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The Sad Bastard Cookbook
- toniotilli 3y ago[flagged]
- toniotilli 3y ago[flagged]
- dredmorbius 3y agoSeeing as the JS-based download link seems broken for me, the book is also available at the Internet Archive: <https://archive.org/details/sad-bastard-cookbook https://archive.org/details/sad-bastard-cookbook>
- jmspring 3y agoThe preface is ridiculous. Salads, PBJs, Ramen, rice and veggies, english muffins / rice cakes and PB/nutella. I'm not sure why this is a thing.
- carabiner 3y agoIt's kind of like TikTok trend of low energy / depression meals.
- jmspring 3y agoI'm voted down for looking at the link and giving a half dozen options without reading the link.
- xingped 3y agoDon't underestimate the stresses, struggles, and conditions people are dealing with in life that make tasks difficult which may seem trivial to you.
- jmspring 3y agoLook at the link, it's more "stessful" than the short list I provided.
- chewonbananas 3y agoThere was a 6 month period in my life where 3 slices a bread per day and cup of tea per day were all I could afford. When that ran out it was cornflakes and tea. Last week in the month was just tea. I had this novel idea of crumbling some bread, mixing it up with water to create a paste and then applying the paste to the 2 remaining slices. That was my Sad Bastard Menu.
- kseistrup 3y agoI believe the point is “… for the zero spoons crowd.” Some days there are just not drive or energy (“spoons”) enough to think about what to eat, and much less to prepare it. This booklet could be of some help here. The Spoon Theory: https://butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory/ https://butyoudontlooksick.com/articles/written-by-christine...
- rocqua 3y agoIs it ridiculous because it is too complicated, or too sinple?
- cooper_ganglia 3y agoThe funny thing is, I’m not even sure if you mean that this is ridiculous because it’s so simple or because it’s so complicated. I say this, because, when I was at the worst of my depressive state, and still occasionally every now and then, I get to the point where I just can’t do anything at all and if there’s more than one or two steps between me and eating, I’ll just go days without eating at all, this kind of depression menu is the exact kind of menu that I was looking for that period of time. Something simple, something fast, something easy. I didn’t even have clean dishes available because I was too depressed to do anything, so if it required any level of cooking more than what the microwave and a paper bowl could handle, then I just wouldn’t eat. I literally would go days without eating because the mental energy to even chew and swallow wasn’t there. I’m glad there are people making cookbooks like this.
- theideaofcoffee 3y agoI hope you are doing better now.
- anders_p 3y agoIt exists because some people barely have enough money to get by. It exists because there are people who weren't fortunate enough to have parents that taught how to cook. It can be a challenge to get a varied diet, when you only have spare change and lack the skills & knowledge that many take for granted. You sound like you lack some ability to empathize with other people's struggles in life - and that you are blind to the privileges you've had in your own life. Not everyone has access to the same resources & knowledge that you have. I know how to cook, but have been dirt-poor in periods of my life. A book like this one (with 50 recipes that cost less than $10) helped me get through those times without having to eat the same 2-3 dishes for months.
- quickthrower2 3y agoReminds me of a non satire student cookbook where recipes are sectioned by what utensils and cooking appliances you have at hand. E.g. one pot, frying pan, etc. all the way up to, well a normal kitchen.
- plufz 3y agoOr the sad microwave cooking https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TTp1iWAHHko https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TTp1iWAHHko
- Savely 3y agoAs a student myself I’d appreciate all those recipe sites to have a filter by appliances. Seems half of recipes involving meat requires a stove I don’t have.
- denkmoon 3y agohttps://www.amazon.com/NutriChef-Portable-Induction-Cooktop-Electronic-Flameless/dp/B08CHGPBW3 https://www.amazon.com/NutriChef-Portable-Induction-Cooktop-... Perhaps a single burner induction cooktop is in your budget, which you can use to brown/fry meat.
- SapporoChris 3y agoThank you for posting this. It made me realize that with this very portable device I can eliminate a stove from dwelling requirements.
- cinntaile 3y agoA lot of dishes would require more than one of these, at which point you might as well get an actual stove.
- Eisenstein 3y agoWith an Instant Pot, an induction burner, and a toaster oven you can make anything that would require a normal kitchen, just in smaller portions (as in, you aren't cooking a whole turkey or a giant casserole).
- nikanj 3y agoCan I easily read this on an iPhone somehow? The download does not seem to start, I just get the ad page instead
- carabiner 3y agoWould work better as a webpage with clickable ToC. I'm not gonna print out a 146 page doc with such recipes as boxed mac and cheese.
- kseistrup 3y ago> webpage And, as an extension of that: a real, reflowable, searchable, bookmarkable ebook.
- mdp2021 3y agoEarly stopper. Since you are there, you could make the contents into a reorganized sqlite file for queries such as "Which dishes contain pasta or broccoli". (For only tentative searches, you know you have Transformers.) Edit: myself, I would also reorganize the contents in a multipanel demoscene interface such as Crusaders' "Bass-o-matic" ( https://media.demozoo.org/screens/s/f4/b1/d9ee.107542.png https://media.demozoo.org/screens/s/f4/b1/d9ee.107542.png ), but with queries, selectors and hyperlinks, but that may just be me.
- r4indeer 3y agoThe page numbers in the PDF ToC are clickable.
- swarnie 3y ago> I'm not gonna print out a 146 page doc Excellent, with no index you would absolutely need a search function which paper can't provide.
- jmspring 3y agoHow many commenting / voting actually followed through and downloaded the content? The content itself is a mess (they admit to it) and sensible alternatives are an easy first pass. The link is worth looking at and the recipes aren't bad. But "so you don't die" is hyperbole and you can survive on less. I live in a food void and cooking is a passion. The link isn't bad, but it's approach is over the top.
