How to cook...basically?

remsburgsgirl

I am not a very confident cook & would love some answers to what are probably very simple questions to most people...these are two things that I struggle with quite often, if someone has some tips I'd be grateful!

1. I have a large frying pan & every time I try out a stir fry (usual chicken & veg) it seems to steam instead of fry...if that makes any sense? The end result is soggy stir fry
I wonder what pan I should buy to make s=decent stir fry's? I bought a wok before and the same thing happened...it was a cheap one, is there a certain brand or type of metal used that is better?

2. I have kids and a husband to feed, most days are one main meal a day & I find myself short of time for prep with a toddler hanging out of me most of the time & like to cook things like a beef stew or a chicken casserole. The thing is I am unsure what the heck I am doing with the casserole in the oven mainly, so I resort to buying that 'cook in a bag' stuff & add chicken, potatoes & carrots with a tin of tomatoes.
I'm sure I could get the same result with a casserole dish & a basic base sauce?

Thanks!!

FortuneChip

I'll leave the 2nd point to someone more experienced but I'll give the first a go

The pan may not have anything to do with it. If you're cooking for a family, is it possible your wok/pan has too much in it? I find if I put too much into a frying pan, it tends to steam rather than fry. Possible way around it is to fry the meat & veg in batches and set aside until you're adding the sauce, then add everything back to the pan

annamcmahon

In reply to your second question as a mama to two under three I'd recommend getting a slow cooker. You'll get a tesco one for €20. I prep and fry the veg after the kids have gone to bed throw everything in the sc dish and leave it in the fridge over night. In the morning I just have to turn it on and I come home to a delicious dinner ready for me. There's a thread on the forum with recipes and advice

beertons

Do you cover the frying pan with a lid when cooking?

touts

remsburgsgirl wrote: »

I am not a very confident cook & would love some answers to what are probably very simple questions to most people...these are two things that I struggle with quite often, if someone has some tips I'd be grateful!

1. I have a large frying pan & every time I try out a stir fry (usual chicken & veg) it seems to steam instead of fry...if that makes any sense? The end result is soggy stir fry
I wonder what pan I should buy to make s=decent stir fry's? I bought a wok before and the same thing happened...it was a cheap one, is there a certain brand or type of metal used that is better?

2. I have kids and a husband to feed, most days are one main meal a day & I find myself short of time for prep with a toddler hanging out of me most of the time & like to cook things like a beef stew or a chicken casserole. The thing is I am unsure what the heck I am doing with the casserole in the oven mainly, so I resort to buying that 'cook in a bag' stuff & add chicken, potatoes & carrots with a tin of tomatoes.
I'm sure I could get the same result with a casserole dish & a basic base sauce?

Thanks!!

1. You need to time when you put in the different elements into a stirfry. Carrots take a lot longer to cook than chopped onions for example. Also some things (e.g. Mushrooms) have a lot of water in them. If you put everything in together then by the time everything is cooked some stuff will be soggy and overcooked.

2. Cooking nice stuff does take time. So Cook large batches. If you are doing a Chicken Curry, Shepards Pie, Lasagna, Bolognese etc do enough for two days. You can bulk up most dishes with things like chickpeas or extra veg. Eat half one day and then keep the second half in the fridge for the following day. OK it might get boring having the same thing two days in a row but you get used to it. If you really get objections then freeze the second half and build up a stock of dinners in the freezer. Then you just get into the habit of cooking one night and defrosting for the second night. This will give you every second night off from cooking (other than rice or pasta which you really should cook fresh each night but that's just a boil it up job). If you don't have enough left over for a second night with the whole family but maybe enough for one or two portions then still don't throw it away. Freeze it in small containers each one containing a portion for one person. Once these have built up have a "Take away night". Pull everything out of the freezer the night before and let people choose what they want as they would from a takeaway menu. If you have more portions than family members then anything that doesn't get picked goes back in the freezer (before it has had a chance to thaw) to wait the next "take away" night. Just make sure to label and date the containers so the oldest ones of each type of meal get used first.

