Bean There, Done That (Black Bean Taco)

Now, I can finally tell people that I’ve made tacos before!

This is going to be a combo post folks. I’m going to combine the ingredients and process into one post since I haven’t been diligent enough and the week is almost over!

I went a little rogue and didn’t end up following any specific recipes. Also, I kind of just eyeballed everything, so I have no specific measurements. Sorry!

I ended up using your basic taco ingredients:

I used a red onion, a roma tomato, and some pre-shredded lettuce.

Pre-shredded cheese!

And some snack-sized flour tortillas.

Oh, and let’s not forget the star of the show. Black beans!

Again, I didn’t use any specific measurements… just my best judgement! You guys trust me, right?

Now let’s move on to how I put all of this together…

I diced up my tomatoes and put them to the side as a topping for later. I did the same to my red onions. I was actually thinking about just adding the onions as a topping as well. But since I was doing my own thing with this recipe…

Why not just mix in my red onions with the black beans? So, I cooked my onions and beans over medium heat.

Then I started thinking that maybe the beans and onions might not give the taco enough flavor, so I decided to add a bit of garlic powder!

After my beans and onions were finished, I topped the rest of my ingredients on my tortilla!

You can see the final product tomorrow in all of its glory along with my impressions. See ya!

An Afternoon with a Fungi (Mushroom Sliders)

Like the title of my post? I always try to be as lame as possible.

ANYWAYS. I’m getting a little better at shopping for produce, if I do say so myself. I didn’t get lost in the labyrinth this time!

Once again, here is the recipe I used. And here is how the magic happened.

First, I tore off the stem of the portobello (aka Frankenstein’s mushroom). Pop! Easy and clean.

Then, I suffocated the poor thing in sandwich baggie. Don’t worry he had about 1/4 cup of balsamic vinaigrette to keep him company. I let that sit for about 30 minutes.

Prepped the veggies. One slice of red onions made enough for my two sliders. One or two slices of roma tomato per slider is probably a better idea than cutting five like I did.

…

Watch TV for 28 minutes.

…

Tossed my shroom in the pan on high heat for 10 minutes, turning it over halfway through.

 

Meanwhile, I put some garlic spread on both sides of my slider buns.

After the mushroom was done, I cut it into fours and put all the ingredients together! Pretty simple right? You’ll see the result tomorrow! As for me, I’m going to take a nap in the middle of the day like a bum.

Putting All My Eggplants in One Basket (Eggplant Stir-fry)

Let’s do this, shall we? I got this recipe from the Food Network site, contributed by Katie Chin.

I murdered one whole Asian eggplant by cutting it in half length-wise and then slicing into it diagonally into half-inch pieces. As you can see, I’ve got the eyes of a mole and cannot cut a vegetable properly to save my life. That’s why you see all those fatty pieces in there.

Then I discarded the bits into a bowl filled with water and two teaspoons of salt, letting it sit for five minutes until that sodium goodness dissolved.

Then I committed another act against humanity by disemboweling a tomatillo pepper, effectively deseeding it. Actually, I just cut it in half like the eggplant.

Chop! Chop! Chop! Thin slices, please. Thank you.

On the side, I whipped up a little somethin’ somethin’ with one teaspoon of sesame oil, one teaspoon of sugar, and one tablespoon of oyster sauce.

Put my veggies in a bowl along with a couple teaspoons of minced garlic.

Then I splashed two tablespoons of vegetable oil in my wok-like pan on high heat…

… and dumped those suckers in! Some oil splashed on me. It was as if the food were spitting on me for doing something horrible… oh well.

Stir-fried for a good two minutes!

Threw in two tablespoons of water and stir-fried again for another two minutes!

Then I added the ooey-gooey oyster sauce concoction and stirred it around for a bit.

Buuuuuuut a problem arose. Remember how I didn’t cut the eggplants properly? Yup, my eggplants were not fully cooked, so I had to stir-fry it some more for a good… oh… three to four minutes? Yeah.

Anyway, you’ll see the final product tomorrow! Ciao.

Baby’s First Steps (French Toast)

First off, my apologies; I didn’t take that many pictures! I guess I was so caught up in making the damn dish, I forgot. I promise I won’t make the same mistake next week! There will be some video of the process coming tomorrow though. And without further ado…

I cracked open my two eggs in a bowl large enough to dip the bread in later. Tossed in a dash of cinnamon, a teaspoonish thing of sugar… and of course, a cup of some good old chocolate milk (I feel like a kid!). Now that I think about it… was the sugar really necessary with all of that chocolate milk? Whatever.

Using my trusty fork, I beat that pile of mess into submission.

Heating up the pan on medium for a minute or two!

 

Now let’s throw some whipped butter into that pan! That’ll give the french toast a little more taste, I think… and it’ll grease that sucker.

Aaaaand here’s where the rest of my post gets boring. I’ve got no more pictures! I swear I’ll do better next time, and if I don’t, complain in the comments! Or shoot me a nasty email.

Afterwards, I dipped my old wheat bread into the mixture, fully coating both sides, turning it into some mud-caked monstrosity. Then, with chocolate goo drizzling all over the countertop, I apprehensively dropped it into the pan.

Sizzle, sizzle! I couldn’t tell if that noise was the toast being cooked or if it was hissing at me, begging me to end its hideous life before it transformed into something that looked like it came out of Frankenstein’s lab. I let that sit for 2-3 minutes on one side and flipped it over to the other side for about 2 more minutes.

Repeat for the other slices.

How does it look? Find out tomorrow. As the philosophical Kanye West once asked, “So what we gonna have, dessert or disaster?”