Broke-Ass College Student Recipes

[rampaging-poet]

If you don't have quite enough ground beef for your taco recipe, try cooking a half-cup of rice and adding it to the beef when you add the spices.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

Yes! I've been doing that for years, it's pretty handy.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

I know that other people are going to find me weird to say this but, if you can't afford bacon, try turkey bacon. It has the added bonuses of both tasting better AND being healthier!

Healthier, maybe. I'd argue that it's tasty but not in the same way that bacon is.

Two strips of turkey bacon with breakfast is pretty tasty, but turkey bacon is not a substitute for recipes that call for bacon. The taste is different, and you really want the bacon fat when you're cooking stuff.

[Maxus]

Broke-ass college student confectionary: Peppermint bark

Buy a pound each of dark AND white (or vanilla-flavored) almond-bark chocolate, the kind that comes in the big blocks. Also, buy some pepperimints, in whatever brand tastes best to you (I like Brach's for hard peppermints and Sweet Stripe for soft). It seriously isn't much. It was well under 10 dollars for me (prices may vary).

Take 18 or so of the peppermints, put them in a ziploc bag, put a towel over them, and pound them to bits with a hammer. Don't hit -too- hard or you may tear the bag and get peppermint dust all over everything.

Take half (or however much) of the dark chocolate, melt it in a bowl in the microwave (30 second a session, stir it around, repeat), pour it into a pan, and spread it evenly (Picking up and shaking the pan each way helps a lot), then put it in the fridge to let it cool and set.

Meanwhile, clean out your melting bowl thoroughly, and dry out all the water (and I mean ALL THE WATER) with a towel or rag, and melt the white chocolate, in same amount as you picked for the dark.

This time, pour about half of your crushed peppermints into the still-melted white chocolate and stir them in. Pour the white chocolate onto the by-now solidifying dark, and spread out. A plastic spatula may be of help here, because the solid bits will make the white chocolate not spread so easy. Don't freak out if it doesnt't totally overlap in two even layers.

Once you're satisfied with the spread, sprinkle however much of the remaining peppermint bits on top, put it in the fridge to cool and set again.

When you're done, shake the loose bits off a trash can, pry it out, break it into chunks, and snack. If you do store it in the fridge, leave the bag open a bit. Otherwise, it'll sweat and get sticky all over the inside of the bag.

This is a pretty malleable recipe. My little sister made some on a plate, last week, forgoing the pan. It's also dead easy and fun to do with little kids. They get to lick the bowls and spatulas (spatulae?).

Adjust the amounts used based on taste, how much you want around, etc.

[rampaging-poet]

I've been using this recipe for tacos since I found it, but it doesn't really work for fajitas. Today, I improvised.

Cut two pork chops (or some chicken) into strips and brown. Add 1 sliced bell pepper and a small or medium onion. While the vegetables cook down, mix the following in a small bowl: ~1/4 cup barbecue sauce, ~1/4 water, 1 tsp chili powder, pepper and garlic to taste. When the vegetables are close to done, add the sauce. Simmer for a few minutes and serve on tortillas.

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Bonus recipe: Beef Heart and Carrot Terriyaki Stir Fry

Begin by preparing the heart. Cut the fat off the outside and remove the veins - they are tough. This recipe only uses about half of a heart, so cut the heart in half and refrigerate one portion immediately. Cut the remaining portion into thin strips. Heat a small amount of oil in a pan and add the strips of heart. While the heart is browning, slice two or three carrots into strips. Add them to the pan as soon as the heart is browned and cook for several minutes.

Add all the ingredients for this terriyaki sauce (1/3 cup soy sauce, 1/3 cup water, garlic, ginger, brown sugar, honey, cornstarch to thicken) directly to the pan. Continue to cook until desired consistency is reached. Serve over rice.

The recipe can easily be scaled up by using more carrots and the whole heart, but a double batch should probably use less than a full second batch of terriyaki sauce. If you find heart's organ flavour too strong (it's nowhere near as strong as liver or kidney, but it is noticable), soak the heart in milk or salt water overnight. You can also remove the silvery membrane from the inside of the heart, but doing so is time consuming.