It takes a bit of doing to get used to it but you will get there. You need food containers and labels and you may need a harger freezer (we bought a small fridge sized one with drawers in DID for something like €139 last year and we keep it in the utility room). But I have found doing it this way had actually saved me money also because I'm bulking things up with cheap options (e.g. a tin of chickpeas) AND I'm not wasting as much because there are fewer leftovers.

rubadub

FortuneChip wrote: »

I find if I put too much into a frying pan, it tends to steam rather than fry.

+1
The stove will have a maximum heat output, this is a fixed amount of energy/power. It takes a certain amount of energy to boil water off, therefore a certain amount of time, the more water the more time needed

This might sound obvious but if you put 500ml in a kettle it gets to boiling roughly twice as fast as a litre. Once at boiling point it takes energy to get it to turn to steam and so evaporate off.

Same on the stove, once boiling it would take a pot of 500ml of water roughly half the time to completely boil off than it would for 1 litre.

If you dump loads of mince into a searing hot saucepan then the heat transfers to the bottom layer, water comes out and is heated, there is enough water that its not vigorously boiling, you can think of it like the bulk of cold mince is cooling down the pan, so its gently steaming all the mince above it and it all goes grey looking. You have in effect thrown loads of water into the pot and it will take ages to boil off, so you have forced a much longer cooking time than you might want. Throw a single grain of mince meat in the same searing saucepan and there is so much energy in the hot metal that the water is vapourised off extremely quickly, it gets really hot really fast and so browns really fast.

So as mentioned you can split up your food to cook it, and that does not only mean splitting it into say onions, and then mushrooms, you could split the mushrooms into smaller batches. Just like the small amount of water boils quickly in the kettle, the smaller batches cook way quicker, so it might not take as long as you might think. Or have several pans on the go at once.

Loire

Hi OP,

I struggled with stir-frys for ages. The tricks for me are (1) have all of your ingredients prepared and ready to go and (2) don't throw everything into the pan together. I use a variation of this recipe http://www.rte.ie/lifestyle/food/recipes/2011/1004/1845-beef-and-ginger-noodle-stir-fry. Taking this as an example...between steps 3 & 4 I take out what's cooked already (the beef + chilli, ginger, garlic) and put into a serving bowl. I then stir-fry the veg and if there's a lot will only do one vegetable type at a time, empyting into the serving bowl as I go. In the end you'll have the serving bowl with everything you need cooked. I usually end up popping this into the microwave before serving.

I'd also highly recommend a slow cooker. I was in Argos yesterday and they have the Breville model for 1/3 off (can't remember the price). You can get them in Tesco and Lidl/Aldi also. The way they work for me - I will cook tomorrow night's dinner when I get home tonight. Generally this involves having everything in the slow cooker by 6pm, putting it on High for the first 2 hours and then on low until we go to bed when I will then plug it out. For the life of me I couldn't go to bed with something cooking food turned on but that's just me. Tomorrow night then I will simply heat & serve to the kids and start making the next night's dinner. Doing this for the past few weeks and it's been awesome - in taste and simplicity.

This forum is a fantastic resource and in particular I find the posters in general are great for knowledge sharing. My own cooking has improved greatly since I became an addict!

Best of luck with everything!
Loire.

stevenmu

Also for stir-frying, the pan (and the oil in it) really needs to be pretty hot, so give it plenty of time to warm up before you add anything. Then throw in your longest cooking ingredients, they should sizzle pretty loudly as soon as they hit the pan. Stir, and add in shorter cooking ingredients as needed.

Merkin

I think with cooking there are two things. Enthusiasm and the desire to practice and you seem to have both so that's a good start

First and foremost, if you do want to cook a stir fry then you will only really get the results you want from buying a wok. You don't have to buy a really expensive one but it is worth investing in one as they are the best thing. You need to coat the pan generously in oil and it should be very hot before adding anything to the pan. Normally a slice of garlic or onion is good to test as it should sizzle. The second rule of thumb is to keep everything in the wok moving. If you don't your ingredients will burn. Third rule is to add things in sequence of when they will actually cook so you should have everything shredded and chopped beforehand. So for your standard stir fry, to a hot wok add the following:

Onions
Your protein (beef or chicken are good, add your garlic, chilli and ginger in after adding the meat)
When these are nicely coloured and flavoured and well on the way to being cooked you then basically flash-fry everything else in the order that they will cook in. Here I would add:

Carrots
Courgettes
Peppers
Mushrooms
Then soy sauce and/or fish sauce
Your noodles

Because your pan is piping hot and your moving everything about, your stir-fry from start to finish of cooking should take just a little over five minutes and will not be soggy - a good stirfry should still have bite or crunch so if you think you might be undercooking everything a little that is preferable to having overcooked mush and you'll keep all the lovely flavours of the fresh ingredients.

