Harleyman! Quick Question; cooking

[Lionheart]

Hey HM,


I have a quick question for you. I know you are a professional cook. I was just wondering if you might know of a good recipe for Mac and Cheese.

When I was making some the other day with actual Cheddar and Mozzarella, it turned out pretty 'different'. A family member said I should try making a cheese sauce rather then using pure cheese on Mac. Supposedly, a sauce will be able to handle the noodles better then pure cheese.

I thought I would seek your 'guru' input on this. I realise that Mac and Cheese isnt really a big thing on the list of professional restaurants in the world, so no worries if you do not know.


Bill

[harleyman]

That person is correct..

Cheese is full of oil , and does not melt well..

Use velveta for making it that way..

But..You need to make a cheese sauce first...

Made with a light roux..butter and flour , cooked in a skillet till thich..Not allowed to brown at all, as that will discolor the sauce..

Then add milk and water to the level you want ina sauce pot..

Bring it to temp slowly, as not to burn.....Add all the cheese cubed you want now...Stiring slowly and often enough so the cheese wioll not stick on the bottom..


Taste till its a cheesy as you want..

Then slowly add the roux , constantly stirring..Go slow , if you add to much it will get way to thick..... When its the thickness you want keep cooking and stirring till the flour tast is gone..








Or..


Milk and water and butter.....Warm and add cheese....


Thicken with cornstarch an water mixed till not lumpy...

Add the cornstarch to the hot sauce till it thickrns..Again watch the amount...

once done getting thick, add heavy whipping cream to smooth and finish the sauce..



Leave the cheesh out, start with butter and onions, and you have a basic bechamel sauce..White sauce...The start of many Frence sauces...




An intresting tidbit ..

Cream sauces and soups , if stored in a glass container, will seperate after an electrical storm..thats why restuarants store in plastic tubs...

[cheezyflier]

http://www.bahf.org.uk/images2/applemacpro.jpg

+


http://i152.photobucket.com/albums/s180/cheezyridr/homealone.jpg

= MAC and CHEEZ :icon_lol:

[crashaz]

ROFL!!!

Hmm when a saying comes for something that contains ass.... I will include a pic of myself. :icon_lol:

[Lionheart]

http://www.bahf.org.uk/images2/applemacpro.jpg

+


http://i152.photobucket.com/albums/s180/cheezyridr/homealone.jpg

= MAC and CHEEZ :icon_lol:


lololol....


I can see how you came to that having read the name of the post, CF...

[Lionheart]

That person is correct..

Cheese is full of oil , and does not melt well..

Use velveta for making it that way..

But..You need to make a cheese sauce first...

Made with a light roux..butter and flour , cooked in a skillet till thich..Not allowed to brown at all, as that will discolor the sauce..

Then add milk and water to the level you want ina sauce pot..

Bring it to temp slowly, as not to burn.....Add all the cheese cubed you want now...Stiring slowly and often enough so the cheese wioll not stick on the bottom..


Taste till its a cheesy as you want..

Then slowly add the roux , constantly stirring..Go slow , if you add to much it will get way to thick..... When its the thickness you want keep cooking and stirring till the flour tast is gone..








Or..


Milk and water and butter.....Warm and add cheese....


Thicken with cornstarch an water mixed till not lumpy...

Add the cornstarch to the hot sauce till it thickrns..Again watch the amount...

once done getting thick, add heavy whipping cream to smooth and finish the sauce..



Leave the cheesh out, start with butter and onions, and you have a basic bechamel sauce..White sauce...The start of many Frence sauces...




An intresting tidbit ..

Cream sauces and soups , if stored in a glass container, will seperate after an electrical storm..thats why restuarants store in plastic tubs...


Thanks Mason,


Transferring to GoogleNotes and transferring from there to my iPhone recipes' folder.

Wild on the separating of the sauce during electrical storms. Somehow, electrons must work with sauce in their 'fusion', or perhaps in the opposite manner.


Bill

[Chacha]

Yummy..

Talking about food....