- yuppiepuppie 3y agoMy wife and I both did. I thought the downloaded content is great. It’s a cookbook that I actually find entertaining to read instead of the typical over the top cookbooks out there. I also enjoyed its sense of humor and sarcasm. Perhaps it flies over the head of some people…
- mst 3y agoThe "so you don't die" is both black humour and a reference to it being things you might be willing/able to both assemble and eat while exhausted, depressed or otherwise impaired. I've had days when I can't get past the activation energy required to use a frying pan, but a microwaved poached egg on toast is just about within my mental capacity. I've had days when I can't deal with anything with a significant flavour or complicated texture, but I can manage to eat a bowl of ramen over the course of an hour or so. It's not about what you -can- survive on, the anticipated limiting factor here is the human themselves.
- stOneskull 3y ago> How many commenting / voting actually followed through and downloaded the content? i did and like it. i find it funny light reading.
- Daneel_ 3y agoI did. It’s good. It’s aimed at people like me whose sole thought is “ugh, cooking? Again?” Food is nutrients. Cooking is time spent making the nutrients edible. The more I can minimise that wasted time (both cooking and eating) the more time I have to spent on useful things. Think of how exciting your laundry is to do. Now do it three times a day and listen to people who gush about how much they love it. That’s what it’s like. Sorry, it’s laundry; I hate it. “So you don’t die” is basically my real thought process - 3pm rolls round and I’m thinking “I should probably eat something.. ugh”
- ehPReth 3y agoI wish I could just take one pill a day (or three) for nutrition (and satiating hunger) and not have to eat meals at all. That would be amazing, not to have to deal with food. Buying, preparing, ordering, over eating.
- wodenokoto 3y agoThere are quite a few companies that deals with this, usually in the form of a shake rather than a pill. I think Soylent was the name of one of the early entrants.
- ajmurmann 3y agoNow I feel old. It feels like yesterday that everyone was talking about Soylent and its eccentric founder who ordered new shirts from China instead of washing the ones he had and tried to find a diet that allows you to not to have to use the bathroom.
- fbdab103 3y agoI am strangely intrigued by the bathroom avoidance. Did he find much success? Although, I seem to recall a correlation between low fiber/defecation frequency and colon cancer, but not sure how strong the association was supposed to be.
- stevenwoo 3y agoThe Alzheimer’s connection study was more recent https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/19/health/constipation-cognitive-decline-gut-health-wellness/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/19/health/constipation-cognitive...
- Scoundreller 3y agoI think he was just trying to conserve as much water as possible. Cotton uses lots of water so he bought some synthetic overalls. He also took some antibiotics to minimize poop, which I wouldn’t recommend unless strictly necessary. It’s all here: https://web.archive.org/web/20200401135943/http://robrhinehart.com/?p=1152 https://web.archive.org/web/20200401135943/http://robrhineha...
- uwagar 3y agosometimes id just stare at ingredients unable to cook: those days id try to get to a soup kitchen, temple/gurdwara/church/mosque kitchen. these were life savers.
- johnaspden 3y agoChrist, this is supposed to be for people with no spoons, and yet one of the recipes is: "Peanut Butter On A Spoon". Could they not be bothered to get someone to proof read it?
- jmspring 3y agoMade the same point in different words. Was voted down.
- Aaargh20318 3y agoThey are probably referring to Spoon Theory:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoon_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoon_theory
- bunga-bunga 3y agoIf you don’t have a spoon you probably should get one. I don’t think you can cook without at least 1 utensil, unless you want to stir with your fingers.
- Ekaros 3y agoIf I had to pick up one utensil it would probably be a knife. Not safest for eating, but still most versatile option.
- gorgoiler 3y agoFantastic, I adore it! In a weird way, this also serves as a training manual for becoming a good cook. Take plain ramen and understand its cooking process through different methods. Now build a sense of how to flavor and season food by adding additional ingredients. What is a potato and how do you cook it? Solid, back to basics stuff. At the other end of the spectrum is an absolute classic of the genre, Slater’s Real Fast Food: https://www.nigelslater.com/real-fast-food_bk_25 https://www.nigelslater.com/real-fast-food_bk_25 It’s a bit more omnivore forward — lamb chops grilled in yogurt is a favourite — and comes from a time when these books were aimed more at young Islington professionals rather than Amazon drivers.
- danparsonson 3y agoShout out also to Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat - the Salt section alone has transformed my cooking.
- KineticLensman 3y agoConcur. This is a great book. I got it after an HN recommendation a while ago and have been using it ever since. I've been cooking for all of my adult life but have picked up a lot of useful basics about underlying cooking processes. The recipes don't start until page 279; the preceding content is cooking basics and processes, structured around the eponymous salt, fat, acid and heat. Its recipe for granola has become an instant family favourite.
- fisherjeff 3y agoWould also add Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything: The Basics to this list
- drbig 3y agoMakes you realize that having an electric kettle, a microwave, a turkey-sized oven and a four burner range - all in the same room - is not mandated by the laws of physics. And now I'll go and buy some frozen spinach. Just like those noodles from instant noodles, should be extremely versatile.
- rex_lupi 3y agoAh. I'm very familiar with a lot of recipes here. Even have a few of my own (inventions? hacks?) which I guess would make a good good addition to this cookbook.
- asah 3y agolol, as a civilization we've arrived to the point where books/internet are more available/commoditized than "good food." Sad Bastard indeed.
- mdp2021 3y agoLogically a fallacy (it should be a "progress race"), but factually a point.
- mdp2021 3y agoModeration, something should really be done to change this culture of these #&%! who pass by and anti-communicate by unclear gestures. It is radically uncivilized, and cannot be encouraged.
- memefrog 3y agoNo they aren't. Food is very widely and cheaply available.
- ralferoo 3y ago30 odd years ago, there was a similar book: How to boil an egg - https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Boil-Egg-Jan-Arkless/dp/0716022206 https://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Boil-Egg-Jan-Arkless/dp/0716022...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- mg 3y agorecipes to make when you've worked a 16-hour day Why not just sit down in a restaurant on your way home? Or if you worked at home, take a nice walk and sit down in a nice restaurant along the way?
