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No picture here, since it's essentially the same as the last time! Just my notes on cooking. For some time now I've been thinking it takes me way too long to prepare a meal, so I thought I should peer at that more closely.
Rice: washed ahead of time and set the cooker to have it done by 5:00 PM.
Meat: cut up and started marinading in soy sauce and ground pepper. Sirloin tips. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
4:50 PM: started cutting carrots (1 lb). A later start than I'd planned, but it's not like it hurts the rice to be kept warm a while.
5:05 PM: done cutting carrots, started preheating oven to 400F
5:15 PM: gave up on grating ginger, put the ground-off ginger into the steak and stirred it, then started mincing the remainder
5:24 PM: finished mincing ginger; I lightly grease a baking pan (well, foil) and put the chicken in, then put it in and set the baking timer for 20 mins. Start sautee'ing the ginger.
5:32 PM: notice that asparagus is thinner, change cutting strategy to 1.25" long pieces. That's done. Stirred the ginger a few times, it's nice gold brown now. Meat goes in now!
5:38 PM: everything happening at once, augh. Stirred meat to collect ginger bits, squeezed orange sauce out into carrots (uncovering), flipped meat to make sure it doesn't overcook. Recalled I hadn't added salt to meat, do so now.
5:45 PM: everything still happening at once. Decanted meat into small bowl, drained juice back into wok. Put asparagus into wok, season with garlic, pepper, salt. Stirred sauce into carrots, notice it's very liquid. Added pineapple chunks.
5:48 PM: things starting to calm down. Took chicken out of oven, set it aside as the carrots/sauce/pineapple need to be brought to temperature. Started cleaning and putting away dishes used so far.
5:52 PM: I have added a cornstarch slurry to the carrots/sauce/pineapple and stirred it in. Once it starts to bubble, I can mix the chicken in.
5:58 PM: relax a bit. Oops. How long has the asparagus been cooking? Turn up temperature on sauce, cover it to induce boiling. Mix beef back into asparagus, set temperature low.
6:00 PM: taste-test beef, determine it's about done, don't want to overcook it. Sauce still isn't boiling? Oops, didn't turn it up to 6 as I thought I had. Rectified.
6:05 PM: sauce boiling, yay! Mix in chicken, start stirring. Realize chopsticks aren't doing it. Switch to spoon.
6:08 PM: done!
One pound of beef, a similar amount of fried chicken, and I wound up with 7 meals-- my plate, plus six "prepared meals" for future nomming.
Rice: washed ahead of time and set the cooker to have it done by 5:00 PM.
Meat: cut up and started marinading in soy sauce and ground pepper. Sirloin tips. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
4:50 PM: started cutting carrots (1 lb). A later start than I'd planned, but it's not like it hurts the rice to be kept warm a while.
5:05 PM: done cutting carrots, started preheating oven to 400F
5:15 PM: gave up on grating ginger, put the ground-off ginger into the steak and stirred it, then started mincing the remainder
5:24 PM: finished mincing ginger; I lightly grease a baking pan (well, foil) and put the chicken in, then put it in and set the baking timer for 20 mins. Start sautee'ing the ginger.
5:32 PM: notice that asparagus is thinner, change cutting strategy to 1.25" long pieces. That's done. Stirred the ginger a few times, it's nice gold brown now. Meat goes in now!
5:38 PM: everything happening at once, augh. Stirred meat to collect ginger bits, squeezed orange sauce out into carrots (uncovering), flipped meat to make sure it doesn't overcook. Recalled I hadn't added salt to meat, do so now.
5:45 PM: everything still happening at once. Decanted meat into small bowl, drained juice back into wok. Put asparagus into wok, season with garlic, pepper, salt. Stirred sauce into carrots, notice it's very liquid. Added pineapple chunks.
5:48 PM: things starting to calm down. Took chicken out of oven, set it aside as the carrots/sauce/pineapple need to be brought to temperature. Started cleaning and putting away dishes used so far.
5:52 PM: I have added a cornstarch slurry to the carrots/sauce/pineapple and stirred it in. Once it starts to bubble, I can mix the chicken in.
5:58 PM: relax a bit. Oops. How long has the asparagus been cooking? Turn up temperature on sauce, cover it to induce boiling. Mix beef back into asparagus, set temperature low.
6:00 PM: taste-test beef, determine it's about done, don't want to overcook it. Sauce still isn't boiling? Oops, didn't turn it up to 6 as I thought I had. Rectified.
6:05 PM: sauce boiling, yay! Mix in chicken, start stirring. Realize chopsticks aren't doing it. Switch to spoon.
6:08 PM: done!
One pound of beef, a similar amount of fried chicken, and I wound up with 7 meals-- my plate, plus six "prepared meals" for future nomming.