[Red Archon]

I apologize for not providing actual recipes, but I just wanted to write about TVP or "soy crumbs." It's fairly healthy, has very high nutritional qualities with no fats whatsoever, diverse enough to be made in to loaves, meatballs, all sorts of sauces, chilis and whatever minced meat is used for and it's ludicrously cheap. In Finland, everything is really expensive, (from what I'm reading in your posts, at least twice, often 5 times more, depending on product) and soy, potatoes, brown and bechamel sauces are the cornerstones of affordable cooking. Meat is always expensive, so is cheese. I personally save as much money on eating as I can, so I can afford smoking and drinking. From what I've picked up over the years, I can eat very well for a euro a day. Focus on large quantities and keep an eye out for protein content per euro ratios.

[fectin]

Bananas have all of the nutritions, and are cheap. They're also super good for cramps, if you're doing a lot of exercise.

Meat price mostly corresponds to how much work the butcher has done to it. Pre-cut steaks? Pricey. The exact same meat in a lump? $1-2 less per pound. I recently found a huge piece (10 lb) of rump steak for $1.99/lb. The packaging was different from the other stuff around it, so I think that's how the store received it, and they were just too lazy to prepare it. It's probably worth shopping when someone is working the meat area, and asking for larger, cheaper cuts.

There are two ways to tenderize meat: hit it with a hammer, or pineapple enzymes.

Corn tortillas are cheaper and taste better, but no-one gets them. They fall apart if you microwave them. If you warm them over fire though (e.g. directly on a gas stove, flipping occasionally), they turn out supple and strong. You want them to be inflating like pita, but also want to stop before they scorch. These are competing goals, but failure is not terrible. It takes me about a minute each.

Sausage isn't super cheap, but it goes farther than other meat. I.e., you can add a lot less sausage to pasta, and still have a meat sauce than with ground beef.

Ground turkey is often cheap, it's healthier than ground beef, and it can even taste better.

Easy casserole; especially for dealing with taco leftovers:
You need corn tortillas, cheese, cooked meat, and cream of ___ soup (I like cream of mushroom; celery or chicken also work fine). Two cans of soup, and two cans of cooked chicken work fine, but it's much cheaper if you get the giant family-size can and use slow-cooked meat that's getting dry, or last night's taco meat, or whatever. You can use tortillas that are a little stale (again, like last night's taco leftovers). Mix the meat and soup together in a big bowl. (If you're feeling fancy, add a can of green chillis, or chop in some chipotle, or whatever else seems like a good idea. You can skip this just fine though). Cover the bottom of the casserole dish with tortillas (as few as you can get away with and actually cover it), then add a thin layer of the soup gunk, then a layer of grated cheese, then tortillas. etc. each tortilla layer, press down to get all the air out. When you finish, the top layer should be cheese. Put it in the oven for as long as you want, at whatever temperature you want. About an hour at 350 is good. I cooked one once for four hours at ~375, and it came out edible though, so it's really, really hard to screw up. Also, all the ingredients are cooked enough to eat to start with, so it's not like you can undercook it.
Not exactly the cheapest thing, but it can be made from leftovers and soup, and is good enough to serve. It also keeps well, and is decent even without reheating.

[Korgan0]

I vastly prefer tacos made with corn tortillas to those made with flour tortillas. They're also super easy to make: get dehydrated corn meal (aka masa), mix with water and salt, form into dough, smash into tortillas with a heavy pan (or a tortilla press if you're fancy) and then cook on a non-stick pan.

If you really want to splurge, keep in mind that skirt, flank, and hanger steaks are just as delicious as rib-eye or NY strip if cooked properly, and are far cheaper.

[Prak]

There are two ways to tenderize meat: hit it with a hammer, or pineapple enzymes.

Really any acid, and what you do is put it in a marinade.

So, a good place for some broke college recipes is Cooking Comically. It's the guy that did the Terriyaki Burger recipe-comic. It updates only periodically, but the recipes look good, both taste-wise and price-wise.

[fectin]

I read/saw somewhere (mythbusters' canon tenderization episode?) that the only ways to tenderize were hammering and pineapple enzyme. I assumed that was some sort of technical term, maybe revering to breaking collagen without breaking protein.

On further review, I have no clue why I would think that, or even accept the premise. There are plenty of ways to tenderize.

[Prak]

Well, and if you're cooking the meat, as opposed to just getting it as tender as possible, you marinate, and use an acid. Pineapple enzyme, or more likely, pineapple juice, could work for that, but you really just want some kind of acid. Vinegar, Dr. Pepper, Orange Juice, Tomato Sauce, whatever.