I am getting soooooooooooooooooooo hungry! :running:

[cheezyflier]

on a more serious note, i have gotten alot of good recipes from here:

http://allrecipes.com/

[harleyman]

I have never cooked using a recipes in my life !

Just a thought....LOL

But I have hired plenty of Navy and Army cooks that could not cook a lick without one...

[Brian_Gladden]

Made Cheddar Ale soup last night....

Made a roux, (cup of flour and a stick of butter) two cups of half and half, 4 cups of chicken broth, 3 cups of shredded cheddar (extra sharp) tablespoon of dry mustard, a generous shot of Worcestershire sauce and couple small shots of soy sauce, one can of beer, salt and pepper to taste.. oh and a tablespoon of Parmesan cheese and a little garlic powder too.


Yummy. after cooking it, I split half the batch into another pan and added broccoli for Cheddar Broccoli soup.



Brian

PS: My mac and cheese recipie calls for a large baking pan, 2-3 sleeves of ritz crackers, 3-4 bags of shredded extra sharp cheddar cheese, cubed ham and a pint of whipping cream or half and half.

Line the bottom of the pan with the ritz, boil the elbows and place a single layer of the pasta on top of the crackers. generously sprinkle the cheese onto the mac and then add ham. repeat until the pan is full. You can also slip more ritz along the sides of the pan as well. Using the last of the cheese sprinkle that on top and then pour the cream all over the dish letting it soak in. Bake at 350 for about 15-20 minutes.

[Snuffy]

Went out to lunch yesterday (Jan 3rd 2010) to Carrabbas Italian Grill ... I had the house specialty Mac n Cheese n Lobster!

Excellent Stuff! :applause:

[Lionheart]

ARRRGHHH!!!!!

What have we done to ourselves!!!


This is torture..


Last night, I ended up creating a new concoction. 1 Bag of egg noodles, boiled, with one giant white onion, sliced and cubed, boiled with the noodles, (a concept I have been wanting to try). I then seared a skillet of hamburger until well done. Drained the water from the noodles (when done) and added the hamburger, and then added 3 cans of Campbells mushroom soup and 1/3 rd stick of butter and let simmer for a bit, stirring in one small steamer bag of peas, and one small steamer bag of corn.

For my own serving (extreme cajun here, raised on pure spices with food sprinkled on top), I then added on soy sauce, sea salt, ground pepper (alot), garlic powder (perhaps too much) and a dash of Parmesan cheese.

A family member enhanced it with some half and half.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......


arrgh.. I need to get down to my new years resolution half wait by June 1st, 2010... How will this happen?



Bill

[Chacha]

I had dinner tonight and this is what I had:

My appetizer:

Canadian Black Mussels Marinara steamed in zesty marinara sauce with garlic croutons

My salad:

Baby Spinach Salad with fresh sliced seasonal pears, toasted pine nuts and crumbled gorgonzola

Main dinner course:

Cedar Plank Atlantic Salmon with whole-roasted sweet carrots, fresh asparagus and red bliss potatoes

My dessert:

Mango Cheesecake


I do not like going out for Dinner! .... Now I feel guilty eating all those.... I need 12 miles on my bicycle tomorrow - man it will be cold outside ... :running:

And I am here in front of my computer blasting pirates! :rocket:

Who started this food thread? :pop4:

[Lionheart]

Who started this food thread? :pop4:



oops..

<-- hides :kilroy:

[harleyman]

Hey, you two think you have it bad about food and weight..

As a Chef for over 25 years I never had many meals outside of where I worked. mainly cause I was there all the time...

So i ate on the go, day in and day out for 25 years , standing on my feet and working..

Point is, I was always busy, and ate constantly, all day , cause I never had the chance to sit and eat a nice meal, so I never felt full, and always felt I wanted something to eat...

Can you say bad eating habits??? I have them..Now I have gone to a different extreme..I forget to eat..It may be 7 at night after I get home some days before I eat...Then I overeat..usually junk crap cause no one here cooks but me , and no one shops for food but me mainly...LOL



Bill..Hint..next time cook the (oyniunsss) (Justin Lingo ) with the ground beef..it will give much more flavor..

