Do you like to cook?

I love it. But I didn’t always. When Cameron and I first got married, I couldn’t cook ANYthing. Truly. If he didn’t make me breakfast, I probably had a Lunchable and a Coke, or I’d grab a bagel breakfast sandwich on my walk to work. Once Alexander was born, and he started eating solids, I realized that if I wanted him to eat better, I needed to start trying to cook better.

I started slowly, just one or two recipes per week. Much of the time, I failed. But I kept at it. Sometimes I made things up; sometimes I followed a recipe. Eventually, I started getting a little better. I didn’t enjoy it for a while though, not until I was more confident with it.

Fast forward and now, I cook most days, at least twice a day, but there are periods each year when I just don’t enjoy it. When that happens, I find that some sort of cooking challenge really helps. I try a new recipe, a new cuisine, a random ingredient I’ve never had, something like that. And just that little change-up sparks my enjoyment again! (See the BINGO card at the end)

Here’s what I’ve decided to put in this email (with the possibility of a part 2 down the road):

• My favorite ingredients

• My go-to websites and social media pages for recipes and inspiration

• My favorite kitchen tools

• Tips and tricks I’ve learned over the last 9-10 years

• Cooking BINGO

I hope you find this useful, whether you like to cook or not!! 🥰

My favorite ingredients

CHICKEN

We eat chicken several times a week. Cameron is watching his cholesterol, so we’ve cut back on red meat and pork. We try to eat fish once a week, chicken 2-3 times, beef once or twice, and then the other days are random.

Chicken thighs are hard to overcook, so they’re a great one if you’re not familiar with cooking chicken. My favorite skin-on chicken thigh recipe is Cracklin’ Chicken from NomNomPaleo. My favorite boneless, skinless chicken thigh recipe is Chicken Cabbage Soup!

Chicken drumsticks are also hard to mess up. I like to toss these in a mix of seasonings plus a little oil then cook them in the oven at 350F for 45-60 minutes. The longer you do them, the crispier the skin gets!

Chicken breasts are the thing we do the most, though. I will cut them along the middle (you can also pound them to make them thinner) then pan fry them. You can also cut them into bites to make chicken nuggets. To do that, there are two* ways…

Option 1:

1. Toss the chicken in salt, pepper, and a little flour**.

2. Dip in 2 beaten eggs mixed with a little water or milk.

3. Coat with breadcrumbs**.

4. Heat a little oil in a heavy skillet and pan fry for a few minutes per side. I don’t usually deep fry because it uses so much oil, but that’s up to you!

Option 2:

1. Toss the chicken in salt, pepper, a little flour**, 2 eggs, a little milk, and mix that all together well.

2. Coat with breadcrumbs** (or skip this for a softer “crust”).

3. Heat oil in a skillet and pan fry for a few minutes per side!

*There are 2 other options that I don’t do, which is why I didn’t mention them! You can oven-fry chicken as well. And you can air-fry, but we do not have an air fryer anymore.
**You can use almond flour in place of the flour and breadcrumbs.

Other chicken breast ideas are Chicken Parmesan, Chicken Cordon Bleu, Grilled Chicken with Vegetables, Chicken Pot Pie, Butter Chicken (my fav!!), and so many more.

POTATOES

I use potatoes a lot. I have them with breakfast a few days a week! My favorite way to do this is peel (or not) and chop them then cook them in butter and a little bacon fat on the stove. It takes 20-25 minutes but they get crispy outside and soft inside. Delicious.

I like to make mashed potatoes a lot too! I steam mine, which is quicker than boiling or baking. Then once fork tender, I mash them with my potato masher (I’ve seen people use a pastry blender and even a hand mixer). Once they’re squished but still a little lumpy, I add a good bit of butter, plus some milk or heavy cream, plus salt and pepper and sometimes garlic and/or Parmesan. I mix that in by hand (not with the masher, just with a big spoon) until it’s creamy!

You can make mashed potatoes in the Instant Pot too. Just add your chopped potatoes in a steam basket (here’s one like mine) plus the minimum amount of water (some machines are ½ cup, some are 1 cup). Set it to 10 minutes manual and do a quick release when that’s done. Then finish them the same way I mentioned above!

SWEET POTATOES

The only way I ate sweet potatoes (until I was an adult) was mixed with brown sugar and covered in marshmallows. Then my friend/roommate in NYC introduced me to this family “recipe” of hers:

1. Bake some sweet potatoes

2. Mash some butter into them

3. Top with tuna salad

4. Add corn

5. Add shredded cheese

It sounds odd, but it’s delicious!! The warm, buttery sweet potato, the salty tuna, the crunchy sweet corn, the salty cheese. It’s just a lot going on, and it works (at least my family loves it!).

Another way I like sweet potatoes is in this breakfast hash.

1. Peel and chop 1-2 sweet potatoes, 2-3 carrots, 1 apple, and 1 link sausage (we love Aidell’s Chicken Apple Sausage for this; bacon also works well, but I would cook it separately and add it at the end). You can also just do the sweet potato, carrot, and apple.

2. Saute the sweet potato and carrot together for about 15 minutes until it’s almost done. I use butter, but bacon fat or a neutral oil would work fine.

3. Add the sausage and apple and cook further until the apple is tender (time depends on the type of apple).

4. Season with salt and pepper.

Baked sweet potatoes are great in a few other ways, besides just eaten as is.

