OH THAT’S RIGHT! One of the integral parts of Cooking with Cat Ears is WRITING IT DOWN!

So, I may be a little delirious with hunger. I may have also watched eight episodes in a row of Cutthroat Kitchen. CLEARLY I CAN COOK AND I’M AWESOME AT IT! (neither fact is true)

So I decided to make sloppy joes! They made it in CK and it was awesome! I love sloppy joes! Who am I to let things stop me, such as my lack of cooking knowledge, my unwillingness to look up a recipe or THE COMPLETE LACK OF MEAT IN THE HOUSE?!

This is going to be fucking hilarious. And in cat ears

So, let’s start with some potatoes. Good base. Get those in some oil on the heat, and then after a couple minutes (when they start making the cooking noise, I’m gonna dump in an entire can of beans.

The beans say to cook for 5-7 minutes. The potatoes probably wanted longer than that. Oops.

As a side note, the whole reason this particular mission was started is I saw we had some English Muffins and I thought “oo, yes, what can I toss on some toasted of those?”. Sloppy Joes is what I came up with. Without meat. I am not a clever man.

After the beans, we need to add some flavoury stuff, and also more vegetables. I think I will nix the “mixed veggies” can in favour of a carrot and some onion. I possibly should’ve chopped these first. THIS IS THE MOST ARBITRARY CWCE!

(Most of this was written steam-of-consciousness style as I was doing things. Later notes will be in these nifty italics. Anyways, this really is the most arbitrary Cooking with Cat Ears I've ever done --notably, I don't have any sort of recipe for what I'm making. That...that is not how I cook. I am an engineer, not a scientist. Recipes are _crucial_.

You know, this onion has been in the back of the fridge for a while. :/ BRB

Okay! I talked to the roommates! They say as long as it smells like onions, it’s probably fine! Time to chop this bad boy.

Oh hey,my camera memory is full. Of *course* it is. And after all the bullshit I went (am going) through to try and get my iphone to be able to take photos for this. It is not able to. Somewhere, apple's proprietary bullshit has gone *extremely* wrong.

Alright, anyways, the onion is really just a fancy spice. Let’s add some less fancy spices: Salsa, paprika, oregeno, and crushed red pepper. And normal salt and pepper. Oo, and cayanne, I couldn’t find it earlier, sweet!

Obligatory ingredients shot, since I forgot it earlier.

OH HI IT’S MY ROOMMATES THEY ARE INTERFERING BY WHICH I MEAN GIVING ADVICE actually mustard sounds like a pretty great addition. Ohright! I have v8 juice, good tomato base! As well as more salsa

Okay! I think it’s time to just sautee this for a while. Fry. Stir. Simmer. I DON’T NEED NO FANCY RECIPES AND ALSO NO FANCY AND USEFUL COOKING TERMINOLOGY!

Do that thing where I let some of the liquid evaporate off by having good heat

“More potatoes isn’t a terrible idea at this stage, right?”
Adam: “dubious silence”
Me: “I mean, I’m mostly just saying that to see if you scream in horror”
Adam: “Well, uh…it’s not like you have anything that won’t suffer from being overcooked”
Me: Excellent. Muahaha.

“It’s like a formula. You know how you adjust the formula, and then you get a different graph at the end. Like math.” —Hannah, dropping some wisdom on me.

GUYS THIS STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS COOKING THING DOESN’T WORK IF YOU’RE BEING COOL AND SOCIAL okay they left, that was pretty good though, I like my roomates and they know way more about cooking than I do.

Okay! Added some cinnamon and some more salt. All the beans have turned to mush!

Ohman, Joseph suggested curry paste, which would’ve been fucking perfect! this is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT A CURRY. We have no curry paste. Goddamnit.

Okay, this isn’t overwhelmingly amazing or anything, but it’s interesting, and I can eat it for lunch over the next few days (which is what will happen with it. I’m debating chopping up some fresh mushrooms to put into an English muffin and sloppy-joe-curry sandwich, but that might be pressing my luck (and a waste of fabulous mushrooms. Definitely time to toast a muffin or two though. Especially since it’s starting to get a little baked and gross around the edges.

Woohoo! I cooked a thing! Without even using any sort of recipe!

We will never speak of this again.

Chicken and Pasta!