[Korgan0]

In addition, if it has the meat lot of collagen (like brisket, although this applies to all meats that have even a little bit of collagen), prolonged cooking at a high-ish heat, like braising in some kind of liquid, will cause the collagen to decompose into gelatin and make the meat much more tender.

The acid thing doesn't cook the meat that much, and I've never seen a dish that uses it for meat. Ceviche is a Latin American fish stew that uses lime juice to cook seafood, and it's delicious.

[Maj]

Bromelain (from pineapple) and papain (from papaya) are used as tenderizing agents because they actually start breaking down the proteins in the meat. Use too much, or leave them on to long, and your meat will end up mushy.

Pineapple juice won't work the same way because heat destroys the enzyme - which is why you can't put fresh pineapple in Jello, but you can totally put canned pineapple in Jello.

[Maj]

Ess and I have recently started menu-planning in order to save more money on our groceries. Afraid that we would end up eating a lot of the same meals over and over again, I took issues of the Cooking Club magazine that I receive and ripped out a whole pile of recipes that we could try. This was this morning's breakfast, and it was fast and fabulous:

Cooking Club[/url]]Cumin Pork in Mojo sauce
2 teaspoons cumin seeds
3/4 teaspoon coarsely ground pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 lb. boneless thin-cut pork loin chops (3/8 inch)*
2 to 3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1/2 cup orange juice
1/4 cup lemon juice
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

1. Combine cumin seeds, pepper and salt in small bowl; rub over pork.

2. Heat large skillet over medium heat until hot. Add 2 tablespoons of the oil; heat until hot. Cook pork in batches 4 minutes or until pale pink in center, turning once and adding additional oil as needed. Remove pork.

3. Add garlic; cook and stir over medium-low heat 30 seconds or until fragrant. Stir in orange juice and lemon juice. Increase heat to high; boil 3 to 4 minutes or until slightly thickened. Stir in cilantro. Return pork and any accumulated juices to skillet; cook 1 minute or until heated through.

*Note: We buy boneless pork sirloin roasts in bulk because they're a good cut of meat at a decent price. Slicing one up into thin slices worked perfectly fine for this recipe.

[CatharzGodfoot]

A. Cook ground red chiles and minced garlic in olive oil at very low heat.

B. Cook spaghetti noodles.

Combine A and B with salt and (optional) Parmesan cheese.

It goes with something like Orvieto Abboccato or maybe a Riesling.

[rampaging-poet]

Super-easy Chicken Quesadillas.
Dice a small onion and fry it in a nonstick pan. Add a can of Kirkland canned chicken breast (or similar). After the chicken heats through, add about four tablespoons of salsa and some granulated garlic. Spoon onto tortillas covered in grated cheese, fold tortillas in half or cover with more tortillas, and bake until cheese is melted.

The canned chicken is about two dollars a can, so it's cheaper and easier to work with than most if not all chicken meat I've seen around here. Bone-in thighs on sale are the only cut that comes close.

[Prak]

This is far from fancy or special, but it was pretty damned good, and makes enough for two meals, more if you exercise that silly portion control nonsense...

Sausage and Mac and Cheese
There are two ways to make this, the basic and the advanced which is actually still pretty simple. I made the basic tonight, because.. meh.

Basic
1 Box Mac and Cheese with necessary stuff:
-1/2 c. milk
-1/4 c. butter
1/2 # Italian sausage (I used Silva brand smoked)
1 ounce yellow onion
1 egg

Heat olive oil in a saute pan, and start the water boiling for the mac.
Medium dice the sausage (~1/4") and large dice the onion (~1/2"), and saute in olive oil. Keep an eye on the water as you prep, and dump the pasta in when it's boiling. A wooden spoon across the top will discourage boiling over.

The pasta should be done just before the sausage, and when making box mac, I always combine the cheese powder, butter and milk in a measuring glass then add it all at once. Strain the pasta, scoop in the sausage (leaving out the oil), add the sauce, stir up, and let sit by itself.

With the saute pan- drop the heat, and let it actually cool to a low-med heat, or as close to as your patience, time, and the heat of the pasta and sausage will allow. Crack an egg into it, and fry it over easy--watch it, it won't take long. You can scoop some pasta and sausage in a bowl as it fries. Place the egg on top of the pasta, and don't care if the yolk breaks, because that's the entire point.