• Spicy Tuna Cakes

• Sweet Potato Breakfast Bowl

My go-to websites and social media pages

There are a few folks I trust when it comes to recipes. I mean, if you Google “chocolate cake” there are literally 834 million results. 😅 It helps to have a few specific websites that you can rely on for quality, consistent recipes. I don’t often use social media for recipes, but I like the ease of going to a certain social media page then just scrolling the images to find what I’m in the mood for.

Here are my favorites for different categories!

• sweet treats - Sally’s Baking Addiction (her Instagram)

• Paleo - NomNomPaleo (her IG) or PaleOMG (her IG)

• Paleo treats - Real Food with Jessica (her IG)

• everything! - Cafe Delites (her IG)

• feeling uninspired? - Half Baked Harvest (her IG) or Fit Men Cook (his IG)

• doing a whole30 - Whole30Recipes

• baked goods - Broma Bakery (her IG)

There are a lot more, I’m sure, but those are the ones coming to mind today!

My favorite kitchen tools

If you’ve followed me on IG long, you’ve probably seen the same items pop up over and over. There are also a few I don’t use often, but they come in VERY handy sometimes. Any Amazon links are affiliate links!

• Lodge brand cast iron skillets

• Rada spatula (theeee best)

• Meat thermometer (I just think it’s good to have one, not a specific one!)

• Candy thermometer

• Bamboo cutting board

• Chef knife (mine is a little expensive, but they don’t have to be! Get a good sharpener, and that makes a big difference.)

• Mesh sieve

• ¼ cup measuring cup! For whatever reason, this particular size is my favorite for more than just measuring. I use it for scooping tuna cakes to be even sizes. I use it for scooping and pouring gravy. I just think it’s the best size of all my measuring cups.

• Kitchen scale

• Big plastic bowl with handle

• 2- or 4-cup measuring cup 

• Kitchen tweezers! These have come in handy more than I expected. I use them a hundred times more than regular tongs.

• Dutch oven

• Instant Pot - I have the IP-LUX, but I don’t see my exact one on Amazon anymore!

There are other things I use a lot, like baking sheets, wire cooling racks, and casserole dishes, but they’re nothing special. I don’t have any I just LOVE, you know?

Tips and tricks

I mentioned some in the last email, but here are some more!

1. You can prep most veggies ahead of time without issues. For example, I will sometimes peel and chop my potatoes for breakfast and simply store them in water to keep them from browning - just change the water every day or two. Other vegetables don’t even need to be in water as long as you plan to use them in a few days (up to 1-1.5 weeks!).

2. When I first started cooking, I’d ask my friend and coworker Katy for suggestions. She always brought leftovers for lunch, and they always looked so good. She kept it simple: usually fish with a variety of roasted vegetables or just roasted vegetables with lentils or rice. And from her, I learned that you can roast most vegetables the same way: chop them, toss them in a little oil and salt and pepper, then roast them at 400F. The timing depends on the food as well as how big you chopped them, but 30 minutes typically works! Start at 20 and work up from there.

3. Add a pinch of salt to your sweet baked goods.

4. Add a pinch of sugar to your savory sauces.

5. Always cook extra chicken and extra rice! I use leftover chicken for so many things, and day-old rice is perfect for making fried rice!

6. If you don’t have all the ingredients for a recipe, you can almost always find a substitution (or omit the ingredient!). Of course, if you’re making chicken cabbage soup, but you’ve got no chicken or cabbage, perhaps save that recipe for another day.

7. When using a chef’s knife, give yourself a flat surface on the food. If it’s something that can roll around like a potato, slowly cut off one small slice and then turn the potato so that the flat side is now touching your cutting board. That way it won’t roll around while you’re trying to cut!

8. If you find that your cutting board is slipping and moving, put a damp, thin rag (or damp paper towel) under it.

9. Make your plate look pretty if you can! We eat with our eyes first, so even if it’s just for you, try to make a nice presentation. It’s a tiny little way to treat yourself, no matter what the food is!

10. USE SAUCES. You can take a plain ole chicken breast, but when you add gravy, or marinara, or mayochup (that’s mayo + ketchup), or BBQ sauce… you’ve got all these different meals!

Remember factorials from Math? Like, 5! is 5 × 4 × 3 × 2 × 1? And let’s say you want to figure out how many outfits you can make from 4 shirts, 2 pairs of pants, and 3 pairs of shoes - you’d multiply 4 × 2 × 3, which gives you 24 different possible outfits.

Okay, with cooking, let’s say there are 3 ways to prepare chicken (fried, grilled, roasted) and 3 ways to make potatoes (fried, mashed, baked). That gives you 9 different meals for chicken and potatoes. Now, add 5 different sauce options, and you’ve got 45 different meals! Of course there are exceptions, but you get my point, I hope! 🥰

Cooking BINGO!

I made up this BINGO board for you to try this week.

If you want, give yourself a reward for hitting a BINGO and then a different reward for clearing the whole board!

There are two versions. There’s no difference in the text, just appearance. If you’d like a PDF instead of the JPG, just reply to this, and I’ll send those to you.

If you liked this cooking email, let me know! I’ll make a part 2 if there’s enough interest.❤️

Shoutouts!

Thank you to Monica, who sent a birthday gift to Alexander! Thank you to Emma and someone for buying me a coffee!

That's it for this week. Have a good one!❤️ Bethany

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