Ask HN: Hackers who cook

>> 5) I love the good eats series, some nice hacks in there. Get a cast iron pan and never wash it. Best thing to cook meat with.

This.

I always make t-bone/porterhouse steaks just like he does in that first episode, and they always come out fantastic. That said, it always smokes the house up something fierce.

There's probably a good half centimeter of carbon on my skillet. :)

One I actually have in my crock pot right this very minute is dead simple and turns out delicious.

Grab some type of beef roast (I usually get either chuck or round), and two cans of Campbell's french onion soup. Throw it in the crock pot on low over night (about 7-9 hours should do it) and you have delicious tender roast beef and gravy that will feed one person for 3-4 days, all for 5 minutes of prep.

Throw in some veggies if you like (pearl onions are really good, and I personally like mushrooms in there as well as they pair well with meat and soak up the gravy/soup mixture). It also goes without saying that if you can make your own french onion soup, it would turn out even better, but that does away with the whole 5 mins of prep stipulation. :)

If you want to get really fancy, look up a Brazilian dish called feijoada. Most recipies call for it to be cooked in a pot or a pressure cooker, but I convinced my girlfriend (who is from Brasil) to try to cook it in a crock pot, and it turned out being one of the best things I have ever put in my mouth. It's a real bitch getting all of the stuff to make it, but it is utterly fantastic and definitely worth the effort.

that is interesting. Velarika is the tamil word for cucumber too

(1. why?) Well it does save cash :) I only consider it recreation when I have friends over. The main reason, however, because it's normal. Probably a cultural thing (not judging!). In the Netherlands (or at least in my circles), it'd be considered "weird" if you eat out (or takeout) more than once or twice a week. It's just considered normal that people cook, like doing laundry. Also means it's not going to be fancy always, sometimes it's just fuel and nutrients (some/any combo of vegetables, proteins and carbs). I also believe it's more expensive to eat out than in the US, relative to cooking from basic ingredients (or maybe vegetables are cheaper, I dunno). I can make tasty dinner for about €5-7 (two portions). Getting something healthy readymade for you is at least €10 (one portion).

(2. planning) Remember that article a while back about "people sized cities" (or something like that)? In NL, if you live in a medium-size town, a supermarket is never farther away than a 5 minute bicycle ride. My closest one is less than 200m, the next (bigger) one is 700m. But I'm lucky :) There are people that do weekly shopping of course, usually either big families or people that live out in the country, where the nearest supermarket is a cardrive away (like in the US). Besides shopping-planning, if I cook for myself, I usually make at least two-three portions because it's really the same amount of work as making one. Also you can't buy many kinds of fresh ingredients in single-meal amounts. So I do need to plan ahead to be able to eat all that stuff before it goes bad. Sometimes that means having weird dinner-type things for breakfast. I hate throwing food away, but I try not to be too hard on myself if it means I ate healthy stuff, but messed up on the planning.

(3. what do I cook) Everything. My staple go-to meals, however are some kind of pasta-vegetable-salad (fusili pasta, cherry tomatoes, any kind of salad vegetables, cucumber, paprika, shallots, etc, any cheese, salami, bacon, eggs, olives etc whatever I have in the fridge + dressing from mayo+mustard+honey) and broccoli + fried tempeh or organic sausages. Also, brussel sprouts. These last two vegetables seem (for me) to cover most nutrients I've been missing when I feel I haven't been eating healthy. At least I feel better immediately :)

I also love cooking weird and/or special stuff. I could write a whole series of posts on that. And I did, but the stories/pictures are spread over many different parts and ages of the Internet.

(4. diet) Not really. I did paleo/keto for a while, twice, it was fun, tasty and really interesting to find your body can go into a different "mode" (ketosis) for energy. However I found that my physical condition for running improved a great deal when I added more carbs to my diet. I probably did something wrong, cause many people seem to be able to do sports just fine on keto diets. Anyway, these days I just don't eat a lot of carbs. I find I have to pay attention to eating enough (sorry I'm probably weird), both calorie-wise and nutrients (as I said, broccoli/sprouts).