Also canned tomatoes with chopped green chilis in that is killer too!


Chacha...You come see me..I will fix you and Hannah with two H's one killer meal...

You pick.... French..Spanish...German..Italian...Mexican..India n..Seafood..Chineese..


Or Taco bell....LOL

[Chacha]

Hey, you two think you have it bad about food and weight..

As a Chef for over 25 years I never had many meals outside of where I worked. mainly cause I was there all the time...

So i ate on the go, day in and day out for 25 years , standing on my feet and working..

Point is, I was always busy, and ate constantly, all day , cause I never had the chance to sit and eat a nice meal, so I never felt full, and always felt I wanted something to eat...

Can you say bad eating habits??? I have them..Now I have gone to a different extreme..I forget to eat..It may be 7 at night after I get home some days before I eat...Then I overeat..usually junk crap cause no one here cooks but me , and no one shops for food but me mainly...LOL



Bill..Hint..next time cook the (oyniunsss) (Justin Lingo ) with the ground beef..it will give much more flavor..

Also canned tomatoes with chopped green chilis in that is killer too!


Chacha...You come see me..I will fix you and Hannah with two H's one killer meal...

You pick.... French..Spanish...German..Italian...Mexican..India n..Seafood..Chineese..


Or Taco bell....LOL



HM,

The thought of that alone added weight to my baggages, another 50 pounds.... Goodness! :isadizzy:

I lived with a Chef for nearly 9 years, The Chef did the cooking, I did the prep and cleaning the kitchen... Can I say I was a Sous Chef? ... I cook but it did not satisfy the Chef's standard, so the Chef did much of the cooking... grocery shopping was my duty, too...

[aeronca1]

My salad:

Baby Spinach Salad with fresh sliced seasonal pears, toasted pine nuts and crumbled gorgonzola

My dessert:

Mango Cheesecake

If there are any leftovers, lolol, I'll PM you my address!

[aeronca1]

Any great hamburger meat recipes out there?

HINT: I'm from the same school as Bill. Spices ARE the main course!

[Moparmike]

Kudos to ya Harley! I don't think I could cook for a living...but I love it as a hobby.

I enjoy digging around for new recipes to try, but ya know what? Half the time the finished product is no where near what the recipe originally was. I wind up free-lancing to my own taste and whatever I've got for ingredients after using the recipe as a general direction.
The bad part about cooking for just myself most of the time is that I never learned how to cook a small recipe...so there's always more leftovers than what I know what to do with.

On the topic of cheese...I just made a killer pot of onion-cheddar soup the other day.
A few nice big yellow onions (good sharp flavored ones), a bit of browned bacon, some milk, chicken stock, & one can of beer...okay a half-can by the time it hit the kettle!, a big handful of shredded cheddar, assorted spices (mainly pepper), and of course a light roux to thicken it up.
Started out with my usual brocolli-cheese soup but didn't have any brocolli handy.

[Moparmike]

Last night, I ended up creating a new concoction. 1 Bag of egg noodles, boiled, with one giant white onion, sliced and cubed, boiled with the noodles, (a concept I have been wanting to try). I then seared a skillet of hamburger until well done. Drained the water from the noodles (when done) and added the hamburger, and then added 3 cans of Campbells mushroom soup and 1/3 rd stick of butter and let simmer for a bit, stirring in one small steamer bag of peas, and one small steamer bag of corn.

For my own serving (extreme cajun here, raised on pure spices with food sprinkled on top), I then added on soy sauce, sea salt, ground pepper (alot), garlic powder (perhaps too much) and a dash of Parmesan cheese.

A family member enhanced it with some half and half.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......


arrgh.. I need to get down to my new years resolution half wait by June 1st, 2010... How will this happen?



Bill

Congratulations Bill! You just made some homemade "Hamburger Helper"! :d Not sure exactly what flavor I'd call it but your recipe is nearly identical to one of my standby recipes. I like to use either shredded hashbrown or thin-sliced spuds instead of pasta or noodles though (lower carb...easier for me to keep track of come insulin time).