- thinkingemote 3y ago1. Because they are a "sad bastard" (And not a highly paid programmer) 2. It's a recipe book (For cooking by oneself not a self help book for fixing ones sad bastardness)
- maerF0x0 3y agoSpeaking from experience Highly paid programmers can be sad bastards.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- pacija 3y agoOr, even better, why not let them eat cake? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_them_eat_cake https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_them_eat_cake
- fsloth 3y agoI don't think eating out is an option for the demographic of this cookbook as a startegy for acquiring daily sustenance.
- aix1 3y agoThere are many places in the world and levels of income where sitting down at a restaurant after a long day is simply not an option. Then there are different personalities: depending on the nature of that hypothetical 16-hour workday, I might not want to deal with people and would much prefer to fix something up on my own. Then there's time: a meal at a nice restaurant will likely take some time. If I've really just worked 16 hours straight, I'd likely be wanting to hit the sack asap rather than waiting around to be served. (I'm excluding fast food both for nutritional reasons and since we're specifically taking about "nice restaurants".)
- coolvision 3y agoMy food for when I can't be bothered is pasta with canned pesto sauce (+optional parmesan). Can eat it every day. Another a bit more involved option is pasta with checkpeas: https://www.seriouseats.com/pasta-e-ceci-pasta-with-chickpeas https://www.seriouseats.com/pasta-e-ceci-pasta-with-chickpea... What's yours go-to recipes?
- grokas 3y agoI'm with ya up until Pine Nuts show up in the pasta. Then I did.
- zeusk 3y agocacio e pepe; easily the best pasta dish vs effort imo.
- ShellfishMeme 3y agoI love cacio e pepe. It's such an amazing dish for how simple it is. One thing that can be tricky is keeping the emulsion smooth and not suddenly have the cheese turn chunky. What I've found very useful there is to put aside some of the pasta cooking water and then blend it up with the cheese on the side using an immersion blender. When you reach a good level of creaminess, you pour it back into the pot with the now drained pasta and use the residual heat of the pot and pasta to slightly reduce it down to the perfect level while constantly stirring. This should make the whole process a lot more reliable while not changing the flavor by adding more complex ingredients.
- chromanoid 3y agoYeah, this even works well when you cook for a family. If you have pasta left from the day before and don't mind sweet dishes you can fry the pasta with some butter and eggs (scramble with the pasta) in a pan and add some sugar. Pretty sating meal... In a late hour after work delirium I like to eat air fried pre-seasoned chicken or turkey breast with toasted gray bread and arugula with some balsamic vinegar and olive oil. The latter usually only when I have the energy left or there is some already clean in the fridge... Is of course only for lazy people when you have an air fryer. The 15 min of waiting are enough time to toast the bread and to put the salad into a bowl and season it. In Germany you can buy cheap organic pre-seasoned poultry in most supermarkets...
- Traubenfuchs 3y agoJust drink huel, mana, soylent or one of the other 10 meal replacement options. On some days I drink 100%. I am thin, muscular and don‘t feel worse on it than how I feel on any solid food.
- i_am_a_peasant 3y agoIf I can't be bothered to cook I will eat a can of hummus spread on bread, then some fruits.
- darkclouds 3y agoBit too (cheap) carb rich for my liking. What is with eating so many carbs, is this book a recipe for prediabetes or a psychotherapy phishing session? And because of forced eating during childhood, this just brings back trauma masquerading as food dislikes. 3 square meals can be bad for your health.
- Scoundreller 3y agoProbably because carbs are cheap for the calories and volume.
- nearting 3y agoSomeone who thinks about how carb-rich a meal is isn't the target audience for a book like this.
- pawelmurias 3y agoIf you don't care about nutrition you don't have too cook just grab some candy from the store or just make a sandwitch.
- darkclouds 3y agoI do care about nutrition, thats why I view candy like the agar from a petri dish breeding pathogens. Surely you know this?
- cbxyp 3y agoRamen + Eggs + Cheese, just shake it and microwave it. Great stuff
- Knee_Pain 3y agoThis should just be a list of stews, soups and porridges with various cereals and ingredients
- Daneel_ 3y agoStew? Soup? Too hard, too much time. Wouldn’t make it. Which is exactly why this book exists.
- maerF0x0 3y agoPremade soups from stores, including simple canned soup is really fast (open can, microwave) ... I dont know how long you could live off them though.
- Knee_Pain 3y ago>too hard roughly chopping random vegetables and throwing them in a pot is hard? >too much time using a pressure cooker for 45 minutes while you watch youtube videos is too much time?
- generic92034 3y agoYes to both points. You would know, if you had been there. Also, who is buying the veggies, who is cleaning up after your 5 minutes of eating?
- Daneel_ 3y agoDing ding ding. Exactly! Don't forget you also have to wash, peel, top and tail, clean, sharpen knives, etc.. A full dinner from when you get up to make it to when you sit down with everything washed/put away is more like 60 minutes in a best-case scenario. 7 hours a week. 364 hours a year. Feels like a crime to use so much time on basic survival needs that have been solved.
- safety1st 3y ago
- qwertox 3y agoMaking your life more miserable by giving you instructions on how to eat an apple or store-bought Mac & Cheese. If it at least had some high quality photographs of the end result maybe it could push you towards saying "Ok, I'll eat". Because if you're really hungry, you're going to eat anyway, even if it's just an apple. But one does not need such a book for that. I'm sorry, but stuff like this doesn't excite me.
- alpaca128 3y ago> Because if you're really hungry, you're going to eat anyway, even if it's just an apple Maybe that's true for you and that's great, but you are wrong if you think that applies to everyone.
- scaredginger 3y agoI'm sorry, this book is clearly a joke. Do you not get the humour?