(5. hacks and tips) I have zillions. Get a good knife. Learn how to use your microwave effectively (it cooks broccoli and many other things to perfection, if you know how--I'll explain if asked). Dishwashing machine. Check out the kitchen-tools section in shops every now and then, see if there's any tools that may make your particular way of cooking easier. If you don't have bbq tongs, get them, even if you're vegetarian. Fresh ginger keeps for a long time in the freezer. Get to know the chemistry behind cooking, preparing food, nutrition, etc. Watch Alton Brown's series Good Eats, it'll not only teach you loads of basic cooking techniques, but also the how & why behind these techniques, and even the chemistry/science of it. Plus it's entertaining. Just pick some random episodes on topics you think are interesting. I guarantee you'll learn something useful from every one of them. Many can be found on YouTube.

More hacks and tips!

- Pay attention to the fact that just because you removed food from the heat source, doesn't mean it'll stop cooking immediately. Cooking with heat is a chemical reaction, and it requires both heat-energy and time. This is the biggest part of cooking effectively with the microwave (which can add energy to food a lot faster than the food can "handle". if you nuke something at 700-800W or higher, try giving it at least as much time "off" as you spent putting energy into it. The heat's already there, the food just doesn't know yet what hit it). But it also goes for cooking pasta, rice, eggs or meat. Generally you can cook many things until they're not-quite-done, let them rest, and they'll be perfect. If you cook them until done, they'll often end up overcooked. Err on the side of undercooked with a slight "bite". Definitely for vegetables and pasta, but if you're not scared and know what you're doing, also meat and eggs.

- Presentation matters. Sure if you're just feeding yourself, who cares. But if you can manage in any way, make your food look nice. There's a huge psychological component to taste and flavour, and it's just a fact that nice-looking food just tastes better. If you don't believe me, try blue food-colouring on anything, and see if you finish your plate.

- On a similar note, slice stuff finely. Get a good knife. If your ingredients are larger than half a spoon, ask yourself why. This is not a hard rule, if there's a good reason forget I said anything. Broccoli gets mushy if sliced too finely and many meats just need their shape. Shape is important. I mean stuff like onions, paprika (bell pepper), tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber, etc. Makes for more comfortable eating.

- TASTY MEALS usually have a balanced combination of all the basic flavours: sweet, salt, sour and bitter. While preparing food, taste it, and spend a moment tasting which of the flavours is not sufficiently present. Add a bit more of some ingredient that prominently has that particular flavour. Bitter can be hard to find. Try spices. This is especially important for salads, dressings or sauces.

- Some fresh ingredients don't need to be refrigerated. This of course depends on the climate where you live. Paprika, tomatoes, onions, garlic. Eggs in NL keep fine outside the fridge, but I heard in the US they wash off some protective layer or something.

- If your (dried) spices smell or taste like sawdust, throw them away. Also try to get basic spices, and mix them yourself. Check out the ingredient-list on sauce or spice-mixes you like (for instance, teriyaki sauce = oil + salty soy sauce + garlic + ginger + black pepper + rice vinegar + something sweet, honey, sugar or molasses syrup + MSG. use stick blender and a glass jar. taste. adjust flavour balance. then marinate your salmon in it, or something)

- Get a couple of different vinegars: wine, apple cider, rice, and blank vinegar. The last one can also be used for cleaning (blank vinegar is basically water + acetic acid, which both evaporate, meaning it shouldn't smell like vinegar when dry). IMO, balsamic vinegar is overrated and usually has a lot of "extra ingredients" (unless it's a really nice one, aged in a barrel, try/hint getting those as a present or something :P). You also need lemon juice and possibly lime. Try using wine sometimes, it's not quite as sour, but can add amazing flavour. Red or white wines go into different types of dishes. If you use the "wrong" kind, it usually still works, but won't be as good as it could be.

- Keep a supply of basic ingredients that are versatile in many dishes: onions, shallots, garlic, black pepper (from a grinder please), many different spices, sweet soy sauce (ketjap manis), salty soy sauce, honey, mustard, ketchup, MSG (yeah really, just a pinch sometimes is excellent), eggs, rice, pasta (fusilli is the only one you need, goes with all types of pasta dishes--yes the shape matters, think surface area + chunk size), worcestershiresauce (vegetarians: contains anchovy), frozen spinach or kale, corn starch (always dissolve in cold water first), flour, concentrated tomato paste. You almost never really need "kosher" salt, but pay attention to the amounts "kosher" flakes are different than small grained tablesalt.

I think that's all I have to say on the subject. (Ha!)