Week 2.6 of Coooking

How To Make A Roast 

Step 1)  The first step of making a roast is to decide what kind of meat you are going to use.

• A person can choose from a variety of meats to make their roast with.  For example, elk, deer, and beef are the more common cuts of roast where we are from.  The roast I prepared this week was a beef roast.

Step 2)  Once your roast is in the crock pot you can go ahead and add seasoning to the meat.  

• Everyone has their own preference when it comes to seasoning.  On this roast I used an onion soup mix.  It comes in a small package so all I had to do was open it up and spread it across the meat.

Step 3)  After you've added the desired amount of seasoning and the meat it ready to go, put on the lid and set the crock pot on the highest setting.

• Using a crock pot is very nice because it does most of the work for you.  Once you have set the the timer you can go on with your day.  Make sure you start this process in the morning so you will be able to have the meal ready by dinner time.  It is about a six-eight hour process.  

Step 4)  Come back to the roast when the time is complete and check to see how it is cooking.  If the roast seems to be cooking well go ahead and turn down the crock pot and set the timer on the second setting.

• Depending on the crock pot, your results may vary a little on this step.  But, for the most part, this will be accurate.

Step 5)  Go ahead and add in some carrots, potatoes, and onions to the roast.  These other foods will give the people eating a nice side dish to their meat.

• These three vegetables are probably the most common choice of side, but of course, you can add any vegetables you like. 

Step 6)  When the roast has finished cooking remove it from the crock pot and put it in a cook places to cut it into slices.  After you have successfully cut up the roast, set it up nicely, with the vegetables, on a platter.

• This last step is optional but it will make your meal look complete and very appetizing.  You have now completed the roast, enjoy!
•  For the blog I used the “How-To” structure.

 

Week 2.5 of Cooking

This week I had company at my house so I had to make something that would be able to feed the six of us.  The solution to this was a pretty simple dish, STEW!  Stew is actually pretty easy to make.  The most important thing is to follow to recipe and the steps that it gives.  Some people feel you must follow the recipe amounts to perfection but I don't think that's really necessary.  Granted, there are definitely foods out there where this is vital but lucky for me, I don't cook at that level.  For dishes like stew, I think the little extra that gets added in only gives it more flavor.

The strongest ingredient in the stew was definitely the wine.  This actually surprised me a little because I didn't feel like I put that much in.  I did follow the recipe precisely on this ingredient, it just has a really strong flavor!

All in all, everyone really enjoyed the stew.  I also prepared a salad with some leftovers from the previous week and they liked that as well.  This was a successful week and I am looking forward to the next!

Week 2.4 of Cooking

Hello friends, and welcome back to the blog!

As most of you know, last Sunday was the Super Bowl!  With it being a tradition, I made snacks for the big game.  The snacks I chose to make were "pigs in a blanket", meatballs, dip, and a veggie tray.  I found that snacks are very time consuming and actually require a lot more effort than the previous meals I have cooked thus far.  Even though snacks weren't that easy, I still had a lot of fun during the whole process.  I have decided cooking is a lot more fun if you have music playing in the background, so that is what I usually do.  My mom helped me again this week as needed but it was mostly just getting me utensils and other things I needed.  Another snack we prepared for the game was teriyaki wings but my mom did most of the work on those so I can't really count that as something I did for the week.

The feedback on my snacks were two thumbs up from both my mom and my dad.  This week was a lot of fun and I am glad I now have another aspect of cooking down.

Here are some pictures!