- qwertox 3y agoIf you look at my history I've been recently told this a couple of times. Which is starting to concern me, because I may have lost the ability to recognize humor. When I posted it, the following post `Fantastic, I adore it! In a weird way, this also serves as a training manual for becoming a good cook. [...]` was at the top. Given your reply, now I don't understand if this post is also meant to be humor. But if it were, then I would ask myself why this and the post itself is on HN. Sure, humor is great, but if you now look at the front page of HN, you won't see a single post which is to be consumed for the giggles. I go to HN because it focuses on interesting topics, and if there is some humor, it is more in the style of XKCD, which is welcome. The cookbook could have been something interesting if it had really valuable recipes, because "Some days are at the absolute limit of what we can manage. Some days are worse than that. Eating—picking a meal, making it, putting it into your facehole—can feel like an insurmountable challenge." hits close to home. I thought, that in HN fashion, I would get something helpful to read. But if the intent of the book is meant to belittle people like me, because apparently it is a joke, then I'd rather not like to see this stuff on HN.
- random_upvoter 3y agoAny non-wealthy single person faces an uphill battle to both 1. earn a living 2. take proper care of themselves. In the Middle Ages people invented a rather neat solution for this problem: go live together in a big building, work together, pray together, cook together and call it a monastery.
- Ekaros 3y agoThen guilt trip others to donate to you money and their inheritance and end up filthy rich... Still doing the same... Kinda weird end result... Who did profit anyway, apart from upper management.
- random_upvoter 3y agoSure such systems tend to end up getting corrupt if they amass too much power. That was not my point. I guess my point was that given the bleak state of today's social landscape, I wonder if there's opportunity for some kind of renaissance of communal living, in one form or another. And maybe these monasteries didn't only exist because of fervent religiosity but also as a practical way for single men and women to have a better life.
- hutzlibu 3y ago"I wonder if there's opportunity for some kind of renaissance of communal living, in one form or another." Sure and it is happening since a while, take a look here for example: https://www.ic.org/ https://www.ic.org/ So far most of the projects are rather in dreamland than in reality, but some are well established and working. edit: you will also find actual monasterys there if that is your thing
- apomekhanes 3y agoVery interesting - hadn't come across this before, thanks!
- gcr 3y ago
- a_petrov 3y agoFrying rice with canned tuna and black pepper has been my life saver as a student. If you have a rice cooker, you can use the rice from it. If not and you don't want to clean two pots, just boil the rice in a saucepan and once ready, get it out and fry the canned tuna with some chopped onion and black pepper. Going to Indonesia, you can find out that's a variety of their national dish (nasi goreng). A sunny side up egg on top of that is an extra bonus.
- bunga-bunga 3y agoFried rice (literally “nasi goreng”) is common across east Asia and varies by local taste. I agree it’s easy to make, I just add whatever sauce, veggies and meat I have and it’s great every time. Speaking of nasi goreng, the one from the Aceh region of Indonesia is my favorite.
- collaborative 3y agoHealthy meals take 2 hours to cook but can be consumed during multiple days As a starter, one must at least eliminate all candy, sugary products, and bad oils. I look around and see no hope for society. Even "healthy meals" are just a substitute for rich, once-a-week-at-most recipes In Spanish, the centuries-old idiom says it best: mesa pobre, mesa sana (a poor table is a healthy table). But people find that too _boring_
- tcmb 3y agoSo how does a 'poor table' take 2 hours to cook?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- xanathar 3y agoJust dropping sugars and bad oils I lost 15kg in a few months, now I have a healthy BMI, and I can still enjoy bread, pasta, meat etc. just in reasonable quantities. I even have one or two desserts per week, the main point is try to control those pesky sugars. It's super easy to lose control, I can't believe it but what a major difference dropping that daily piece of chocolate, the sugar in the coffee and the soft drinks made.
- BlargMcLarg 3y ago2 hours? It takes a few minutes to bake most lean meats and eggs. Potatoes aren't too difficult to cut and cook. Same for rice. Many vegetables can be eaten raw. All of it can be done in parallel. Who are you talking about in this, a family of 5 using blunt knives? Even many confection recipes don't take more than 90 minutes, and those are known to take ages (and aren't in any way 'healthy').
- BiteCode_dev 3y agoReally funny, but a lot of those contain more carbs than fiber, so they cannot be used every day.
- maerF0x0 3y agoJust to be shockingly pedantic -- Dietary fiber are carbs so containing more fibre than carbs is technically impossible. Ok, but I think your point means like refined starchy foods, and not fibrous vegetables and grains?
- BiteCode_dev 3y agoIndeed. Just like when people say "sugar", they usually mean the white stuff, or fructose syrup, not carbs in general nor fructose in fruits.
- warthog 3y agoThis is gold
- tcmb 3y agoI just canceled my HelloFresh subscription, because the meals took too long to make, occasionally some ingredients were missing or wrong, I had no space to store all the ingredients that were delivered, and I hated the amount of cleanup I had to do afterwards. This cookbook is exactly what I need.
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y agoProtip: you can cook things like pasta, roasted veggies, etc ahead of time, say a weeks worth, and store it in ziploc bags in your fridge. Just head a portion in the microwave to eat. It cuts down on work (including dishes) hughley and tastes just as good, or on the case of the roasted veggies, better.
- jack335 3y agoNice the first two are my go-to lunch anyway!
- madmax108 3y agoGreat resource. For stuff in a similar vein, check out the YouSuckAtCooking Youtube channel[1]. Absolutely hilarious, while still being helpful to get better at cooking! :-) [1]: https://www.youtube.com/@yousuckatcooking https://www.youtube.com/@yousuckatcooking
- euazOn 3y agoMy favourite cooking youtuber made a very information-dense video about exactly this. Things like microwaved potatoes are simple but save my ass. https://youtu.be/TCM6WXyBOCo https://youtu.be/TCM6WXyBOCo
- jeffrallen 3y agoI come from a culture that reveres food, cooking, and eating in community. This entire thread is a nightmare for me. You do you, hope it works out for you. :)
- ark4579 3y ago[well-done. see now you went and did it. made be sign-in using already saved username and password so that i can post this comment.] 5 star. chances of my survival increase by 7%. if only there was a github page for this where i could create PR to add recipes and/or puns. p.s. it's gonna be a treasure trove for most people with ADHD.
