The mighty left over

In the column prior, about the dominance of Trader Joe's supplied homemade pizza, the left over ingredients were quite hefty. A good amount of mushrooms and sliced red onions were left.

And, as mentioned prior, a meal was quilted together to blanket the taste buds of any starving student, both in pocket and in mouth.

The dinner time meal was comprised of grilled, seasoned chicken breasts, rice and sauteed veggies, as well as the quite uncommon, but none the less delicious vegetable, swiss chard.

For college students, this may sound completely unreasonable and out of the price range and or skill, but the only difference between this and a lean cuisine is the dishes and a few extra minutes.

The chicken used was Foster Farms bag of frozen chicken breasts. The bag is about two and a half pounds and costs about $10.00. For the amount of chicken that is given, it is a pretty good deal.

The swiss chard you can get at pretty much every grocery store that carries a moderate amount of produce. For those who don't know what swiss chard is, the best way to describe it is an almost sweeter version of spinach. It's a leaf that looks a lot like romaine lettuce, big in size and green. But swiss chard seems to be more billowy with the way the leaf sprouts up and out from the main stem. It is usually tucked away in a corner, and might require some assistance in finding, but for the most part, it is usually labeled on the twisty tie that holds the leaves together.

It usually isn't to expensive and comes in a bundle about half the size of it's leafy look a like- romaine lettuce.

The only other ingredient is rice, which is a pretty common thing in a kitchen. If not, it should be and it's a pretty cheap item. Even if it's not used for a year, it is still good.


So, to put it all together, you'll need two pots and a sauce pan. Use a medium size pot to cook the rice. Boil two cups of water and pour the rice in. Leave it uncovered and turn it down a bit. Cook this for about seven to eight minutes.

In order to steam the swiss chard, there is a device cleverly named... a steamer.
They are moderately cheap and can be bought at places like Target or Safeway.


Fill the second pot with just a bit of water. Wash and cut the stems off of the swiss chard. Cover the pot and let the water boil underneath the steamer until the leaves are soft. It will cook down quite a bit.

For the veggies, the fun begins. Put about two spoonfuls of olive oil in the frying pan - just enough to cover it. Let it heat up, you can usually tell by when it starts to smell a bit, or the oil is steaming. Drop the veggies in and stir them every now and then until they are all soft and cooked. I kept the sliced mushrooms and red onions in a plastic bag in the fridge.I usually add some seasoned salt, but I add that to everything. It's a staple in all my meals.

Last, but definitely the best, is the chicken. I used a George Foreman grill which is amazing for any and all quick meals. It cooks the chicken breast - frozen - in more or less, depending on size, five minutes.

To serve it, put the veggies over the rice and add the chicken and swiss chard on the plate. I'd recommend adding some salt to the swiss chard.

Overall, the meal probably costs about $4.00 once everything is divided up and averaged out.

Homemade Pizza Revolution

Pizza parties will forever be revolutionized.

No longer are they exclusive to the twelve and under, huddled in the party room at the local Round Table. Think back to your childhood when mom wouldn't take you out to your favorite pizza place, but instead she made the dreaded home baked pizza. They never tasted the same and never came close to as juicy and delicious as those greasy slices from the pizza joint down the street.

Take those thoughts and erase them completely, throw them out the window. Trader Joe's markets is writing their declaration of war on bad homemade pizza. Watch out Boboli, you're "Authentic Italian Crust" is being challenged to a dual of taste buds.


Trader Joe's sells all the ingredients one needs to make one scrumptious pizza pie. They have three different kinds of pizza dough you can try: garlic herb, plain white, or whole wheat. The doughs come in a bag, lightly covered in oil to keep them from sticking to the bag.

The great thing about the doughs is that since they are not baked, you don't get that dry, "all crust with a little pinch of toppings" taste in your mouth. It bakes in the same out of time it takes for the cheese and other toppings to be cooked all the way through.

