Home Cooking

It’s Not Impossible, But It Does Take Some Practice…


For those of my readers that haven’t been hanging around this Blog for any length of time, I’m going to take this opportunity to mention that, besides being an engineer (and architect and artist and writer and scholar and musician and lover and history buff and all around self-proclaimed good guy), I also really love to cook.

So much so, I have started writing a separate cooking blog called The Redneck Gourmet to document my cooking adventures,

Go check it out when you have the time, if you will.

I think that I am getting pretty good at it (succumbing to yet another a brief moment of self edification here)…cooking, that is. The writing about cooking part of my resume probably still needs some work yet.

It hasn’t always been that way with regard to my interest in cooking, however, but smack dab in the middle of my life, after I got divorced in my mid thirties, I decided to seriously learn how to work my way around something besides the Barbeque grill—an avocation that many, if not most, men are afraid to do. As a result, I started hanging out in the kitchen doing something besides eating peanut butter sandwiches off of a paper towel while leaning over the sink.

I’ve actually managed to competently take over the kitchen in my domicile. My girlfriend Pat doesn’t seem to mind, however.

To my surprise, I figured out that cooking is really just simple chemistry like I learned at Georgia Tech—surrounded by some fancy candles, stainless pots and pans, a few pieces of china or stoneware, and perhaps some vases full of flowers if you want to demonstrate a little flare.

The cool thing about the chemistry of cooking is that it is so forgiving (within certain limits) and unlike titrating an acid/base solution or worrying about how many “moles” of sodium you have in your Pyrex glass beaker, with cooking you can use your eyeballs and taste buds as your litmus paper and you do most of your work without wearing safety glasses.

At least that is the way MY cooking goes…there might be a few people out there that have a different experience and opinion on this topic.

Regarding cooking safety, I still do have a tendency to want to cook half naked—from the waist up that is, and in the process I’ve learned first hand an intimate knowledge of how to control the temperature of a skillet in order to prevent spattering my belly and chest with hot grease while frying bacon in the morning.

Don’t worry, when I have guests in the house I elect to wear a shirt to cover my hairy chest and possibly a baseball cap to cover my ever balding head.

“Hairless” food is always a good motto, and my lovely Mother just made me a nice apron as a Christmas gift this year so that I wouldn’t spoil my shirts and pants if and when I happen to allow a sauce to get too hot or commit some other culinary “boo-boo” while preparing my guests’ dinner.

Actually, I’ve found that you can meet some really interesting people when you know how to cook. Many people are eager to interact with you and help you as you hone and develop your cooking skills.

I try not to eat crappy junk foods in my middle age, so cooking definitely helps my dietary issues. No chips, no Twinkies, no candy (OK, ok maybe some Godiva chocolate), and few cookies. I prefer instead to torture myself cooking more wholesome foods in theory, from scratch, but still I elect to use bacon grease and gobs of real butter in my concoctions.

You know what?

In the end , when everything is said and done, I will still be dead Dead DEAD like the next Vegan that sits around eating Tofu and soy burgers all day, so why deny myself of the most important ingredient in food...

Flavor!

I’ve also learned that you can live without a microwave oven—the solution being something called aluminum foil, a 250 degree oven, and a bit of patience. I’d rather reserve the counter space in our small condo kitchen for other uses than having a big white plastic box sitting around doing nothing 23-3/4 hours each day. Fast cooking is great, but we can’t afford the real estate right now (I do have a double oven though…)

Any whoooooooo…

What started this rambling was when I was limping around the Internet this evening and looked up a recipe for Pimento and Cheese.

Here are the recommended ingredients to make your own:

16 oz. pkg. Kraft Deluxe American Cheese (grated)
4 oz. jar pimento
2 eggs
1 tbsp. mustard
1 tsp. vinegar
1 tbsp. mayonnaise

GREAT...Seems simple enough to me, how about you?

The purpose of this epic Internet Google expedition was that I happen to love a good Pimento and Cheese sandwich every now and then and I thought that I might make my own spread from scratch for a change here at home.

Nothing fancy, just two pieces of bread and some Pimento and Cheese spread.

But I couldn’t leave things that simple, Nooooo Sirrrrrr, not MEEEE, so I wandered into my kitchen to see what I had been eating out of a plastic tub in the fridge.

I think I might be sick.

Take a gander at this list of ingredients off of a tub of store-bought “Pimentoy and Cheesy” crap that I had in my house this morning:

American Cheese Imitation (water, partially hydrogenated soybean oil, Cassen, whey [milk], Sodium phosphate,Modified corn starch,Sodium citrate, Salt, Artificial flavors, Lactic acid, Sorbic Acid [preservative], Adipic acid, Artificial Colors, Calcium Phosphate, Sodium Aluminum Palminate, Riboflavin,Vitamin B-12)

Salad Dressing (soybean oil, water, corn syrup, vinegar, egg yolks, modified corn starch, sugar, salt, spice, lemon juice concentrate, oleoresin, Paprika.

Bell Pepper (Water, bell pepper, citric acid)

Potassium Sorbate and Sodium Benzoate to protect flavor

Anmatto Color

Salt

I'm going to get my favorite large wooden spoon and go gag myself now...