- maerF0x0 3y agoWhen It's really bad I just buy multiple costco rotisserie chickens, some frozen veggies, put food on plate, microwave, cover in sauce, eat. Add in premier proteins, fit crunch, and clif builders and you can shop for like 2 weeks in a single run and not die. My "I cant be bothered" template is the following. is essentially pick one from each category * 1/2 LB (225g) veggies * 1/2 LB or 1 fruit * 1 protein * Caloric load if I'm not trying to lose weight * Condiments / spices to taste Veggies: Frozen mixed (peas, carrots, corn, green beans, soy beans), pre-roasted costco bags, "california mix" etc. Frozen veggies often are nutritionally superior to fresh due to halting nutritional decay. Fruit: Apple, orange, banana, Water/other melons, Straw/other berries Protein: look for 35-70g protein -- 1 skin on chicken breast, 2 boneless skinless chicken thighs, ~150g tilapia, 1 tin of tuna, 1 pork chop/steak, 1 egg + 300g whites, 1 hand size of salmon, 1/2lb shrimp Calories: 1 slice of bread, 1/2c cooked rice, 1 cup cooked pasta, 1/2 avocado, 1/4c mixed nuts Sauces / Condiments: Bachan's Japanese BBQ, Kinder Honey Hot BBQ, Kinder Lemon pepper (esp. for tilapia) Edit: Would love recommendations for other sauces that allow me to squeeze a nationality of cuisine over my template to make it taste like that country's food (kinda).
- buggyipadmettoo 3y agoIt takes me 1hr 20 mins to debone 6 Costco chickens, portion the meat into 1.5lb bags, throw in the freezer, start the pressure cooker for bones, and clean up (except for the pressure cooker/bone stuff I might do tomorrow) That’s 66 servings of .25lbs of meat. Tips: wear gloves, do it while they’re warm, shred by hand. Add salt and lemon juice to taste (and preserve) before freezing.
- falcor84 3y agoYou mention needing to use the Left Bumper to pick veggies, but what are the xbox controls for the other choices?
- generic92034 3y agoWay too much effort, unfortunately. That is, for me when I am in the mood the book is alluding to. ;)
- serf 3y agoneat concept. the constant '<---' footnotes all over the place make it hard to read because they pull focus from the statement at hand for me visually.
- ulnarkressty 3y agoJust get an instant pot, it's an incredibly versatile kitchen gadget, even without the pressure cooking. You can make all sort of bean, rice, wheat etc. dishes. Add whatever condiments and frozen veggies you can find and leave it alone for half an hour. Do it once for the whole week. Once you master the stews and want to get fancy, you can make stock from meat and vegetable left overs, it beats the store bought flavor enhancers by a mile.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- nkrisc 3y agoEasy and delicious, and only 3-4 of the ingredients are perishables you need to get. The rest are pantry items: * ~2lb sirloin (flank if you have money to burn) * Some soy sauce * Sesame oil * Onion powder * Garlic powder * 2 white onions * Peppers of some kind (I like shishito for this, and something really spicy if I’m not cooking it for my family) * Scallions (if you want, there’s already onions) * Baking soda * Corn starch * Beef bouillon paste Cut the streak in thin slices across the grain, think stir fry size. Toss in a bowl with onion powder, garlic powder, soy sauce, baking powder, and sesame oil. I don’t measure when I cook, but I’d guess maybe 2 tbsp of onion powder, 3 tsp garlic powder, 3 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tsp sesame oil, 3 tsp baking powder. Eyeball it and toss well to coat the meat evenly. If it seems like too much, do less. You can always add stuff later. Let it marinate for a while, 1-4 hours usually. I do it a few hours before I want to cook, it cooks fast. Meanwhile chop the onions and peppers. Heat some oil in a Dutch oven or other large pot. When it’s hot put the beef in and brown it for a few minutes. Add the onions and peppers and toss for a few minutes and let them cook. Next prepare two cups of the beef bouillon paste according to its directions. Add it to the pot and mix everything. Finally, add about 3 tsp of cornstarch to a small bowl and about an equal amount of water. Mix it until there are no more lumps and before it settles out again add it to the pot and let it simmer a little longer, or until the sauce is almost thick enough. It’ll thicken more as it cools. Serve over rice or whatever you want.
- Daneel_ 3y agoMany here will really appreciate the nice recipe, however you're missing the point of the cook book. People who are looking at this cook book are definitely not going to spend 1-4 hours waiting for marinade. They barely have 1-4 minutes of effort in their tank. * Buy pre-marinated diced beef from the store * Buy pre-diced frozen veggies * Buy microwave rice 1. Oil in pan 2. Beef in pan, cook for 1-2 mins 3. Veggies in pan, lower the heat to 75% 4. Cook for 5 mins and optionally add soy sauce and maybe some chicken powder (Knorr's) 5. Add microwave rice to pan, cook for another 5 mins while mixing 6. Serve Total time: Under 15 mins, one pan used. Prep time: 0 mins, other than shopping.
- 3y ago
- mrob 3y agoMy strategy is a follows: Cook a big batch of food with spreadable consistency (e.g. bolognese sauce, hummus, lentil daal, mixed vegetable puree) in an electric pressure cooker. Ideally this should all be done in one pot. Pour the food into an aluminum roasting pan, greatly increasing its surface area to volume ratio. Take a plastic storage box of similar shape to the roasting pan but slightly larger, put lots of ice in it, and add just enough water to cover the ice. Float the roasting pan full of food in the ice bath. Let the food cool to below room temperature, stirring occasionally to speed this up. Keep the storage box lid on while not stirring. This shouldn't take more than about half an hour. Spoon the food into silicone muffin trays, and put it into the freezer. Wait for the food to freeze, take it out, transfer it to plastic bags, and return it to the freezer. This makes convenient blocks of food that can be defrosted by microwaving. I make batches of 24 at a time. One is enough for a snack/side dish, two a small main, three a regular main, and four a large main. They can be mixed for variety. The easiest complete meal is a bowl of rolled oats, water, and frozen blocks of food. The whole thing can be reheated by microwaving (rolled oats are sold already cooked), and because the frozen food was cooled so quickly I'm not worried about food safety if it's not thoroughly reheated. Yogurt/pickles/etc. can be added for more variety. I think the ice bath and aluminum roasting pan are necessary, because it's otherwise difficult to cool large batches of food. The silicone muffin trays double as giant ice cube trays when they're not being used to freeze the food. You could probably use metal muffin trays instead, but silicone makes it easy to remove the frozen stuff.