Advanced

Basically this version just subs the box mac for home made.
Instead of Box Mac, you will need:
~1 oz Flour
~1 oz butter (2 tablespoons)
~1/4 c milk
somewhere between a third and half cup of shredded cheese- I suggest cheddar
1.5 c macaroni, or choice of pasta

Heat the butter in the pan, and dice the sausage and onion as above, then saute in the butter. In separate pot, boil pasta.

When pasta is done, scoop in sausage and onions and toss it all together, place back on a very low heat, and reserve the butter in the pan. Add the flour and stir together to make a roux, you don't want it dark, so keep it only vaguely near the heat. Add milk, stir, keep an eye on the thickness. This will need to be a good cheese sauce, but cheese thickens it, so you want this first part a bit thin. You can add white or black pepper if you want. This is bechamel, remember it, and love it, because it's a mother sauce and knowing it allows you to make any number of more complex sauces. Dump it into the pasta and add the shredded cheese and stir together. Add more cheese as desired, just not too much, unless you're trying to create organic building material in your bowels.

Spoon into a bowl, and go back to your pan. Hopefully it's usable, because you're going to add butter, let it melt, and fry an egg, over easy, and then slide it onto you sausage and pasta.

The advanced version takes a bit more time, and maybe costs a little bit more, but on the larger scale, I doubt it's actually even as pricey as box mac.

[fectin]

This is bechamel, remember it, and love it, because it's a mother sauce and knowing it allows you to make any number of more complex sauces.

For example, just adding cheese digivolves it into mornay sauce.

[Prak]

Well, depending on the cheese. The above is really basic, and could pass as a mornay, but typically that would involve gruyere and parm. If you use cheddar, and add dry mustard and Worcestershire sauce, it's a more traditional cheddar cheese sauce. If you add ale and maybe some paprika to that it becomes rarebit, and a very, very good thing.

[...You Lost Me]

rampaging-poet, how do you bake your quesadillas? Are you tossing it an oven at 425 F or something?

Also, about how long does it take to heat the chicken.

[rampaging-poet]

I baked them by throwing them in the oven at 350 F for ten minutes, then flipping them and cooking for another few minutes. Baking them at 425 F for a shorter time would probably work too.

The canned chicken I use is already pre-cooked, so I just cook it at medium heat for two or three minutes while I wait for the oven to finish pre-heating. The whole mix will be baked into the quesadillas anyway.

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Basic Crock Pot Cereal Mix
Ingredients:

• 12 cups cereal
• 3 cups pretzel sticks
• 1 small can of mixed nuts
• 1 cup oil or melted butter
• 1 1/2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tbsp seasoning salt
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder

Combine the first three ingredients in a large crock pot; mix well. Combine the remaining ingredients. Pour the oil mixture over the dry ingredients and stir. Cook on low heat for two and a half hours, stirring every half hour.

For cereal, I typically use three cups of Honey Shreddies and nine cups of Life. The original recipe called for three cups each of Cheerios, Corn Chex, Rice Chex, and Wheat Chex.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

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Awesome veggie fry-up
Ingredients:

• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 small onion
• 1 small zucchini
• 1 small yellow squash
• 1-2 cups mushrooms (I like crimini or portabella)
• 1-2 tbs balsamic vinegar (more or less to taste)
• 1-2 tbs olive oil

Slice all the vegetables thin, and cut the mushrooms nice and chunky. Heat some olive oil in a saucepan. Throw the pepper and onion in it, cooking until everything is soft and the onions are turning slightly brown at the edges. Throw the zucchini, the squash, and the mushrooms in with the peppers and onions and add the balsamic vinegar. Stir and cover (the vinegar will draw out the juices and start simmering). Cook until the mushrooms and squash start to soften (but stop before they get too mushy).

Note: this recipe is awesome.

[rampaging-poet]

Two and a half for one recipe special!

Lime and Garlic Slow Cooker Chicken
1 pound bone-in chicken thighs (skinless, if possible)
2 limes
2 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp thyme
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
2 tpsp butter
1 1/2 cups chicken stock (at least enough to cover chicken)
Optional: 1 cup instant rice

This recipe comes from a slow-cooker recipe book. I have never actually seen skinless, bone-in chicken thighs for sale, but skinning the chicken by hand didn't take too long.

Place the chicken in the bottom of the slow cooker. Cut the limes in halves or quarters and squeeze the juice over the chicken. Mince the garlic and add it. Sprinkle the spices over the chicken. Add butter or margarine. Top with enough chicken stock (or water + chicken bullion) to cover the chicken. My large crock pot took three cups instead of the cup and a half the original recipe called for. Cook on low for ten hours.

