do it right as-is, and it never goes well when I start playing with things, so I followed it as exactly as I could even though it sounded odd. Six tablespoons of oil in the pan? Gah, that can't be good for you... but I did it. Handled raw chicken (ewwww), crushed garlic, tried to figure out how much a "sprig" of herb was, tossed it all in the pan. Then we got to the bigger issue: It said cook for 20 minutes. I was using the cut of chicken it said (chicken breast, not boneless), and these things were huge/thick. How the heck was it going to cook through in 20 minutes? Even though I think it's broken, I kept checking with my meat thermometer. Eventually, when it reached 50 minutes of cooking time, it seemed to be at the right temp, so I took it out.

Unfortunately it didn't taste very good. Not bad, just not too good. I suspect I don't like rosemary or sage, because it had some odd flavor I didn't really like. Mostly it was just generally tasteless though. It was semi-okay when I put a lot of salt on it (though I'd rather not do that). Positive thing: It sure was moist chicken!

Tonight's effort gets a C- instead of a D because it hasn't yet made me sick. (Yay maybe I got it cooked through!) Any food I cook that I can eat and doesn't make me sick gets a passing grade!

Does anyone know if veal is still a bad meat to eat? Cruel/evil/lock poor baby cows in a cage they can't move in? I was thinking about making Wiener Schnitzel next, looks easy enough, but it's made with veal.

Comments

[pure-trance.livejournal.com]

Isn't Wiener Schnitzel made with pork usually x_X? I thought that's what Wiener meant.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I wasn't sure, so I googled it! Wiki says (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiener_Schnitzel) "a traditional Austrian dish and popular part of Viennese and Austrian cuisine, consisting of a thin slice of veal coated in breadcrumbs and fried. " So I guess veal it is!

[pure-trance.livejournal.com]

I guess the recipe site I saw it on did a variation xD;;

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I'd think pork would be good, too! :)

[wanderingscribe.livejournal.com]

Sorry your chicken didn't come out as planned, but you've given me a great idea to try out. Chicken paillard stuffed with herbs and garlic!

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yay! I hope it comes out well! :D

[tamd.livejournal.com]

To me, garlic, sage and rosemary is very dominant, so a little goes a long way. Perhaps just a couple sprigs of thyme would do more.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

*snugs* Next time I'll try that!

[piratewiccy.livejournal.com]

a sprig is one stem, or stick of the herb. Rosemary and Sage and garlic are all very strong flavors and can over power chicken. If you want to do chicken and add alittle flavor but not over power it, try lemon and a little butter and a sprig of rosemary. The flavors balance together nicely and shouldn't seem too strong for you.
As for Veal...in the states Cows are killed like a month or so before they reach a year old as to prevent mad cow desease. So, pretty much the Veal you get over here is from the same cows you eat in hamburgers and steaks. In other countries though, the cows are calves and you might have an issue eating them if you have an issue eating baby anything.
Also, with the way meat is today, you really can't go by the cooking time in a recipe anymore. Chicken breast lately are bigger than Pamela Anderson's breast and will take much longer to cook than chicken did a few years ago. You did the right thing by checking the meats temp.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's not so much that they're baby animals, it's just that last I heard (probably PETA-caused c.c ) about veal was that they kept a calf in a tight little stall where they couldn't move or turn around, in the dark, force fed milk until they're sick (to keep... um... something about improving the meat). So long as that's not the case, I'm fine with it.

Chicken breast lately are bigger than Pamela Anderson's breast

Ha ha! But yes, I couldn't believe how big these things were. Didn't seem like they could come from chickens!

[ani-mama.livejournal.com]

You should see how big those "meat" chickens get...ours were free range(no steroids, plenty of exercise) and did not get as big as the store ones, but it is not unheard of for them to get to 40 pounds. My fat cat is 15 pounds.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

A 40 pound chicken? My god, that's crazy. That's bigger than lots of dogs! Wow...

[ani-mama.livejournal.com]

The chickens are bred to be large, then pumped up with steroids to boot. Most supermarket birds are Cornish Crosses, and they can literally get too big to move around on their own.

[piratewiccy.livejournal.com]

the cows are confined but are not forced fed. They are limited movement as to not develope much muscle mass.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I guess maybe I'll try it! :D

[hamburger.livejournal.com]

When did you start eating meat again? I DIDN'T GET THAT IN MY THISTLE NEWSLETTER. :|

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

*laughs* A couple months back. I never made a post about it because I didn't want to get random "lol i new u wuld go bak" and crap like that.

Know what did it? Bacon! Bacon! I decided a life without bacon was a life not worth living. :P

[hamburger.livejournal.com]

Hahaha! I always said of all the meat I eat, it's bacon that would make it hardest to be a vegetarian.

Hey, you had a good long run though. It was like... holy crap 6 or 7 years? Have I really known you that long? Good golly.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I always round to 8 when telling people how long it was, but it might have been closer to 7.

And we've known each other way more than that! I'd guess like... um... more than 10 years?

[hamburger.livejournal.com]

Not quite that long. I think since 2000 at the earliest?

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Um, maybe! Sometime during PokeMUSH time, whenever that was. :P

[ani-mama.livejournal.com]

Yay for learning how to cook anyway! It is a useful skill to have. Your grading system scares me though. ;p

50 minutes to cook a chicken breast seem really long. That must have been a huge chunk of meat! Next time you might try cutting the meat into smaller pieces.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I wish I had learned earlier... it's nice to be able to make enough that you can have leftovers as the next meal. I ate more chicken for dinner tonight! Yay easy and cheap!

Doesn't 50 minutes seem like a long time? They were really big though. I'd say at the widest part it was a little thicker than my fisted hand.

I thought about cutting it, but ewww touching raw chicken more than I had to. :P

[voidmagus.livejournal.com]

Heh. One of my favorite recipes is chicken&40cloves. 40 cloves of garlic. And the garlic flavor isn't overpowering. But I suspect this to be because of the black magic involved in the cooking. Skillet-sear chicken breasts, dump in 40 (or as many as you have the patience to peel) cloves of garlic, then as much olive oil as comes half-way up the chicken, and add a good bit of thyme. Cover and bake. Sometime during the baking, magic happens. The resulting chicken is delicious, and the cloves of garlic change from being pungent (and garlicky) to sweet (and garlicky), and become spreadable as warm butter. Best garlic toast in existence. Also, all that extra olive oil is now garlic infused. Cook with anytime you want a more subtle garlic flavor.

Have had multiple girlfriends who still harass me, and offered to trade sex for the recipe. I require no such bargain, but keep the recipe from them because I hold grudges.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, yeah. I forgot about that! I first heard about it back when I wasn't eating meat and it sounded like an interesting idea. Maybe I'll give it a try! :D