You know what's the ups?
Gee Sor, no! What is the ups?
I've got a delightful houseguest at the moment, and he's got a not at all delightful migrainey thing. Neither of us has eaten dinner yet. And I own a pair of goddamn cat ears.

Let's.
Do.
THIS!

For those of you who don't remember those halycon days of 2012, back before I had a job (no really), I once came up with a totally brilliant idea for a side blog project, and then never put any work into it again. It's called Cooking with Cat Ears, and details how completely shite I am at cooking.

But the cat ears help.

Anyways, the zeroth step is always to put on some AWESOME LOUD MUSIC! We're gonna start with P!nk's "Raise Your Glass", and see where things go from there.

Tonight's dish is gonna be a hodge-podge of stuff I foolishly suggested to Amul, namely, pasta with pesto, chicken, and mixed veggies. Oooooooo. Mostly oooo because I have _basically never cooked meat before in my life, oh many shits.

Also oooo because I do not have a recipe. BUT! I WILL PREVAIL!

Step one, wash hands.
Step two, gather ingredients:

Wait, no, step one-point-five is "where's my goddamn apron?
And step one-point-seven-five is "what's in my pocket?"

Ah. That's right, I forgot that I didn't eat all the szecuan peppercorns that I poured out (too many by accident) when I was at Timmc's house, and so I put the extras in my pocket for later. They've been through the wash! I wonder if that has affected their taste!

That goofy grin means "no, it has not affected the taste in the slightest, you just go ahead and weird out your mouth kiddo, what's the worst that could happen".

ANYWAYS! STEP TWO! GATHER INGREDIENTS!

That's frozen veggies and store bought pesto, because piss off, that's why. You can also see my awesome skull glass, and a thing filled with amazing trail mix that 42itous made for me 'cause she's the best.

Anywho, Amul suggested I boil the chicken, and cut it once its cooked, so I'm totally going to do that! One hundred percent!

...how does one boil a chicken? Oh goooo-gle!

Great, found a thing, this looks dead simple! Lemme just open this chicken up and...
...
...
...

Fuck.

I...I should've thawed the chicken. That is what I should've done. Okay. I am going to unpackage the chicken and stick it in some warm water for ten minutes. The internet would totally not lead me astray, right?

And THEN, I will take it out of the sink, and toss it on the boiler and bring the water to a boil at medium-high heat and then lower the heat and watch the chicken until it turns all white! OKAY I CAN DO THIS I CAN DO THIS (I totally cannot do this.)

At any rate, I'm making a box and a third of pasta, so I better get that water boiling.

This is a boring part of the cooking process. I believe I am going to spend the next ten minutes eating trail mix and dancing to Shriekback and Moxy Fruvous.

Or, unloading the dishwasher because I am a REAL ADULTgood housemate.

*tentatively pokes chicken* Oh! Oh, that's getting pretty floppy, oh go--WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!

I don't know. I don't care. It has a terrible texture. The chicken package has no information. I am going to drop it in the sink and wash my hands forever.

(actually, because I am working with chicken and raw meat freaks me the fuck out, I am washing my hands approximately every third picture. This was just weird.

Oh.

David suggests it's some form of thing to prevent odors or whatever. Probably harmless. O-okay then.

At any rate, the chicken is floppy, which the internet says is time to cook it.

Floppy proof:

And cooking!

(of course the pasta water boiled at the same time as the chicken was ready. Of course. But here they both are!)

Man, it's been like ten minutes and I am poking at the chicken with a chopstick and I think I may have totally ruined a package of chicken, and the chicken water isn't even boiling yet and goddamnit. I ruin everything I touch*

*in the kitchen.

Amul does not seem to share this belief, which is very kind of him. Anyways, time to do the veggies. Because you know what we own?

Pampered Chef awesomesauce veggie steamer. This thing is the greatest thing. I need to remember we own it more often, and get like two hundred frozen veggies to put in it. It's dead simple, add veggies, add water, nukerwave for three minutes, drain, serve. BAM!

Okay okay okay! Everyone came into the kitchen, and so between talking to real! live! people! and doing the quick "take everything off the stove" nonsense, I didn't really document the process. But I drained the pasta, which I've been doing forever, that part's easy, and pulled the chicken out of the pot and onto a cutting board with a fork.

Then I sliced the chicken, which was dead easy, because chicken and good knives. It turned out to be a little dry, but not actually bad! Huzzah!!

And here we have it:

I have made a thing!
It's about damn time.