The doughs sit in the refrigerated section, conveniently right next to a tub labeled "Pizza Sauce", which is a bit contradictory considering Trader Joe's is very intimidating for the new shopper. If you don't know exactly where the product is or what it looks like, it can be quite difficult to try and find. Spaghetti sauce works good for pizza sauce as well, but the pizza sauce compliments the dough better.

Mozzarella cheese is a couple sections down from the pizza dough. I prefer buying whole mozzarella and then grating it myself, but they come in pre-shredded bags. Also, the cheese comes in whole milk or skim milk. I prefer whole milk, although more fatty, the taste is uncompromisable.

From then on out, the fixings are all by choice. There is sliced pepperoni a bit farther down from the cheese, hanging underneath what little selection of lunch meats Trader Joe's has. The pepperoni has a kick, but isn't spicy per say.

There are plenty of other things that you can find at the store to put on the pizza. And that is part of the beauty of making a pizza at home, it can be made strictly to ones liking. The customization of the pizza is limitless.


My pizza includes (with prices):
-Garlic Herb dough: $1.29
-Trader Joe's Pizza Sauce: $2.29
-Whole mozzarella cheese (in whole or skim milk): 4.29
(just the basics cost all together: $7.87)
-Sliced Pepperoni: $2.79
-10 oz. Sliced Mushrooms: $2.29
-8 oz. Sliced Black Olives: $1.19
-two Red Onions (they come in pairs): N/A (Since I don't buy these every time I get supplies to make a pizza, I didn't keep records of how much it costs, but I know it wasn't that expensive.)


The great part about the pizza is that pretty much everything gets used in one batch with the exception of the mushrooms and the onions. There are just the right proportion of mushrooms and sliced onions left over to make another meal out of it.

I usually bag the left overs and saute (lightly cook) them together in a little bit of oil sometime later in the week. I put it over rice and cook up either some chicken or some breaded fish and it turns out pretty yummy. Surprisingly, it doesn't take that long to cook either.

But back to the pizza. The cool thing about all of this is that it's a great meal to cook with friends. Have each one of your friends buy an ingredient, and then each of them prep their own. One friend to stretch the dough, cut the onions, wash the mushrooms, open and drain the olives, shred the cheese, and so on.

A cautionary note about the dough, before you lay it out on a cookie sheet, make sure that you spray it with some form of Pam, or rub it with some butter to make sure the dough doesn't stick. Flour works good to, but I find that if you use to much flour, you can taste it on the pizza which is never good. I use a combination of the two, I use Pam so the flour has something to stick to. I pour a bit of flour onto the cookie sheet and then shake off the excess into the garbage.

While the pizza is cooking, it's a good opportunity to socialize and hang. When the pizza is done, it cooks for about 40 minutes, then it's chow time.

So grab your appetites and your machetes, there's about to be a taste revolution. Bad taste buds will no longer reign in the land of homemade pizza, viva la revolucion.

Input

Here's the deal, I need three ingredients from you guys, and then I, the magical meal maker, will try to stir up some fast, cheap, easy concoction of a meal for all you starving college students who miss the "homemade" stuff to enjoy. Then, I'll write about it; if it was good/bad, how it was made: measurements in English, equipment, seasoning, the whole nine yards.


So here's what I need:

1) a meat (or for vegetarians, tofu or rice and beans will do)

2) a vegetable

3) a carbohydrate (such as rice, pasta, etc), or some other ingredient to make a side dish.

EX: I need ingredients like:

1) skirt steak
2) corn
3) white rice




I'm not sure how this will go, or if the result will even make it up here. Comment back with ingredients by Friday afternoon and I'll get cooking.
Ideas include maybe something you never had time or courage to make? Let me know. I plan to write step by step how I did it, costs, measurements, the whole enchilada (yuck yuck)

Drink suggestions are also good. I am not sure if I will include them or not, but feel free to add.

Thanks!
the anonymous A