- bob1029 3y agoI am curious - what does your weekly grocery bill look like? > because the frozen food was cooled so quickly I'm not worried about food safety if it's not thoroughly reheated. This is something I picked up on. My meals go straight from 200F+ to freezer. I don't really even let the containers cool down first.
- mrob 3y agoGrocery bill is almost certainly below average. Rolled oats and pasta are cheap. Dry legumes are cheap, and the electric pressure cooker makes cooking them easy. Minced (ground) beef is cheap too. Canned sardines and salmon are also reasonably priced (I mix these into bechamel sauce before freezing). The main fresh vegetables I eat are onions and carrots, which are cheap all year. Swedes (rutabagas) are cheap when in season (they're expensive now in the UK). Frozen spinach is also reasonably priced, and it goes well in most legume dishes. Each batch of food weighs about 2kg, so I'm not sure about putting it directly into the freezer without pre-cooling. It might be a good idea to set up some temperature logging to see if I can safely skip the ice bath step.
- sph 3y agoI would pay top dollar for the Sad Bastard on Low Carb Diet Cookbook.
- spirit557 3y agoIt could be printed on an 3x5 index card and be way more cost effective than this cookbook which mostly is processed junk.
- sph 3y agoThe sad reality is that processed, sugary junk is the only thing that's affordable if you're poor and/or too depressed to buy yourself healthy food. A pack of ramen noodle has abysmal nutritional value (in terms of micronutrients/vitamins) and costs 1/10 the cheapest meat or fresh vegetable.
- bob1029 3y agoThe trick for me is to apply engineering to the kitchen. You can actually enjoy really elaborate meals if you simply make more each time and utilize pyrex+freezer. Why make only 6 servings of spaghetti when there's still 50% free space available in your instant pot? (that 'max fill' line is but a polite suggestion :D) Planning ahead, logistics, etc. can make all the difference in the world. Imagine spending one hour in the kitchen to only feed yourself one time. That would be peak insanity to me today. I used to live it for about a decade myself. Ate out about every other day as a consequence. Ordered in a pizza once a week. Today, I eat out about once a month. I haven't ordered a pizza in 3+ years. I absolutely hated cooking until I learned about terms like "mise en place" and realized that manufacturing/lean/six sigma principles work just as well in my kitchen as they do on a factory floor. Also, tools like the humble pressure cooker can take your 2 hour process cycle down to 20 minutes. It arguably tastes better in many cases too. Cooking is not a mystical process. Much of it (not all) is science and engineering. You can robotically produce incredible meals. And I argue you should - The food on America's shelves and restaurants is only worsening in my estimation.
- mrob 3y agoThe importance of the "max fill" line in an electric pressure cooker depends on what you're cooking. If you're cooking legumes, you should respect it, because they can foam and make a huge mess if you try to cook too much at once. But I've never had a problem cooking steamed vegetables past the line.
- didgeoridoo 3y agoIn my experience, going past the max fill line is mostly a problem when using the “rapid pressure release” on a recipe with lots of liquid. Pressing the release button can emit a a superheated geyser of soup with enough force to hit the ceiling.
- hombre_fatal 3y agoWhat's nice is when this happens by itself while it's cooking and it spackles your counters, cabinets, and maybe even ceiling with salsa and food debris while you're away.
- moffkalast 3y ago> Wilty vegetables. If it’s looking sad in the fridge, it will probably taste okay once hot water is added. Hah, where's the "I'm in this picture and I don't like it" option.
- molticrystal 3y agoHere is a great ramen recipe from a classic reddit thread that my glance over the book failed to spot: >Creamy chicken flavored preferred but regular chicken will do. >With drained noodles and with the flavor packet add black pepper, garlic, Parmesan cheese, butter and just a bit of milk to make it creamy and sauce like. Since they didn't include measurements, this is what I ended up using: 1 pack creamy garlic seasoning 1/4th cup water 1/2 tsp garlic grilling salt blend 1 tbsp butter or margarine 2 tbsp parmesan cheese [0] Source https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/4a5ni8/whats_your_favorite_way_to_improve_ramen/d0xjp6b/ https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/4a5ni8/whats_you...
- Daneel_ 3y agoI bet it would taste great but that's definitely not healthy though.
- keepamovin 3y agoI laughed at the title before I even read it. Am I going to be disappointed if I read it? You know back in the day I remember 'the anarchist cookbook' along with all kinds of other somewhat legally dubious online literature, such as phrack magazine, 2600, erowid, thehive.ws; And bizarre euphemisms such as SWIM (someone who isn't me) peppering the tales of free long distance telephone calls, dumpster diving, and synthesis of (most likely scheduled) hallucinogenic, entheogenic psychoactive chemicals. Hahaha. Those were the days! These days I'm so leery of ubiquitous surveillance I likely wouldn't even dare search for those things (tor be damned, eyes everywhere, can't trust anything!)...heavy sigh On a finer point: I really wish they hadn't scheduled Salvia because of the seeming hysteria that resulted from some people who had unfortunate outcomes while apparently using it. Such a powerful spirit plant! By that logic alcohol should have been Schedule 1 LONG ago. My suspicion is 'the ruling elites' like to schedule anything that can allow people to unlock higher abilities, or bring more power to themselves. So, sadly, beneficial plants and chemicals are thrown in with actually dangerous addictive ones...:( Fucking tragedy. My hope is one day its glory will be restored in the same way that we're seeing with psychoactive mushrooms happening now to some extent. Good old Salvia--you meet entities on that trip, too! To me they literally seemed like tree/plant/forest spirits, and when on it, like I, oops I mean, like SWIM, was "inside the plant network".
- iteria 3y agoTo be fair, we did try to outright ban alcohol and make it illegal. It just didn't work. If people in mass acted towards any drug like they did with alcohol, they'd cave. See: Marijuana
- janwillemb 3y agoIn Iceland they do a good job largely banning alcohol.