Any great hamburger meat recipes out there?

HINT: I'm from the same school as Bill. Spices ARE the main course!

See Bill's recipe above....Hamburger Helper outside the box. Build it whatever flavor you want today, and do it different the next time you make it.

Throw browned & seasoned burger into pretty much any pasta sauce you buy or make and top pasta with it, mix some burger in omelets or scrambled eggs. Dare I mention meatloaf, meatballs, or Tater Tot Hotdish too? :)

Dig around online for anything called Cheesy Hashbrown Bake too. Hashbrown spuds, cheese, eggs, burger, onions, whatever veggies you think would taste good in there. Casserole it up and throw it in the oven at 350-375. Time will depend on how big your casserole dish is.

[Henry]

i love cooking
been doing it for 40 years
i do use basic recipes for starters if i have not made something similar
Mike the half can of beer is one of the things that got me started:guinness:
most things i cook have wine or beer in them somewhere
and you have to taste it dont you:kilroy:
in my younger days i traveled a lot and tasted many foods from many places
and always tried to find out what i was eating
often i could not speak or understand the language
so i would just point to someone's plate
ill have one of those:icon_lol:
i love using herbs spices and precious liquids
i love grocery shopping
i always look for something on sale
could be fish, shrimp,lamb, beef, pork,chicken
or vegies.
i just opened my freezer to see what i have
Hallibut steaks, babyback ribs, frozen squid with other seafood shellfish
etc etc
the thing to stop you putting on weight
i smoke a lot
i have weighed 140lbs for 42 years
LOL
H

[cheezyflier]

today i'm making my beef stew in the crockpot. it's a good hot meal on a cold day, and i don't have to pay much attention to it.

[Henry]

today i'm making my beef stew in the crockpot. it's a good hot meal on a cold day, and i don't have to pay much attention to it.
i need a crockpot
i cannot find mine i found the plug and cord
just cannot find the rest:isadizzy:
H

[Chacha]

If there are any leftovers, lolol, I'll PM you my address!

There are a lot of these at SEASONS 52... A local restaurant in the area.... It's a chain restaurant, I think Georga has one and NJ, IL and PA, and CA....


Healthy food, but no matter how healthy it is, if I attacked it it becomes extra baggages...





Henry,

If you are done cooking, Holler, so we can taste test the food.... :icon_lol:

I love baby back ribs.... I can eat that and lots of sea food... I am a seafood person! :ernae: I love your recipe with beer or wine on it.... I cook with coke or sprite on some of my food as well...






Mike,

I like the recipe on your Hamburger Helper, I will try that one tonight! Eeeeks! :isadizzy: I said I am not eating that much again!







Cheezy,

I love the beef stew you are making..... Daughter and I always eat hot meal cooked from food... we don't normally eat frozen dinner .... I did try frozen dinner last year, but I rather have real food cooked..... I can eat FD in emergency cases only....

Emergency cases such as I get hungry in the middle of the night and I don't want to cook .... LOL

[cheezyflier]

i don't know what happened but at some point i decided that chili powder and cayanne need to be in almost everything i put tomatoes in. the kids don't like it if i make it too hot, so i have to use restraint

[Moparmike]

Mike,

I like the recipe on your Hamburger Helper, I will try that one tonight! Eeeeks! :isadizzy: I said I am not eating that much again!




My generic recipe is trimmed down a bit from what Bill had going on in his pot but it's all basically the same thing...something that can be brewed up in only one kettle. You see, I'm allergic to doing dishes...:d
It also gives me some quick, nuke-able leftovers to take to work so I can avoid the dreaded sandwich burnout. :)

For one package of ground beef, I use one can of Cream of Whatever soup (or the equal amount of a tomato sauce if I'm doing it "red"), and about 3/4 of the water or milk required for whatever carb payload I'm putting in it (rice, noodles, pasta, spuds, etc.).
Season the meat while it's browning (onions and spices). Once it's browned add the soup & water/milk and your pasta/spuds/rice. Bring it to a boil and simmer til the pasta is done.
And if you mess up on the amount of liquid, you can either add a bit more as it's simmering or do the cornstarch/water thing to thicken it up.

