Breakfast - - Page 21

by ML

Motel Room Gourmet: Desperation in a Coffee Pot

As you know well by now, we hardly stick to just the gourmet food items here at Endless Simmer. Sometimes you find yourself in a situation where you just don’t have much to work with.

And this my friends, is what a hungry ML feeds her boyfriend while road tripping. After 13 hours of driving, we found ourselves in a seedy motel in a sketch Missouri town with no food. Well, besides a can of Quaker oats and some tuna noodle casserole that had been sitting in the car all day….

Josh wanted to eat the tuna noodle casserole that was…well, lets just say not good anymore. I didn’t want to risk the other driver having food poisoning, so I pulled out a classic motel room trick and made some coffee pot oatmeal.

Yeah yeah, I know Alton Brown did this on his show, but I’ve been doing cool weird shit like this since I was a freshman in college (who hasn’t?) However, instead of actually making the oatmeal IN the coffee pot (we wanted coffee in the morning, and I wasn’t cleaning that damn pot), we poured hot water and oatmeal into tupperware containers and just let it cook right there. We had stolen bananas from the previous night’s hotel, which made a perfect accompaniment to our…gruel. Cooking? Hardly. But it fit the bill.

I know I’m not the only one. What have you prepared and eaten out of desperation?

in Breakfast 3 comments

by tvff

Spend vs. Skimp

As the noted economist and Nobel laureate Steely Dan once said, “Times are hard…you’re afraid to pay the fee.” While Mr. Dan was not necessarily talking about our current economic downturn, the sentiment remains true.

When it comes to buying food, though, there are times when it makes sense to cut some corners and there are times when you just have to bite the bullet and shell out for quality. The smart shopper, however, knows the difference. There are some no-brainers out there. Never buy cheap gourmet ingredients like prosciutto. These types of purchases don’t come often, and when they do you’re usually happy to lay out some cash.

But what about the staples that form the backbone of your kitchen? How can you get the best bang for your buck without overspending for something that won’t pay off? Check out the list below for our top three best investments for your shopping dollars and the three items you can nab from the bargain bin.

by BS

Feed Us Back: Comments of the Week

– ESers don’t have much confidence in Padma Lakshmi’s sitcom hopes. harleytexas:

What a great show it will be, she’s such a talent and shines on Top Chef, it’s a sure-fire hit. Wow, what a load of shit I just wrote. No talent, not interesting and grating on the nerves…wheeeeeeeeeeeee!

C. Christy Concrete makes a fair point:

Whatever it is, it’s doomed to failure if her cleavage remains deeper than any potential story plots or character developments.

I’d say that’s debatable.

– miked is all for cereal with your beer:

I think you could pour a nice chocolate stout over a bowl of cocoa krispies. young’s for instance. also old rasputin is thick enough too. you could also brew a chocolate stout with cocoa krispies… at least the added sugars would be fermentable. itd probably impart some chocolate flavor. god knows what effect all the chemicals and additives would have on it tho.

While Jens points us towards some actual cereal-beer-instructions.

– And Hakuna Fritatta wins both best blog name and comment of the week for their thought’s on Rachael Ray’s risotto:

in Breakfast / Celebs / Drinks / TV 0 comments

by BS

Beer and Cereal — Together at Last?

Unlike gansie, I’m a serious lover of cereal. Like gansie, I’m also a pretty big fan of beer. Unfortunately, societal norms prevent me from pouring beer over my breakfast cereal. But I still haven’t given up on finding a way to unite these two favored food groups of mine. So I was pretty intrigued when I stumbled upon this post over at Accidental Hedonist:

I’ve either been reading way too much beer research of late, or there has to be a workable beer recipe found in the cereal aisle of your local grocery store.

In perusing the ingredient list of a box of Grape Nuts cereal, I read the following:

Whole grain wheat flour, wheat flour, malted barley flour, salt, dried yeast, soy lecithin

So, am I crazy, or is there a basic beer ingredient list in here?

Beer from cereal? Is it really possible? Because if so, I may have found my new calling in life: home-brewing batches of rice krispies beer, cinnamon toast crunch beer, and fruit loops beer.

Let’s hear from all you amateur brewers. Is cereal-brew the wave of the future? Or a sad bachelor’s pipe dream? And what’s the craziest thing you’ve ever tossed in a home brew?

(Photo: Slightlynorth)

in Breakfast / Drinks / Personal 9 comments

by BS

Feed Us Back: Comments of the Week

– Top Chef Masters has ya’ll missing Padma more than you might have thought. Summer:

I’m liking Kelly Choi less and less with every episode. The way she delivers her lines is grating… she emphasizes the end of every sentence to give the impression that what she is saying is SO IMPORTANT! and yet she never seems to have a valid comment to make about the food. She has none of Padma’s elegance.

– Everyone wants in on Britannia’s English Breakfast on a Bun creation. Although Lucy makes a fair point:

It’s not an English breakfast without HP and a cup of tea! Other than that it’s perfect.

– And finally, congrats to gansie on her second-place finish in the zucchini-garama masala foodie fight. Don’t miss battle #7: Pineapple and Basil. Mmmm!

PS – bonus comments of the week points to anyone who can explain what the eff is going on in the Kelly Choi pic above.

in Breakfast / Sandwich / TV 9 comments

by Russell Warnick

All of England on One Bun

Living in the US has taught me one thing: no matter what, no matter where, there is always an ultimate this or ultimate that, the ultimate burger, the ultimate hot dog, the ultimate blah blah blah…

I was watching a show the other week on this very topic, and the host was traveling the country in search of the ultimate/largest cheese steak. This got me thinking — it’s not all about being the biggest (cough cough), it’s about being the best. In my university town of Leeds there is a small cafe called the Crusty Bin. This eatery would serve up the best breakfast sandwich that has ever passed my lips. With this in mind there was only one thing left for me to do: recreate the Crusty Bin breakfast sandwich.

When I first told gansie that I intended on writing a post about a breakfast sandwich that I used to eat during my university life she immediately responded with, “I want it to start with a crazy university days’ story.” I suppose I could tell you about the time I gathered at the Crusty Bin with friends after our university summer ball, when after a night of drinking this was the only place we wanted to be. However, there was one person missing from our group because he was caught only hours earlier doing the dirty with his girlfriend in a portable loo in the grounds of one of England’s finest country estates… I can’t go any further as it wouldn’t be SFW. Or I could tell you the story of how I woke up the day after my 21st birthday, which also happened to be the day I handed in my final year dissertation — with a mohawk and an incredibly painful hangover which was cured by said sandwich. But I won’t.

You didn’t read this post to hear about me, you read this post due to the mouth watering picture above.

A gooey cross-section shot and the full deets on what’s in it after the jump…

in Bacon / Breakfast / Eggs / Endless Bacon / Featured / Sandwich 17 comments

by Bliz

I Just Need 20 Seconds of Your Time

…Ok, maybe a little bit more than that. I want to take a break from the Top Chef Masters interviews and random ingredients for a minute. First of all, let me say that it is, and will always be, the process of cooking; the smelling, touching, tasting, listening euphoria of being in a kitchen that manages to force me to sit on laptop after an entire day sitting behind my office computer and type endlessly about food adventures and exploits. All soap box aside, there are just some things that you can do in a kitchen that are too fucking cool not to tell the world about.

For anyone that is unfamiliar with the 20 second omelet, this is a cool technique that not only delivers a great final product, but shows you know a thing or two about one of the most difficult ingredients to cook well. That’s right gans, I’m going there, against my better judgment and in anticipation of your wrath, I wanna talk eggs.

in Breakfast / Cheese / Eggs / Recipe 6 comments