- strken 3y agoAccording to Wikipedia their ban lasted 7 years before they legalised wine, then another 13 years before they legalised everything except strong beer, and during that period they had substantial smuggling and illegal brewing. Is that info wrong?
- tacone 3y agoI used to cook with a trick invented by an italian woman, called "vasocottura" (then my microwave broke, possibly because of that). You basically put food in a sealed glass jar, and cook it in the microwave for 6 minutes. The air inside will slip out through the seals, resulting in a near vacuum effect. The food will keep cooking for circa 20 minutes while it cools down. Then you can either warm it up in the microwave until the seal unlocks or put the food in the fridge (depending on the food type it will last from a few days to a few weeks thanks to the vacuuming) Not every dish comes good (and the vegetables soften considerably), but the flavor is incredible (thanks to the vacuuming) and it takes 20 minutes total without no human handling. You also can batch preparation, while one jar is cooking, you can prepare the following ones, and have up to 10 dishes ready in 1 hour of active work. Here is a video: https://youtube.com/shorts/ccyOSIvqtgQ?feature=share https://youtube.com/shorts/ccyOSIvqtgQ?feature=share Don't try it without further investigation, since not every jar will work without breaking itself or the microwave.
- mabbo 3y agoThe hardest part of cooking is often the mental load of "what am I going to eat?". Infinite choices. To pick one is to deny all the rest. What do I even have? What could I make that's worth eating? At the start of the pandemic, my wife and I began solving this problem with meal planning. Every Saturday morning, when we're at a pretty high energy level, we decide on lunch and dinner for the next seven days. Including when leftovers will be eaten. Then I go buy the groceries needed for those meals. We keep the schedule in a shared word doc. The system has evolved over time but the core idea of pre-planning the decisions has always been there. Now there are no decisions to make. It's Thursday night and you're exhausted? You are having sausage pasta. That's the plan. Get cooking, it's easy and you have everything. If you read the description of the linked book and feel you relate to it, I cannot recommend this strategy enough.
- boruto 3y agoI have two dishes which I mastered to make during our stand up call. 1) deal chawal(North Indian dish). 2) Vegetable biriyani. Frozen veggies are easily available in West that a rice cooker and remote controlled induction stove means I set it up in 5 mins during our stand up, it makes itself and remains hot till 12.30 when I have lunch.
- daverol 3y agofor simple recipes (with a touch of nostalgia) look no further than https://www.mostlyfood.co.uk/index.php/cooking-in-a-bedsitter/ https://www.mostlyfood.co.uk/index.php/cooking-in-a-bedsitte...
- overton 3y agoSeeing a few canned tuna comments here. I love it as much as the next guy but PSA: it has more mercury than you would imagine -- in the range of ~60mcg per tin in some cases. Nobody needs that, and I've personally banned it from my diet.
- totallywrong 3y agoOne of the things I absolutely love about the country I live in is the culture of the daily menu. Every day you get a different, grandma-like soup, main course, fresh juice, and small desert. Nearly every restaurant does this for the equivalent of 4 - 6 dollars (I'm in LATAM). Eating that well would be otherwise impossible for me as I don't enjoy cooking at all.
- slim 3y agodesert that would be "dessert" (I don't blame you for that mistake, because americans seem to pronounce it like the arid land covered in sand)
- de6u99er 3y agoI got myself a cooking robot (Bosch Cookit). All I have to do is buy ingredients, follow the instructions on the display, and put it to the dishwasher after cooking. The recipes are easy to follow, very tasty and most of them are healthy.
- rootusrootus 3y agoThat looks cool. Cost more than my induction cooktop did, though, and in any case they don't seem to market in the US. I'd like to see it in action. But I'm not spending $2700 to import one just to find out ;-). I guess it's a direct competitor to the Thermomix TM6, which is available in the US and quite a bit cheaper.
- ZYXER 3y agoHacker News saving the day, once again!
- sigwinch28 3y agoBuy an East Asian style rice cooker and you’ll have hands-off low effort carbs for the rest of your life. Cook dried pasta in a pot of boiling water. Season it with oil, salt, pepper, and Parmesan or any vegitarian/vegan alternative. That’s two options for your calories in a low-effort hurry. If you want to cook nice food for yourself, I recommend Marcella Hazan’s “The essentials of classic Italian cooking”. Her recipes can be scaled to 1 or 2 servings quite easily. Many of her sauces freeze well in silicone ice cube trays for big cocktail ice cubes. This means you can take advantage of an economy of scale by cooking a batch and freezing a lot of it into portions which you can reheat on the hob in a few minutes. Well… this applies to a lot of homemade sauces but I like hers a lot.
- majewsky 3y agoFor rice cooking, the following works well for me. Add to a pot 1 cup of rice, 2 cups of water, 1 pinch of salt. Turn on the stove and let it cook with lid on until the water is gone (i.e. soaked into the rice). If I understand correctly, the only difference with a rice cooker is that it shuts off at the "water is gone" point, right?
- nerdchum 3y ago"Pick up the rice cooker bowl with a towel, and eat right out of it." They get me!
- seruda 3y agohmmm I don't know
- vibrolax 3y agoMy wife and I agree that eating well is one of the most affordable luxuries. Eating in ordinary restaurants and ordering takeout becomes less attractive once you hit a threshold of kitchen competence. Our experience is home prepared meals costs 1/3 as much as purchased meals, and rarely results in a disappointing experience.
- MikeTheRocker 3y agoThat's interesting because I find home cooking to be very expensive, if you value your time. Cooking for one, the marginal difference between the price of groceries vs eating out is easily outweighed by the time cost of shopping, food preparation and cleanup. Of course if you enjoy cooking it's a different story.