When I made this, the chick turned out super-tender. The flavour was pretty light (likely due to the doubled stock amount), but well worth it.
1/2 recipe: the leftovers made a delicious chicken salad with two tablespoons of mayonnaise and a little yellow mustard.

If you'd like, you can add a cup of instant rice in the last ten to twenty minutes of cooking time for a one-pot meal. Otherwise, save the leftover juices for...

Instant Ramen Hot And Sour Soup
1/2 pound of boneless pork
1/2 tbsp ginger ginger
2 cups chicken stock
2 cups water
1 flavour packet from spicy instant ramen
1 vegetable packet from instant ramen (or other vegetables to taste)
2 1/2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 can sliced bamboo shoots in water

Cut the pork into thin strips. Mince the ginger. Add both to a pot and fry until the pork browns. Add all other ingredients to the pot and stir well. Cook on high to bring to a boil, then simmer ten to twenty minutes.

The instant ramen I used for this recipe was Paldo Teumsae Ramyun, which worked out to about a dollar per package. Around here that's standard price for anything better than Mr. Noodles. The broth it makes is way too spicy for the two cups of water the directions call for, but it was just about right for this recipe. This brand also includes a pretty skookum vegetable packet.

Without the pork, this is a $3 vegetarian dinner for two. Adding meat or tofu obviously brings the price up a bit, but you don't need a lot of it for a dish like this.

[rampaging-poet]

Ground Pork Chow Mein
1/2 pound ground pork
2 cloves garlic
3-4 green onions
2 tbsp rice vinegar
1 tbsp soy sauce
2 cups bean sprouts
~4 cups chow mein noodles, uncooked

Start boiling a pot of water to cook the chow mein in. Heat some cooking oil in a large frying pan. Mince and add the garlic (or use a garlic press - they save so much time). Begin browning the ground pork while you chop the green onions. Add the green onions, rice vinegar, and soy sauce when the ground pork has browned and reduce heat to a simmer.

Boil the chow mein for 2 minutes or as directed on the package. Drain the noodles, then add noodles and bean sprouts to the frying pan. Increase heat back to medium and stir-fry until bean sprouts are tender and sauce is well mixed (3-5 minutes). Serve immediately.


A package of chow mein big enough to make 2-3 batches of this was $2.50. Green onions were on sale, so I managed to pick up the vegetables for less than a dollar. Ground pork is about four dollars a pound here, so that half pound of ground pork cost as much as the remaining ingredients combined. Still, it's basically a $4 dinner for two or one starving college student.

[Prak]

Thread Necro?

Thread Necro.

Orange Soy Chicken and Vegetable Stir Fry

• Ingredients
• ~1# of chicken, I used drumsticks, because that's what the food pantry gave me and I had in the freezer
• 1 orange
• ~1/3 cup soy sauce
• ~1 tsp of ginger powder
• ~1 tsp of garlic powder
• Peanut Oil
• 1 tbsp Minced Garlic
• 1 leek
• 2 stalks celery
• 1 carrot
• ~1/3 cup soy sauce
• drizzle of honey (iunno, 1 tbsp?)
• 2 stalks green onion

Put the chicken, 1st portion of soy sauce ginger and garlic powder in a ziploc bag, squeeze the juice of the orange into it, give it a good massage, and stick in the fridge. Let marinate.... eh, I think it marinated like 7 hours today, but anywhere from like an hour to 24 hours would be fine, and the only difference is penetration of flavor.

When ready to cook, start some rice in a rice cooker, or whatever.

Heat up some peanut oil (enough for saute'ing, so, like, 1 tbsp) and put in the minced garlic. Once the oil is hot and the garlic is browned (not blackened, garlic is good, burned garlic is not), throw in the leek, celery and carrot, saute.

Once the veg is a bit softened, add the second portion of soy sauce and honey, stir up, cover and let cook down a bit.

Take the chicken out, and add directly onto the veg, then pour in the marinade (you're going to cook it, why fucking waste it for fear of bacteria killed by heat?). Cover and let cook about ten or so minutes, or until the chicken is done, turning at least once.

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It's simple, it's good. Honestly, I actually kind of liked the stir fry more than the chicken, and that's rare for me. Probably takes about forty minutes? But honestly, you can probably tighten that up.