Best Food Network Chefs: Male

For a lead in to this post, check my previous post. Without further ado, here are the three male Food Network chefs that I would want to cook for me.
3. Emeril Lagasse
Specialty: Cajun
Emeril is known for his Louisiana-influenced cooking style and his pattented "Bam!" in his cooking show. (Fun fact: He used to tape multiple shows during the same day and they would occasionally tape late into the night, so Emeril would yell "Bam" to wake his cameramen up.) Emeril is very solid, but I worry a little bit about the spices in his foods. I do like a good spicy food, but not all the time
2. Bobby Flay
Specialty: American
Flay is an awesome chef and master of the barbecue and would be an excellent chef. But the bottom line is he can't hold a candle to the next guy.
1. Mario Batali
Specialty: Italian
Maybe I'm a hypocrite for choosing Batali, who is the premier Italian chef on the food network, when he has not shown the ability to diversify like some of his predecessors on the list. But he is that good at cooking. I once saw him make bark look delicious. (That's a lie, but I bet you he could. He's that good.)

Best Food Network Chefs: Female

I maintain gender equality in all workplaces. I grew up living with my mother, three sisters, my grandma and even a female dog. My dad and I were on our in and often outnumbered by the estrogen-driven household.
That being said, I do not think that there are many professions that women can't do, with maybe the exception of king(fast forward to the 2:15 mark). But in my experience, women are generally better at cooking. That being said, the guys on food network are also very good (as can be expected from people that are paid to cook.) But I decided that the women and men on the Food Network need to have separate rankings.
If I could pick a female Food Network chef to cook for me for the rest of my life, here are my choices.
3. Giada DeLaurentiis
Specialty: Italian
I have written about the cranially heavy cook before (I still contend her dome is visible from space), and she specializes in Italian food, my well-documented personal favorite. So why is she not number 1 or at least 2? Well first of all, she annoys me when she pronounces mozarella cheese all italian-y, like mosssarelllllla. Second of all, and more importantly, she doesn't she me the versatility I need from an everyday chef. I'm sure she's capable of it, but I need to see it to believe it. Until then, she will have to settle on coming out of the bullpen.
2. Paula Deen
Specialty: Southern Comfort Food
You think of Paula Dean and what do you think of? The answer: butter. Paula is a southern belle (and active tweeter, apparently) and specializes in making the delicious food that your body hates you for eating (in no small part due to her love of butter.) Paula would be number one by a landslide if a.) I could eat better and b.) I didn't want to live past to age of 50.
3. Ina Garten a.k.a Barefoot Contessa
Specialty: Everything
Garten had an interesting path to cooking, but from everything I've seen, she is very good at it. Garten makes everything well; she makes awesome desserts, she makes awesome entrees, and basically everything in between. My mom has replicated many of her recipes and I have always enjoyed them. For my money, I'm going Barefoot.

Restaurant Time

Here is a trip I made on Gowalla.com about college restaurants in the state of Ohio. These restaurants were all featured on either Man v. Food  or Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, two of the best shows on television.
And while it would be tempting to rank certain college food joints, I am going to do a broader version. Here is a ranking of the best types of food restaurants for late night eats.
Sandwich Shops
Any type of sandwich shop is a personal favorite of mine. Jimmy Johns is the most popular at Ohio but any local sandwich shop would do. In fact, I wish Ohio had a better selection of late night sandwich shops. Oh well.
Pizza
Easily the most popular choice, good college pizza is hard to find. (Unless you have had a few too many Natty lights, then everything tastes good.) Though I can't have cheese, I have been known to get an occasional cheese-less pizza.
Mexican
This encompasses everything from burritos to tacos to...well that's about it. Burritos in particular are some of the most popular options, but not for people hoping to help their bad stomach feeling.