And...you can also do the same type of thing with some beef or chicken chunked into about 3/4" cubes or sliced into 3/8" strips instead of the ground beef too.

I can't stand most frozen or pre-prepped food either...not to mention the shock your system goes into when you read the nutrition info on most of that pre-packaged food!

[Moparmike]

i don't know what happened but at some point i decided that chili powder and cayanne need to be in almost everything i put tomatoes in. the kids don't like it if i make it too hot, so i have to use restraint

I have to tone things down too if I've got company coming over too.
Try some italian-type seasoning too instead of the chili heat....or a little blend of both (yes, that does work & is actually pretty good...another "mistake" I made that turned out better than expected).

[harleyman]

I like food...Period..All Kinds too...


My favorite you ask...

Hmmmm Perhaps Weiner Schtznel with Spatzen (man, its been a long time, not sure if my German spelling is correct anymore)

Thats of coarse with a veal bone reduction brown sauce with plenty of red wine added to glaze it off.....

[Moparmike]

Hmmmm Perhaps Weiner Schtznel with Spatzen (man, its been a long time, not sure if my German spelling is correct anymore)

Thats of coarse with a veal bone reduction brown sauce with plenty of red wine added to glaze it off.....

Now you're talking! I grew up on anything & everything German/German-Russian.
Spaetzen or Spaetzle (little spaetzen) or Knoephla is always something to look forward to and easy as all get out to make.
Also, try it with fry sausage ( a good garlic ring sausage) and sauerkraut. Deglaze the pan you fried the sausage in and make a brown sauce with it...gravy!

Okay...I gotta quit watching this thread! I think I've put on about 5lbs just reading the posts!

[Chacha]

Now you're talking! I grew up on anything & everything German/German-Russian.
Spaetzen or Spaetzle (little spaetzen) or Knoephla is always something to look forward to and easy as all get out to make.
Also, try it with fry sausage ( a good garlic ring sausage) and sauerkraut. Deglaze the pan you fried the sausage in and make a brown sauce with it...gravy!

Okay...I gotta quit watching this thread! I think I've put on about 5lbs just reading the posts!


:running:

I gained 50

[harleyman]

Now you're talking! I grew up on anything & everything German/German-Russian.
Spaetzen or Spaetzle (little spaetzen) or Knoephla is always something to look forward to and easy as all get out to make.
Also, try it with fry sausage ( a good garlic ring sausage) and sauerkraut. Deglaze the pan you fried the sausage in and make a brown sauce with it...gravy!

Okay...I gotta quit watching this thread! I think I've put on about 5lbs just reading the posts!



I love spetzel just pan cooked in butter with sausages.....and lots of scallions over the top...Man..Thats eating..

I love Mondel Schnitzel too..With a cherry kirschvauker sauce...Yee hii... ( again the spelling, its been years )

[Willy]

My cooking is more along the lines of trying to make a dish that I like to eat. My mom taught us boys the basics of cooking and left us to our own devices beyond that. So most of my cooking isn't real fancy. But I do love tex-mex so I do a lot of chili, enchiladas, chimichangas and tacos. But I've been known to do italian and chinese too.

One of my favorite tricks for batchelor cooking one pot meals is to mix cooked hamburger into rice a roni box dishes. But most of my cooking involves beef or venison in it. I'm not much on chicken or pork.

[tigisfat]

I am by no means a trained chef, but I have an alternative way of making mac and cheese.

Start with a simple homemade alfredo sauce, make only a few cups.
Start adding mozzarella out the yin-yang. Parmesan too, if you have it, but in lesser quantities.
Add sauteed minced garlic, and elephant garlic for a sweeter taste.
Add crushed red pepper to taste.
Lastly, add crushed sun-dried tomatoes until the sauce is a light orange. Don't overdo it.
Add more cheese until you think it can't handle more.

Add and stir into one pound of the pasta of your choice.



Thanks for the ideas, guys. I'm going to try a few of them out.