- extragood 3y agoWhen I was saving for the down payment of my condo, one of the biggest changes I made was making my own lunch, rather than eating out every day. There are going to be regional differences of course, but here in SF, a modest lunch costs at least $20. My average was around $25, or about $6500/year. I adopted "meal prep Sundays" where I make all of my lunches for the week ahead, and the average cost is consistently around $5, making my annual weekday lunch cost about $1300. +$5200/year post tax to be used on other things. Applying the same general idea to dinner unlocks further savings. The funny thing is - I don't know that I'm even sacrificing time with this approach either. It takes me maybe 1.5 hours on Sunday for the lunch prep thing, but I'm saving a bunch of time by not physically going to restaurants, ordering, taking deliveries, etc. The variety is lacking with this approach, but the tradeoff is well worth it in my book.
- MikeTheRocker 3y agoI'm going to make some assumptions, so please forgive me if this is not accurate. You said you were in San Francisco and looking to buy property, so I'll guess you were probably a Senior Software Engineer at the time, based on presumed age and Hacker News demographic/location. The median wage for that position and region is $295,000/year according to levels.fyi [1]. I happen to also live in the same city with the same job title, so I can confirm anecdotally this feels about right. It might have been lower back when you were saving though. Not sure how long ago this was, but let's roll with it. 5200 / 295000 = ~%1.8 of your gross income. I'm a bit doubtful that you were able to prepare a week's worth of food in just 1.5 hours, including shopping and cleaning, but if so, that's incredibly efficient. Let's assume 16 waking hours per weekend day. 1.5 / (16 + 16) = ~4.7% of your weekend. So very roughly speaking, we're looking at a marginal difference of saving around 1/50th of your income at the expense of around 1/20th of your free time. Personally I feel that's not worthwhile, and in my case the numbers are actually more stark. This of course does not factor in the non-zero time to go out for lunch. This could significantly change the calculus. We're also not including non-financial factors which might play in. [1] https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/levels/senior/locations/san-francisco-bay-area?limit=10&sortBy=offer_date https://www.levels.fyi/t/software-engineer/levels/senior/loc...
- unsupp0rted 3y agoThis is actually amazing. I’m not a person who loves food: I’ve lived or stayed in two dozen countries and I just eat whatever seems simple, mostly chicken, eggs and salads. Although initially I was curious and adventurous with food, I realized I just don’t care much, with very few notable exceptions, like Pad Thai (which I’m pleased is in this cookbook!). I’d love to see a variation of this cookbook that isn’t 90% carbs. Doesn’t have to be Keto, just not pasta-pasta-ramen-ramen-rice-rice. A lot more boiled/fried egg-based recipes would be great, or something with canned Tuna / canned Chicken, I guess, if we’re aiming for no-planning recipes that use practically imperishable ingredients.
- ghaff 3y agoYou can make omelets (most simply--there are also frittatas and the like) with just eggs plus whatever cut up. Normally I wouldn't used canned goods--though I suppose I could use canned sardines/small shrimp/etc. or various canned mexican and asian vegetables. Both bacon and grated cheese keep a long time in the fridge and there are various things you could freeze in small batches including vegetables out of the supermarket freezer section. An omelet is one of my lazy go tos when I don't have anything else really ready to go.
- tiffanyg 3y agoI've already spent too much time in this thread and commented too much, but given some of the other comments and the relative rarity of the opportunity: "Sad Bastard"? Why would I listen to that guy? No, give me "The Fat Bastard Cookbook". He knew about the very finest of meats, "human veal" (aka, "baby"). Yes sir, give me some of them baby back ribs, them trotters unsullied and uncalloused by the cruelties of gravity and vicissitudes of time, the "filet mignon" of "suckling human", or the "cuisses de bébé" (served similarly to the more well-known "cuisses de grenouille"). As another great "chef de l'humanité" once observed, "A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled..." And, think of the benefits for the environment!
- DarkmSparks 3y agoI half expected to see a republishing of the jolly rogers cookbook. Sadly not
- cmpalmer52 3y agoCampbell’s Cream of Chicken and Mushroom soup (that’s a type, although you can double the recipe with one can of Cream of Chicken and one of Cream of Mushroom) Can of water Add to saucepan Stir and bring to a boil Fill can with Minute Rice Stir instant into soup, remove from heat, cover Wait 8-10 minutes This was a go-to college meal. It’s great on a cold day, very filling. One day, I made mushroom risotto. I used the right kind of rice. I ladled the made-from-scratch stock over the rice one ladle at a time, stirring slowly. I added the mushrooms and kept stocking and stirring. Finished with some fresh Parmesan. Took about 40 minutes of near constant attention and it was absolutely delicious. Pareto Analysis: The Campbell’s soup and Minute Rice is about 80% the same with minimal effort.
- linsomniac 3y agoMy wife and I are both good cooks, but have been pressed for time. However, 3-4 years ago we basically stopped eating out, largely because of just how expensive it is. I changed my perspective around that time from "food is a chore" to "food is a luxury", and started trying to "go the extra inch" and try to make some nicer meals. Tonight was extra special, being our 5 year anniversary, so I: Grilled a couple steaks, caramelized 3 onions and used the fond with some wine, tamarind, miso paste and beef stock to make a pan sauce, baked some potatoes and roasted some carrots. The left over onions and pan sauce I turned into a salad dressing for the week. It takes some work, but once you dial in the basic chemistry of cooking, things start to become second nature.
- 8thcross 3y agoThanks!
- nerdponx 3y agoQuick, easy, cheap cooking becomes a luxury in and of itself when you have GI issues that limit what you can eat. Putting together balanced meals on a very restrictive diet becomes an exhausting chore, almost exacerbated if you once enjoyed a broad diet and good home cooking. There have been many times in my life when I wished I could eat like this! Never take food for granted, not even your sad bastard dinner. That said, if you live alone, you might as well go for my old favorite: the sardine melt. Toast some whole wheat bread, gently smash sardines into the toast, sprinkle with salt, put a slice of cheddar cheese on top, put back in toaster oven to melt the cheddar. Your apartment will smell like fish, but it actually tastes really good and is very nutrient dense. Get the sardines packed in olive oil for a little extra fat and flavor. A side of boiled peas or broccoli and carrots makes it a complete weeknight meal.