What Not To Eat

In college, there are a lot of crappy food options. I once wrote in an article for college freshman that there are two guarantees in college: you will eat crappy food and you will stay up late. Often, the two go hand and hand, with beer usually the link.
But living in an apartment has afforded me the luxury of making my own, not crappy, food. I have given a lot of alternatives to crappy food in previous posts, but here are a few tips to avoid falling victim to the crap-ola served at college. (And If you were wondering, yes I did break the record for most uses of the word crap in a blog intro. I am making up for years of not being able to say it in my house.)
Watch What You Buy 
There are good and bad versions of every food. Do not be lured in by flashy labels; actually read the nutrition label. A whole lot of sodium? Not good. Lots of saturated fat? Not so good either. Here is a link to foods processed foods to enjoy along with some restaurants. It also has healthy alternatives, but those are from the John Madden School of the Obvious.
Avoid the Cheap Stuff
For college students, hearing the word cheap is like Brett Favre hearing the name Jenn Sterger: it gets them really excited. But cheap foods are often cheap because they are very unhealthy and typically have processed foods.  This list explains the ingredients that comprise many processed foods. And to round of the processed food portion of our program, here is a list of the weirdest processed foods.
These tips may not be the most popular, but they are an easy way to eating healthier and avoiding the Freshman 15.(Or any other weight gain.)

Don't Forget the Dishes

I live with two roommate. One does a good job of maintaining a clean room and and he does his dishes, most of the time. My other roommates is quite the opposite; his room has an odd stench and he has yet to wash a dish (that's no lie.)
Now I fall somewhere in the middle. My room is not very clean but I tend to clean the dishes pretty regularly.
However, our dishes have got to a point where we have to resort to washing the bigger dishes in the bathtub. They no longer fit in our sink.
It's a sad state when you are reduced to cleaning dishes in the bathroom, so here are some links to avoid the current situation I am in.
For those like roommate #2 that does not clean, here are some basic rules for cleaning dishes.
Here is an interesting experiment by faculty at Ohio State that analyzed how clean dishes are.
Not quite related to the actual cleaning, but here is a fun, interesting blog about the terminology used in the kitchen (like washing up dishes versus cleaning.)

My next post will talk about different restaurants at the ballparks on my map.

Baseball Trip

Here is a map of a cross country baseball trip. The map will soon be updated with links to the best food in each city.

View The Cross Country Baseball Trip in a larger map

What Brett Favre Should Have Done

College kids do not get in trouble with naked cell phone pictures. They are much smarter than athletes.

For the dairy free among us

Perhaps I should have mentioned this when I first started off, but I wanted my blog to be about cooking and be funny and enjoyable. In the summer of 2009, right after my freshman year of college, my doctor told me that I could no longer have milk. No milk? Me? The same guy that, by himself went through nearly two gallons a week? Well, as my doctor told me in her Indian accent, "Oh, no, no no. You can have too much of a good thing."
Well that was news to me.
So I thought, "No milk, that sucks. No more milk and cookies, no more cereal. Oh well, it's not going to be fun, but I'll deal with it"
What I didn't realize was that the no-milk, or dairy free, diet was broader than I had anticipated.
No chocolate. No butter. No cheese. I could not eat anything with those or any of these ingredients.
When the nutritionist handed me that list, my anger level was somewhere around here.
But after my splurging on one last large chocolate milkshake made with vanilla ice cream (easily the best type of milkshake), I said my goodbye to the dairy world.
Now, I have replaced cow's milk with vanilla almond milk (my personal favorite of the different milks I tried.)
Butter is easily replaced and has been the easiest adjustment from "real" to "fake", but the different chemical composition in butter and milk makes it difficult to bake with.
I realize now there are a lot worse things than being milk free (though the poor nutritionist that got an earful from me would beg to differ.) Taking my milk away from me was like taking a camera phone from Brett Favre. It might seem tough at the time, but it's for your own good.
So for future reference in my posts, all of my foods are made dairy free, whether I like it or not.

