Fish - Chips + Veggies!

As a newly burgeoning chef who once gave herself a horrific episode of food poisoning, I am always cautious when cooking meat. Chicken is my safe zone, and even then I tread carefully. Luckily, many groceries come in a variety of pre-cooked and frozen options that allow me to ease my transition into real cooking. Today I decided to make myself some fish sticks. They're quick, easy, and vaguely healthy. My fish sticks of choice were Ian's "All-Natural Allergy-Friendly" fish sticks. They were actually not the best fish sticks I've had, and I kind of cheated and microwaved them, but I made it up in the extra helpings of veggies.

First, I bought some fresh green beans forever ago at the farmer's market. I have never cooked green beans by myself before, but I helped my mother and aunt cook them enough that I know you have to rip off the ends or something. I think you're also supposed to take out that middle stringy part also, but I didn't want to get too complicated. Here, you can see the prepped string beans on the left, and the to-be-prepped beans on the right:

Next, I broke out my trusty Key Food brand canned corn (unsalted!). Of course, only I could mess up heating up canned corn. I wasn't watching it too carefully and some kernels split. Idiot moment but they were still delicious. 

After boiling the green beans for about 10 minutes in salted water, I drained them, then threw them back in the hot pot with a sliver of (unsalted) butter, salt, and pepper. Stirred em up and voila! Fresh cooked green beans!

Altogether I ended up eating more vegetables than fish sticks, which is fine with me. The green beans aren't as flavorful as the corn, but you could always add more butter to both veggies. In my research (aka: googling "how to cook green beans"), a lot of people seem to really dig adding bacon and/or toasted almonds to their green beans. I had neither in my kitchen but I'm sure it is delicious both ways (especially the bacon route). May have to try it next time, but it was definitely a good start. And of course, I have some leftover corn and green beans for tomorrow... or tonight.

Tips for Enjoying

• Again, give yourself veggie options. Like I said, the green beans were not that flavorful, but I always love corn so it was nice having that to go to when I got a little tired of the greens.
• If you're not as health conscious, be generous with the butter. It really does make everything better, particularly corn and green beans. Same goes for bacon fat.
• Add some salt. I probably didn't add enough (about two cranks from my salt grinder). It does bring out the flavor since green beans can be bland.

- V

Broccoli... the worst kind of vegetable

Oh broccoli... the greenest of greens. The veggiest of veggies. The scourge of vegetable-haters everywhere. Not, unfortunately, a small tree where a family of gummi bears live. One of the age-old methods of dealing with these green abominations is smothering them in cheese. One way to kick it up a notch, while adding another vegetable, is to follow this Kraft recipe for "Hearty Sausage Skillet."

First, another disclaimer: I am not a Kraft representative. However, my family has been getting the Kraft Food & Family magazines for a few years (back when they were free), and I think they're great. They feature a lot of kid-friendly recipes. By kid-friendly, I mean they are so easy a 5-year old could make it (or a law student with the cooking skills of a 5 year old) and enjoy it at the same time. The strings attached to it is that the recipes feature a lot of Kraft brand or affiliated company products. Not a huge deal, but it's a little annoying sometimes.

Anyway, this recipe is super easy, quick, filling, and hides the vegetables under some good old-fashioned (Velveeta) mac & cheese. The recipe calls for Kielbasa, but obviously you can leave that out or substitute it with whatever (potentially healthier) alternative you want. Like I said, I am a meat eater. I have made this recipe a few times and used everything from fresh kielbasa to pre-packaged turkey sausage. This time around, I picked up some Aidells chicken sausages. It's pre-cooked so I didn't have to worry about not cooking it enough. Yes, I have given myself food poisoning before. The diced tomatoes are easy enough - I just picked up a can of Hunt's at the corner market.



I follow the recipe exactly, since deviating usually gets me in trouble. My first bump in the road came when the recipe called for "covering" the skillet. As a 20-something living for the first time on her own, I also only have cobbled together kitchenware. That means I have no Kitchen Aid mixer of my dreams, fancy cast iron skillets, or lids that properly fit my skillet...



Yup, sometimes you gotta rough it out. This messed up my timing somewhat, but it wasn't a big deal until I threw in the broccoli. I found that the broccoli was still pretty crunchy after a few minutes, plus the pan was getting pretty dry since the steam was obviously not having trouble staying in the pan. I added a little bit more water, then eventually just threw my hands up and covered up as much broccoli as I could:



I probably ended up cooking it for longer than the prescribed 5 minutes. In the end, though, it worked and was delicious. I ended up with a colorful, veggie-rific, filling meal that obviously included leftovers for later:

Tips for Enjoying

• Cut up the broccoli into teeny teeny pieces. I ended up putting in more broccoli than the recipe called for, so I made up for it by cutting it up super tiny.
• Make sure it is thoroughly cooked. Really, broccoli is bad enough when it's cooked, don't worsen it by under-cooking it.
• If you're looking to make it a smidge healthier, don't add in all the cheese mix. I also went for the 2% milk option, which tastes just fine to me, even if it's always a little abnormal in color.

- V