Your Best One-Pot Meals

What is your go-to recipe?

If you’ve read the book One Pot Wonders, you know that there are tons of meals you can create that only require one pot. Whether you want to leave the slow cooker on all day or make a quick stir fry after work, the possibilities are only limited by your imagination.

Skillet Steak with vegetables is a favorite recipe in the book, as is chicken ratatouille. The best thing about these recipes is that not only do they incorporate most food groups to give you a well-balanced meal, but they also require less cleanup than many other meals since they only require one pot!

What are your favorite one-pot meals to make at home?

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Food & Beverage
Vegetarian / Vegan
Home Cooking
Recipes
Desserts/Sweets

Cozymeal Lets You Learn to Cook at Home

Cook with a chef in your own kitchen

Sure, you can learn to cook with celebrity chefs from the comfort of your home by watching Food Network and pausing it (a lot), or you can check out a cookbook to follow, but some people just learn better from a classroom-like environment. You may not want to leave the house at all, though, so where does that leave you? With Cozymeal, you have options.

If you live in New York City, you can use the app to find local chefs that are willing to visit you at home and teach you to cook without having to leave the house. You can even invite friends over to join in your culinary adventure! You’ll learn to prepare a three-course meal at your chef’s elbow in a professional yet friendly and fun manner.

Have you ever taken a learn-to-cook class from home or otherwise? How did it go and which classes would you recommend? 

 

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Culture
Lifestyle
Food & Beverage
Home Cooking

Have You Tried the Air Fryer?

Move over, pressure cooker: now the air fryer is all the rage. Air fryers work very simply: they take a few moments to fire up, then apply heavy air pressure to fry your foods without adding grease and oil. Pretty cool, right?

Hungry Girl recently tested the air fryer to see if it was as amazing as it sounds and found that it was not only just as effective as a deep fryer, but that it also was easier to clean up, faster to use and had the additional health benefits of less oil, butter or grease required for frying. This thing could be revolutionary. Plus, it’s not a single-use tool; you can also use it for roasting, baking and grilling any other foods that fit in it.

What do you think of the air fryer? Will you be trying it?

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Food & Beverage
Vegetarian / Vegan
Home Cooking

At-Home Coffeehouse Beverages

There’s just something about getting your tea or coffee made at a coffeehouse rather than doing it yourself at home. Whether it’s the plethora of syrups and toppings you don’t have at home, the fancy equipment or just the age old rule that everything tastes better when someone else whips it up for you, most people enjoy a drink out rather than in—but many avoid it since it does tend to get pricey.

According to International Delight, you can make your own delicious latte in 5 seconds with their new One Touch Latte. It’s pretty much a spray can that sprays latte ingredients into your coffee instead of whipped topping. In the commercials, it appears to “stir” the coffee as it’s sprayed so your coffee is made in seconds.

Hmm. Do you think this new One Touch Latte will be as good as your favorite coffeehouse drink? Have you tried it or do you plan to? Share your reviews below.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Food & Beverage
Home Cooking
Desserts/Sweets

St. Patrick's Day Feast

As St. Patty’s rapidly approaches, plenty of hungry bloggers are turning toward corned beef and cabbage recipes. While you might make your own, many people also turn to their favorite local butcher, baker and candlestick maker (well, perhaps not that last one) to pick up a quick feast to celebrate their Irish heritage. Between that, green beer, soda bread and more green beer, festivities can be covered pretty quickly, but there’ s always something special about making your own corned beef as well.

Do you prepare your own Irish feast, pick up your fixings or dine out for the occasion? Are you ready for St. Patrick’s Day this year, or are you planning on a fish dinner that Friday? Share your meal plan in the chat below.

 

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Healthy Fast Food?

It’s becoming a possibility! Serving chopped veggies and fruits really isn’t some mysterious practice that fast food giants can’t decipher without a colander and Ouija board; it’s a pretty simple concept. It’s just not as cheap and comes with a bigger risk—if people don’t flock to the fresh produce, it’s in big danger of being wasted. There are ways to circumvent that, of course, and the restaurants that are making it big by selling healthier menu items must get that.