What a Crock...Pot

One thing that really bugs me about sports fans is when they label a sport as "easy." As a former soccer player but still enthusiast, I faced some of these criticisms. "All you do is kick the ball", "There's no scoring" blah, blah, blah.
The fact is that nearly every sport can be reduced to a simple, moronic sentence. Football would be  "hit people, run the ball, kick the ball." Basketball would be "pass, dribble shoot." Baseball would be "throw, hit, catch."
But fans of those sports could easily counter these arguments with any knowledge of the game.
That being said, my next statement may sound hypocritical, but it is true.
Cooking with a crock pot (or slow cooker) is easy. Seriously.
Reducing cooking with a crock pot to putting ingredient A and B into the crock pot and turning it on is really all you need to do.
Today, I took the easy way out and made some shredded beef with my slow cooker.
Here is all I did.
Bought a big hunk o' meat (I used a 2.5 lb round roast, but any type and size of roast will do) and put it in the slow cooker.
Then, I emptied the contents of a mushroom-onion soup into the slow cooker.
Next, I added a can of diced tomatoes.
Finally, I put in a little water. Why? I am not sure. I remembered my mom at some point in my life telling me to do this so it seemed like I should. (In the end, I used a little bit too much water. But the good part? It didn't matter! And why is that? Because cooking with a crock pot is easier than LeBron's decision to go to Miami. (Honestly, would you rather live here or here? And I even picked the most flattering picture I could find of Cleveland.)
One thing to remember in cooking with a crock pot, it takes a while for your food to cook. If you are cooking it on high, it takes about 5 hours. If on low, about 10 hours. But on the plus side, it makes your kitchen smell awesome throughout the day!
It's a quick thing to prepare and good to make before class, put it on while your at class, and then it will be ready when you return.
Here are some helpful links for crock pot cooking.
This aptly-titled blog is exactly what it sounds like. Favorite Slow Cooking recipes
To be honest, I just thought the name was catchy. A Crock Cook
Lastly, here is a list of 10 crock pot recipes with photos

Eating on a Tight Budget. Well, almost.

After posting that I was going to chronicle what I ate and the price of what I ate in a recent post, I had a very pleasant wrench thrown into my plans. My parents and sister came down to visit and my mom prepared a delicious spaghetti dinner.
So my plan on chronicling the price of everything I had to eat that week will have to be postponed.
That being said, some useful things came from the spaghetti and meatball extravaganza. (Extravaganza may be a bit of an overstatement considering I am used to eating it, but I have been subjected to my own cooking for a month or so now and I realize how much better my mom is at cooking than me.)
One thing to remember to try and do at college: eat at the table.
While I have been known to eat my cereal on an ottoman in front of the TV, I enjoy it when I get to eat like a civilized human and not like Donnie from the Wild Thornberrys.
This next part will sound cheesy, but I am the same guy that seriously contemplated buying this CD.
Get your roommates together and eat at the table. Now if you have roommates you can't stand, this obviously does not apply. But my roommates and I sit down for a "family" dinner once a week, and it is always a good time.
One good thing to think about cooking for a family dinner is hamburgers. They are very easy to cook and are always a crowd pleaser.
My simple recipe is this:
Buy lean ground beef, but not too lean. Ideal meat to fat ratio is 92% meat versus 8% fat.
Make sure to use seasonings. McCormick's Steak Seasoning is my go-to seasoning for burgers, but I also add in a couple of Italian seasonings occasionally. Also, do not forget a little salt & pepper.
Then, simply make the patties, fire up the grill (or frying pan) and cook. (My suggestion? Once you think they are done, cook them another five minutes at least. I am notorious for eating mildly raw meat, and it is not something I am proud of.)
As I mentioned in previous posts, baked beans is a perfect complement to burgers.
For more adventurous recipes, the folks at allrecipes.com have compiled a good list of different burgers. But for my money, I'd just keep it simple. As my grade school teacher Ms. O'Brien always said, keep it simple stupid. (She wasn't the nicest lady.)

