Your trusty signature recipe.

[Korin S.]

I'll start off by saying I'm not much of a chef. Last year I took a half-year cooking class, and most of it all went in one ear and out the other. A select few recipes have stuck firmly in my mind, though, and whenever I have to cook something, I fall back on those. I was wondering if anyone else had some of these? Some dish that you can dredge up from the back of your mind so you're not stuck serving sandwiches.

One that stuck with me was an easy pasta carbonara sauce. Before, things like carbonara baffled me because I had no clue how you could make something like that. Turns out, an easy way is to just add cheese to a bechamel sauce. I won't write a recipe, because I'd probably get the measurements wrong. So, just that tip for now; add a cup of cheese or so when you're stirring and waiting for the milk to thicken. Diced and fried bacon goes in there somewhere too. Then, just pour over boiled pasta of your choice.

Like I said, I'm not much of a chef. But for those more talented (most of you), if you don't mind, what's your signature dish?

[Ziel]

I don't know that I really have a signature dish. I'm wiling to attempt to make almost anything.

I'm kinda on a macaroni and cheese kick right now. I use an adaptation of the recipe from my mom's old Betty Crocker cookbook. It's rather tasty to substitute half or all of the cheese with pepperjack. I also enjoy making lasagna, because I can just eyeball quantities of everything. Similarly, when I make tacos, I season the meat myself so I don't have to use one of those sodium-packed flavor packets you can buy. I just kinda throw in various spices until it looks and smells about right. It's fun because it turns out slightly different every time I make it.  I also found a very good recipe for meatballs, but I've only had reason to make it once. I'd like to be able to pull that one back out again sometime soon.

[Narei Mooncatt]

Any time I'm at a family cookout or something, I like to make the mashed potatoes. It's simple, but I guess no one up where I live has had them this way and I'm requested to make it a fair bit. You need a 5 lb bag of new red potatoes, a stick of butter or margarine, milk, and an electric mixer.

Wash the potatoes but leave the skin on them. I guess you can peel them if you don't like the texture of skin on mashed potatoes, but I leave them on. Boil the potatoes until done and easy to cut with next to no effort, drain the water as much as you can. Cut the potatoes into smaller pieces, but don't need to fully mash them yet. Put them back onto high heat and cook out most of the water (cutting them helps this process), stirring constantly to prevent burning and remove from heat when done. Add the stick of butter and a little milk and blend on low with the mixer. As they are whipped, add more milk, a little at a time, until desired consistancy. You can also add in other condements like cheese, bacon pieces, sour cream, etc during whipping if you'd like.

[Ryffnah]

My mom invented a chicken enchilada recipe when I was young out of things that she had lying around the house that day.  If I need to make something for having people over for dinner, that's my default.  It involves diced chicken cooked with garlic, chili powder, and cilantro; a can of corn; a can of olives sliced; and a big can of tomato puree.  When that's all cooked up together, you roll it up in tortillas in a pan, spread some sour cream mixed with salsa on top, and then sprinkle mozzarella and parmesan cheese on top of that.  Then bake it for twenty minutes.  They're delicious.  It's my favorite recipe.

Edit:  Also diced onions.  Cooked with the chicken.  I forgot that before.

[Ziel]

Any time I'm at a family cookout or something, I like to make the mashed potatoes. It's simple, but I guess no one up where I live has had them this way and I'm requested to make it a fair bit. You need a 5 lb bag of new red potatoes, a stick of butter or margarine, milk, and an electric mixer.

Wash the potatoes but leave the skin on them. I guess you can peel them if you don't like the texture of skin on mashed potatoes, but I leave them on. Boil the potatoes until done and easy to cut with next to no effort, drain the water as much as you can. Cut the potatoes into smaller pieces, but don't need to fully mash them yet. Put them back onto high heat and cook out most of the water (cutting them helps this process), stirring constantly to prevent burning and remove from heat when done. Add the stick of butter and a little milk and blend on low with the mixer. As they are whipped, add more milk, a little at a time, until desired consistancy. You can also add in other condements like cheese, bacon pieces, sour cream, etc during whipping if you'd like.

Sounds tasty. I've always loved mashed potatoes made with the redskins. If not those, I do Yukon Gold.

Something I've done lately when doing mashed potatoes is cooking them in essentially a 'tea' of seasonings. Add whatever herbs you want to the boiling water. Throw in a couple cloves of garlic. Just smash the clove enough that it's opened up but still in one piece. And also get some onion in there. Once they're boiled, take them out and dump the water with all the seasonings. You might need to rinse some of the herbs off the potatoes, too. You end up with a light flavoring to the potatoes, but they won't have anything visibly in them.

[Narei Mooncatt]

Bleh, onions. Whoever thought those were edible needed to be institutionalized. XD

[Ryffnah]

Any time I'm at a family cookout or something, I like to make the mashed potatoes. It's simple, but I guess no one up where I live has had them this way and I'm requested to make it a fair bit. You need a 5 lb bag of new red potatoes, a stick of butter or margarine, milk, and an electric mixer.

Wash the potatoes but leave the skin on them. I guess you can peel them if you don't like the texture of skin on mashed potatoes, but I leave them on. Boil the potatoes until done and easy to cut with next to no effort, drain the water as much as you can. Cut the potatoes into smaller pieces, but don't need to fully mash them yet. Put them back onto high heat and cook out most of the water (cutting them helps this process), stirring constantly to prevent burning and remove from heat when done. Add the stick of butter and a little milk and blend on low with the mixer. As they are whipped, add more milk, a little at a time, until desired consistancy. You can also add in other condements like cheese, bacon pieces, sour cream, etc during whipping if you'd like.

Sounds tasty. I've always loved mashed potatoes made with the redskins. If not those, I do Yukon Gold.

Something I've done lately when doing mashed potatoes is cooking them in essentially a 'tea' of seasonings. Add whatever herbs you want to the boiling water. Throw in a couple cloves of garlic. Just smash the clove enough that it's opened up but still in one piece. And also get some onion in there. Once they're boiled, take them out and dump the water with all the seasonings. You might need to rinse some of the herbs off the potatoes, too. You end up with a light flavoring to the potatoes, but they won't have anything visibly in them.

My mom always left the skin on, so that's what I'm used to, and I like them that way.

Making them with red potatoes though is an interesting idea.  I hadn't thought of that, and I may have to try it some time.  The tea of seasonings sounds good too.