While McDonald’s, Taco Bell and other companies are working to cut some of the junk from their foods, other companies are offering completely whole foods at the low cost and low prep time you expect from fast foods. From Salad and Go to LYFE Kitchen, there are healthy chains for every taste and lifestyle.

Have you tried healthy fast food? Is it even available where you live? If so, what did you think of it?

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Easy Overnight Oatmeal

If you’ve never tried overnight oatmeal, you are in for a treat! Overnight oats give you the convenience of a quick, no-cook breakfast with a little evening prep work, but they also give you a delightful, thicker version of oatmeal that’s much more dessert-like.

All you have to do is soak your favorite oats overnight in a container (glass works great) with your preferred milk (cow’s, almond, coconut, etc.). You can also use yogurt or another dairy/dairy alternative product if you prefer. I’ve never used ricotta but I’ve used it in warm oatmeal and I bet it would work well, too. Mix both up and add in any fruit, honey, chia or flax seed or any other ingredients you like, then store it in the fridge for a fast, easy-to-spoon morning breakfast that packs a powerful punch!

You can add fruit in your oatmeal but don’t add any crunchy toppings until you serve it since that will just make it soggy. What is your favorite oatmeal recipe?

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Food & Beverage
Home Cooking

How do you make French toast?

Share your recipes below

French toast. It’s one of the simplest meals you can make, and you can serve it for breakfast, lunch or dinner. You can even eat it as a dessert! But the question is, which way do you make it? There are dozens of ways to make French toast and each way has its own benefits.

An egg in a basket style of French toast has the added benefit of the egg in the center (which can be scrambled, if you prefer). Stuffed French toast is decadent, but baked French toast with brown sugar, cinnamon and sugar may be even more sumptuous for the palate. Whether it’s fried or toasted, drenched in syrup or fruit, or even used as sandwich bread, French toast is a pretty versatile food.

How do you make your French toast? Which is your preferred method to eat it—and to cook it? Share your favorite recipes in the chat.

 

 

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Klat Categories: 
Food & Beverage
Vegetarian / Vegan
Home Cooking
Recipes
Desserts/Sweets

Is that parmesan or wood pulp?

Surprisingly, it might be both

The FDA recently posted a warning to consumers: many store brands of grated parmesan cheese are not 100% parmesan, as their labels proclaim. Some of them are up to 20% wood pulp.

In fact, some so-called "parmesan" cheeses contain no actual cheese at all. (But lots of wood pulp.)

It all began back in 2012, when the FDA received an anonymous tip. They raided the Castle Cheese factory in Pennsylvania and found that exactly zero percent of the Market Pantry brand "100% Parmesan Cheese" sold at Target was made of parmesan cheese. It turned out to be an amalgamation of Swiss, mozzarella, cheddar cheese, and cellulose (a.k.a. wood pulp).

Anonymous industry executives have been quoted as saying that some grated parmesan cheese brands can be up to 20% wood pulp. A small amount of cellulose is considered acceptable in grated cheese, 2 to 40 percent, to help keep it from clumping. But 20%? No.

The best way to ensure you are getting the cheese you want is to buy a chunk of parmesan, and grate it yourself. It's easy to do, and it's so much more delicious than the stuff in the plastic canister!

Bananas are the #1 food

Most-purchased food item in the nation

Tech Insider was curious about what was the #1 most purchased food item in the country, so they asked Walmart, the country's largest retailer. The winner by a wide margin: bananas, with over 1.5 billion pounds sold last year.

The humble banana has easily unseated other grocery staples, including everything from ground beef to apples, by virtue of its ease of use and family-friendly nature. Kids love bananas, probably because they are the fruit which is most like candy. (A large banana has about as much sugar as a Snickers bar.) Moms like them because they are at least nominally healthy, with some fiber and potassium in there. (Although many common foods are much higher in potassium, including yogurt, spinach, and dried apricots.)

Bananas are also probably purchased often because they go bad so quickly! Or maybe that's just my own anti-banana sentiment. On the up side, bananas are very portable. It's hard to eat an apple or an orange at your desk without getting your hands sticky, but the banana's peel provides hand protection from the messy fruit itself.

Pages