Sandwich Time

As any fan of the TV show Friends is aware of, people can have very strong feelings about sandwiches. Ross turned into "Mental Gellar" after the heist of his beloved moist-maker sandwich. Joey would risk his life for a sandwich.
And to be honest?
I can't say that I wouldn't act the same.
Sandwiches are one of the most versatile foods and not to mention one of the most delicious when prepared correctly. "Veggie" and sandwich should not be combined together. I worked at Einstein Bros. Bagels for two years and made all kinds of sandwiches. (In fact, my official title was Sandwich Artist. Translation: I am THE authority on making a solid sandwich.) Veggie sandwiches should be eliminated from all diets. (If you are vegetarian, good for you. But I propose that if you are vegetarian, you are not allowed to eat sandwiches. "Veggie" gives the honorable name sandwich a bad reputation.")
Well here are some quick tips when making a sandwich.
1.) Keep A Solid Selection of Lunch Meat
Some personal favorites of mine: Salami, Capicola, Mortadella, and Roast Beef. (Have I mentioned I'm Italian?)
2.) Grilling is Thrilling
A quick way to add to your sandwich? Toss it on a frying pan for a couple of minutes and voila! You have an even more great sandwich. This is also a great way to spice up traditional favorites. Try grilling peanut butter and jelly (or peanut butter and banana, a personal favorite of mine and Elvis), and you can thank me later.
3.) Wear a Condim...ent
My Italian heritage innately makes me reach for olive oil or Italian dressing to add to any sandwich, but there are plenty of great condiments that can make a big impact on the sandwich. These great condiments include: Thousand Island dressing, brown/spicy/dijon mustard (yellow can get boring), and horseradish (particularly excellent with roast beef.)

Here are some solid links to great sandwiches:
Esquire put out a list in 2008 of The Best Sandwiches in America. (Cleveland makes three appearances.) The magazine also has some cool sandwich links here and here. I even learned something from them.
Make sure to check out the Primanti Bros. Sandwich on that list, a favorite of Pittsburghers (my hometown.) For those of you not from Pittsburgh, first of all, I'm sorry. Second of all, you can attempt to recreate the Primanti Bros.
To conclude, here is another list of best sandwiches in America. (So what if I couldn't resist using the list that ranked Primantis No. 1?)

The Quest to Eating on a Tight Budget

When the younger of my two older sisters was in college, I would always hear her complain, "I'm a poor college student."
My thoughts?
Stop whining. You are not that poor, you have plenty of money, blah blah blah.
Well, here is my formal apology Angela, because I now see what you meant.
I am a poor college student.
(Side note: here is a link to my sister Angela's blog, featuring some crazy Korean food. She is currently teaching English in South Korea).
That being, being a poor college student (PCS for future reference) does not necessarily mean being a cheap college student when it comes to food.
Being cheap when it comes to food is easy. There is Wendy's, $5 pizzas and frozen food at your fingertips, and that often sounds more appealing than actually cooking a meal. But is being cheap always going to be affordable? That's what I plan on finding out.
Over the next week, I plan on figuring out what is the least expensive way to eat. I am going to document what I eat compared to what a "cheap" version of that food would have cost me.
Now this mission may not be on par with this guy's quest to eat on a budget, but it should be a good test to see how much college students waste on certain types of foods.
(In the meantime, here is a list of "cheap" foods)

Tastes Like Chicken

I have now reached the one month point in my cooking career, so i decided to commemorate the occasion by stepping out of my comfort zone and try something that I have never cooked before.
Now I am not a person that likes change very much. Any person that knows me can attest to that. I am the same person whose mom packed him a peanut butter and jelly for lunch every day from about 7th grade until I graduated high school. (Here is more than you ever wanted to know about PB & J, probably my favorite combination of all time. Other favorite combos: Eminem and Jay-Z,  Aaron Neville and Linda Rondstadt (I swear), and MJ and Pippen)
That being said, making new dishes was not in my comfort zone. But hey, you have to grow up sometime, right?
So  I decided to try and make a chicken dish. Even though I am partial to red meat and noodles more than poultry, I thought that a change in food would be good for me. Plus, my mom said that cooking chicken was easy.
So I set off this afternoon, scoured the internet and blogosphere before settling on this: If I am going to make something new, I want the recipe to come from a pro.
I turned to the Food Network's big headed personality, Giada de Laurentiis. (And I don't mean big headed as in cocky. She seriously has an enormous head to body ratio.)
After  looking through numerous recipes, I settled on Roasted Chicken with Balsamic Vinaigrette. (The name makes it sound a lot fancier than it is.)
I would explain how I made it, but I just followed this recipe, with a few changes. I just bought four chicken breasts instead of a whole chicken and kind of ignored the whole chicken broth part.
Well, it turned out to be quite a success. The chicken was delicious and I even had my roommates verify that it tasted great.
The chicken was not difficult to cook at all, consisting of soaking the chicken in the marinade and cooking it for 50 minutes (10 minutes less than the recipe indicates.)
I highly recommend it to any student with some time to cook. It's great to make on weekends because the leftovers should last until about Wednesday (if you make it on a Sunday, like I did.)
Here is evidence of the cooking.