As far as casseroles and stews are concerned, you actually need next to no prep for a really good casserole. You do need a good casserole dish though so I would recommend a Le Creuset - I have a couple of them and they are brilliant. I made beef in red wine stew at the weekend and it was absolutely delish.

Ingredients

2lb lean stewing beef, all visible fat removed, cut into bite-sized pieces
6 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
2 large onions
3 large carrots, peeled and cut into large chunks
2 large leeks, thickly sliced
4 celery sticks, cut into large pieces
800ml beef stock (Oxo is fine)
200ml red wine
400g can chopped tomatoes with herbs
2 bay leafs
2 tsp dried mixed herbs
salt and freshly ground black pepper


method

1. Preheat the oven to 160°C
2. Place the beef in a heavy-based casserole dish with the garlic, carrots, leeks and celery.
3. Stir in the stock, wine and tomatoes and add the bay leaf and mixed herbs. Season well and bring the mixture to the boil over a high heat.
4. Cover tightly and transfer the casserole to the oven and cook for 3-3.5hours hours or until the beef is meltingly tender.

It really is that simple. Very little prep (bar the veg obviously) and full of nutrients because of the amount of veg in it. It says the stew serves four but there really is six pretty big portions so it could do you over a couple of days.

remsburgsgirl

Thanks so much for all the advice...I am after spending some time also looking into different threads here too, some great tips

The stir fry tips for not loading the pan are obvious, I never thought about it like that before...I will definitely try it out next time I stir-fry...I find it expensive to stir fry, but I am not a big meat eater so I like this type of dinner as it is loaded with veggies & I can add meat for the rest of the family....I must look into other recipes that give us a good veg intake, maybe there is a cheaper option to stir-frying? @Merkin I do need to reinvest in a wok, I need to invest in a some decent cooking equipment overall I think if i am going to start being serious about cooking for the family! I was looking at some casserole dishes recently, but they all looked the same to me, I don't mind spending on one or two decent ones, but I have a collection of crappy equipment in my kitchen that never gets used as it doesn't seem to do the job that I want

@Beertons: No I only cover the pan with a lid if I am adding a sauce & keeping it warm or letting it simmer, never for a 'dry' stir fry

Seriously looking into this slow cooker thing that has been mentioned too...I have never heard of one before, seems alot like sticking my stew in the oven for 3 hours on low, only maybe more efficient?

Merkin

Slow cookers are brilliant because you can go about your daily business without having to worry about timings or checking up on progress. You could basically through everything into one after breakfast in the morning and have a lovely supper ready come evening time....all you need to add are your rice or potatoes or whatever. My OH feels like they give the food an odd taste (I don't) so we don't use ours as much as we should but there's a lot to recommend it, especially if you're a busy Mum!

Whistlejacket

+1 on the Le Creuset cast iron casseroles. I have an ancient one a friend gave me that the lid handle had fallen off. It was otherwise perfect so I got a replacement handle in the outlet in Kildare village. I went back a few months later and bought a second bigger casserole. I use them both a lot and find them brilliant.

You're dead right about the equipment. A few good quality items e.g. decent saucepans, a good knife etc. will serve you well for years, while the rubbishy stuff/gimmicks stays in the back of the press taking up room until you throw it out! Nigella Lawson has a humorous take on her habit of buying faddy cooking gadgets and then not using them in her book How To Eat. I'd recommend it as a read; not everyone likes her writing style but I think it's a brilliant discussion on the bigger picture of how and why we cook, especially for families. Cooking for the people you love and care for is very rewarding. It make all the work and effort worth it when you get licked plates and offers to do the washing up!