My first solo expedition into cooking was quite a success.

Brinner Time!

My family loves having breakfast for dinner (more commonly known as brinner), and honestly, what is there not to like?
Having pancakes at any time of the day is a gift from the heavens (or at least Aunt Jemima) and a perfect excuse for eating unhealthily while pretending that pancakes are a normal meal.
(Now believe me, I am an ardent and steadfast supporter of flapjacks, but there is no way that they are really part of a healthy meal. But somehow, a parent decided that he/she would let her children get away with combining cake, butter, chocolate chips (a great addition) and sugar in syrup form and it would be okay for their children to eat. I am eternally grateful to that person.)
But before I delve into how to make an exceptional brinner (which doubles as how to make an exceptional breakfast), I have to link to one of my favorite TV shows, Scrubs, and thank it for providing me with inspiration.
When making a solid brinner, it is important to realize that it not simply breakfast. Pouring cereal and toasting Pop-Tarts may be acceptable for breakfast, but not for brinner. Brinner requires a solid base of foods, using foods that typically are used in traditional dinners in a different form. Instead of having ham, have some bacon. Instead of having mashed potatoes, make some hashbrowns.
But making sure to couple those with a breakfast favorite is important.
Here is my pick for the ultimate three-course brinner. (Editors Note: I was going to make it five courses, but it turns out I am the only person that eats five-course brinners. To find out what the other suggestions were, follow me on Twitter and ask me, @adam_flango.)


First Course: Bacon
Personally, I'm a fan of breakfast sausage instead of bacon, but I will defer to the masses on this one. Bacon is not difficult to cook at all (spray pan, heat pan, cook bacon), and is the perfect starter for your meal. It is not nearly as filling as some of the other breakfast meats, but one key is to make sure you do not make too much bacon (yes, there is such a thing.) Stick to making only as much as you want to eat, or however much you anticipate your roommates eating. If you are going to eat two or three (the recommended amount by my unofficial health standards,) then do not make a dozen strips. The more you eat, the more full you'll be. (That last sentence was courtesy of John Madden's School of Obvious.)
Second Course: Fruit
This course is dealer's choice. While I have never been a big fan of fruit because I am stuck in the mindset of an 8-year-old, I have grown to be fond of a few fruits, such as strawberries and bananas.
This part of the meal largely depends on the time of the year and what fruit is ripe, but my suggestion would be to go for berries or citrus-y fruits. They can serve as a nice palate cleanser too. (Ever since I ate a fancy restaurant for the first time and had a palate cleanser before my main meal, I have been a big fan.)
Third Course: Pancakes
My love of pancakes was documented in the opening of the post, and sadly I do not have any specific recipe that I use. But honestly, my mom always made them from the back of the Bisquick box and they always turned out delicious.
Here are a 5 different ingredients that add even more taste to pancakes.
Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chips: My personal favorite
Pumpkin: Great this time of year
Blueberry: Classic
Ice Cream and/or Whip Cream: Because you're in college, and you can.
Applesauce (on top of the pancake): A Flango family favorite. Plus it makes pancakes kind of seem healthy.
For more pancake goodness and some creative designs, check out this awesome blog. And be sure to check out the pancake toilet bowl, which had me laugh out loud. Remember, I have the mindset of an 8-year-old.

Filling out the roster (or meal)

Find me a star athlete and I will show you an exceptional sidekick.
Nearly all athletes that have led their teams to championships have had an excellent supporting cast around them. Michael Jordan had Scottie Pippen. Larry Bird had Parish, McHale, Havlicek and a lot of others. The Yankees had Jeter, Clemens, Rivera and a slew of talented people. Joe Montana had Jerry Rice. Terry Bradshaw had Franco Harris, Lynn Swann and John Stalworth.
And that is just off the top of my head.
The point is this: no team has ever been great simply because of one player. Championship level teams usually need a great player, but also a great supporting cast.
The same thing goes for cooking.
While it might be a stretch to call my cooking championship-level after three weeks of cooking on my own, I have at least begun to lay the groundwork for a championship-caliber lineup (i.e. good side dishes that I can cook in addition to a couple of solid entrees.)
What I failed to realize when starting out is that simply making a hamburger or pasta was not quite enough food. There needs to be more to it than just my world-famous (okay, maybe just Athens famous, or perhaps just my apartment-famous) pasta dish or my delicious burgers. I need to add a supporting cast to my great player. I needed to find some solid side dishes.
When my mom was preparing me for college, she was focused on helping me learn to cook healthy entrees. The idea of side dishes was not discussed much, but I have begun to find what dishes work well with what types of foods. Here are some suggestions for easy side dishes to go with your meal.
1.) Baked Beans
Conventional logic would say that you can simply pour the beans into a pot, stir them up and serve them. But I've found that most canned beans (and by most I'm basically referring to Bush's Baked Beans) can taste a lot better by putting in a little extra effort.
(This is for a 28-ounce can of Bush's Baked Beans.)
To start, drizzle some olive oil (an ingredient you should have in your kitchen based on my previous post) into a pot and put the pot on medium. Then, cut up about 1/3 of a cup of onions. Dice the onions into fine pieces, the smaller the better.
Next, put the onions into the pot and let them cook a little while. They should cook for about 4 minutes, but they should not brown. If they are browning, turn down the heat and add the beans.
Once the onions have cooked (and they will begin to liquify), pour in your can of baked beans and stir the ingredients together.
Once you have poured the baked beans, immediately put in 1/3 of a cup of ketchup. This is the part that is most important. The ketchup adds a nice flavor and adds a bit of a thicker consistency, which I prefer in my beans.
Cook until you see the beans starting to bubble and/or smoke a little bit. (That might not be the technical term, but that was my queue for turning it off last night, and they tasted delicious.)
Finally, and enjoy. (And when you serve, don't worry about a serving dish. Remember, you're in college. Just put a hot pad or a pot-holder on the table, pot on the hot pad, and you have yourself a serving dish.)
Now if that seems a bit elementary and you are feeling more adventurous, try this recipe for a bit more advanced approach to baked beans. I plan on trying it sometime soon, and will make sure to pass along my thoughts.
2.) Baked Potatoes
 There are less work when making potatoes, but they are an excellent side dish because they are filling, so they are ideal to accompany a lighter main course. Potatoes can be cooked in many different ways, but here is how I typically make them.
First, you boil some water. While the water is boiling, wash the potatoes (any amount will work). I don't peel the potatoes (the less work the better!), but you can peel the potatoes if you want. Then, when the water is boiling, add in the potatoes. The potatoes should take no more than about 8-10 minutes, but you can keep checking them as they boil. To check if the potatoes are done, simply stick a fork in the potato. If the potato slides off the fork, the potatoes are done. If the potato sticks to the fork, they still need to boil, and if the potato breaks apart, then you should have taken them out a minute or two earlier.
Once the potatoes have boiled, dump them into a strainer and let them sit for a little. (At this point, you could eat them if you wanted, but I like to add a little bit more to them.)
As they sit, get out some ham and some onions. (Slices of ham are preferred, but lunch meat ham would probably work.) Slice up the ham and onions into little chunks.
Then, cut them up into chunks, about bite sized. Then, put a pan on the stove on medium with either some olive oil or butter in the pan. When the pan has heated up, add the potatoes, ham and onions. Cook them up until you see that they are ready, adding some salt and pepper too. (All those items are fine to eat pre-cooking, so serve when you think they are ready.)
For the finishing touch, put the food into a tupper-ware container. Add 1 to 3 tablespoons of light miracle whip into the tupperware (depending on how many potatoes you used), shake it all up, and serve.
This was a variation on a dish my mom made growing up, but for my culinary capabilities, it tasted pretty darn good.
For more potato recipes, who better to turn to then Betty Crocker? Once again, those are a bit more complicated.
Other side dishes I'm sure are good, but those are a few of my favorites. (And basically the only ones I know how to make.)

Cooking Essentials

To be able to cook somewhat successfully, there are certain ingredients that are fundamental to a solid dish. These ingredients are not meals by themselves (ground beef is not an ingredient, but italian seasoning is), but rather are accessories to the meal, but key in adding flavor.
Here are some simple ingredients that can make a big difference in your kitchen.
1.) Salt and Pepper
    It may seem basic, but I have been amazed at the kitchens I've been in on campus that lack the two basic seasonings. Salt in particular should be used more than when the food is cooked. It's an important beginning seasoning and should be used when boiling noodles, cooking eggs and boiling potatoes, just to name a few uses. Click here for more information on the importance of salt.
2.) Extra-Virgin Olive Oil
     This ingredient headlines Food Network's Chef Cat Cora's list of 10  essential cooking ingredients. Olive oil (or E-V-O-O if you are Rachael Ray) can be used in a variety of recipes. Adding a little olive oil in a pan and lightly cooking it, along with adding a couple of other choice ingredients (my favorites: garlic and baby tomatoes) can make for a quick and easy pasta. But olive oil can also be used to add flavor to any vegetable dish or anything cooked in a frying pan. And if that's not enough to add olive oil to your kitchen, it also has health benefits.
3.) Onions and Garlic
     While the two do not make your breath smell any better, they will make your food taste better. Onions are a more common ingredient than most people realize; they are present in nearly any sauce and and used to add flavor to many meat dishes. Garlic only requires a little bit to be effective. Be careful when you are using garlic; too much garlic can ruin a dish.
4.) Noodles
     This may go against my rules for this list being comprised of ingredients, but nevertheless, noodles are a quick and easy way to make a good meal. But to be able to eat noodles, you have to be able to boil them. Here is how to boil noodles (when I wrote this would be a basic cooking blog, I meant it):
Step #1: Boil Water. Fill a pot with water (any temperature works) and putting it on the stove on high. Typically, it takes water about 10 minutes (give or take a few) to boil.
Step #2: Add salt. This step can be done anytime before the noodles are added to the boiling water. The salt adds a little flavor to noodles.
Step #3: Add noodles to boiling water. When you add the noodles, you need to make sure that a.) the water is boiling and b.) you set a time right away. When adding the noodles, check on the box how long you should keep the noodles in the water. I prefer cooking the noodles al dente, which typically means 10 minutes for spaghetti and 8 minutes for penne.
Then, simply put the noodles in a strainer and add your olive oil, onions and garlic and you have a pasta dish. It's all about having the right ingredients

An Amuse-Bouche

Growing up in a large, Italian family welcomes certain stereotypes. Yes, my family talked very loudly, often while using their hands. But the most important, and most accurate depiction of Italians is at the dinner table.
Each weekend, my mom would prepare a big, delicious meal that would make the guys from the movie Goodfellas proud. (Except she did it primarily by herself and not in prison. But I bet it tastes just as good.)
Heading into my junior year at OU, I was excited to finally be able to cook my own meals, and perhaps do my own Goodfellas impression. But there was one slight problem. My cooking skills made Mrs. Doubtfire seem like a gourmet chef.
So this summer I asked my mom to give me a crash course in cooking, to give me some background so that I could fend for myself in the kitchen. I learned the basics; I can cook eggs, boil noodles and grill a mean hamburger. But nothing was on the level of momma's home cooking.
Now, after a summer that saw some interesting and some successful attempts at culinary greatness, I have finally begun to fend for myself.
This blog will chronicle my amateur foray into the world of cooking by incorporating cooking articles, recipes and other food related items, as well as personal videos and pictures depicting my feeble attempts at concocting meals. The blog will also blend cooking with sports, my one true love, and pop culture.
I will also include snippets from my roommates endeavors, which may be worse than mine (some of their creations belong on this website.)
And through all of my trials and tribulations, I will keep one phrase in my head: at least it's not the dining hall.
(Title courtesy of watching season two of Bravo's Top Chef and learning what an amuse-bouche was.)