Lasagna Casserole~

mkay this is another one of my quick-n-easy self made recipes.  I came up with this one back in high school because one of the things my dad loved for me to make was lasagna, but the problem is lasagna noodles are a pain in the butt to cook with.  I never seem to have a pot deep enough to cook them in, so one night I decided to use shell noodles instead (since they are my favorite lol).  Personally I think it's a heck of a lot easier to cook lasagna this way! and this should be something you'd be able to cook in the dorms :D ...well except for the beef, I'm not sure how to pull that one off :(   (also forgive me for misspelling any of the ingredients lol)

Ingredients:


1 box of shaped pasta
1/2 small container of ricotta cheese
1 small jar of pasta sauce (I use prego traditional)
1lb of beef
1/2 cup of grated parmasan cheese

Directions:

Stove 1.  Start scrambling the beef and put your water onto boil (remember you need 4 cups of water for every cup of dry pasta). Cook pasta until desired tenderness, should take 8-12 minutes

Dorm 1.  Put your water (same amount in stove) and past into a covered microwave safe bowl (make sure the steam has somewhere to escape to) and cook on high for about 10-12 minutes per cup of pasta. Keep an eye on it, if you're water level goes lower than your pasta level then stop and add more water.

Stove 2.  Once your pasta is finished cooking the meat should be too, so drain the water and add the meat to the pot of noodles then add your jar of pasta sauce and half of the container of ricotta and stir. Once the sauce is warmed completely through sprinkle on the parmasan and you're ready to eat!

Dorm 2.  Once the pasta is done remove the lid of your pasta sauce and pop that in the microwave for about 3 minutes (i'll be honest i've never warmed pasta sauce this way, but it should work just fine) keep warming at intervals of 3 minutes and stirring after each one til the sauce is warm.  Then add to your noodles and half the container of ricotta stir it up then sprinkle on the parmasan and you too are done! :D

Sorry for no recipes lately!

I've been super busy with studying for tests so i haven't had time to post any new recipes but I promise they're on the way!  Some of the yummiest things i've ever eaten were dishes my grandmothers have made and i'm planning to grab a few of those recipes when i head home this weekend :D because there's nothing better than some home cookin for those times you can't make it home :D

Home Made Mac N Cheese

Mmm~ what's better than a cold yucky day like today than a big bowl of mac n cheese!  Sadly the weathermen are callin for more snow eww ;^; i'm so sick of the cold i'm ready for spring time now! Until then though i'll just eat some tasty home made mac n cheese :D  This is a pretty simple recipe and has room for all kinds of improvisation (which i might post on later dates) but for today this is a use what you have on hand recipe so it's super duper simple and cheap! Music to a college students ears i know haha  Stove top directions are listed first and microwave/dorm instructions are listed below that :) happy cooking!

Ingredients:


1 to 1.5 cups of uncooked noodles of your choice
3 to 3.5 cups of water
8oz of velveeta cheese diced
1/4 cup of milk
3-4 tablespoons of sour cream

Stove Top Directions:

1.  Mkay so firstly we're going to bring our 3 cups of water to a boil, and once it's almost rolling boil (meaning there's a bunch of bubbles floating to the top, but it's not splashing all over the place) add your 1 cup of noodles, for me this would be shell noodles because i like them the best.  If you're using shell noodles it'll take them about 12minutes to cook, make sure to stir every few minutes or the noodles will stick to the bottom and then you'll just have a big ol mess
2.  While your noodles are cooking now would be a good time to go ahead and dice up our cheese.  The smaller you make the cubes the faster they're going to melt so keep that in mind when you're cutting it up, and no as you can see your cubes don't have to be perfect and all the same size.

3.  After your noodles are done cooking go ahead and add the cheese and a 1/4cup of milk.  Stir until the cheese is all melted, if it seems like the mixture is too thick try adding a little more milk.  After the mixture has reduced you can add in your 3 table spoons of sour cream (though this step is optional) and you're done simple as that :D so eat up and enjoy!

Microwave Directions:


1.  For those who live in the dorm you can make scratch mac n cheese too!  Make sure you have a big microwave safe dish and that you'll be able to cover it.  You're going to add the water and the noodles in together and cook it on high for the same amount of time 12minutes, but you need to stop it at the 6minute mark and stir it so the noodles don't stick.  If your noodles still aren't done after 12minutes continue cooking for another 2-4minutes and keep doing that until they are done.
2.  After the noodles are cooked drain the water and add in the diced cheese and milk, the cheese will start to melt as you stir but if after a couple of minutes of stirring and all the cheese isn't melted just pop it back into the microwave for about a minute and that should be enough to finish melting the cheese.  Then plop in your 3tablespoons of sour cream if you'd like and you're done! Enjoy!

As per request a quick and easy noodle recipe!

Okay so when a friend asked me for a "quick" noodle recipe i was like...aren't all noodle recipes quick? lol (i assumed he was making ramen noodles, the greatest college staple next to coffee haha) so i told him that i didn't know any off the top of my head but i would look up a good quick recipe for him.  I found this interesting recipe from http://www.mattfischer.com/ramen/?p=789 and the title is Hella Broke Ramen Tacos.  Now i'm putting the disclaimer out there i haven't tried this one yet haha but from the sounds of it i think it works pretty well! The only down side is that it's all starch and fat :( so this doesn't really live up to my standards of cooking, but let's face it when we're in a big rush and super tight on money nutrition is pretty far down on the list of importance.  So what i recommend is that you do your best to add some veggies or fruits to this (aka tamato, salsa, peppers, some type of veggie/fruit you see with tacos, or just your favorite).  When i do get around to making this i'll come back and post some pics so you know what it's going to look like :) also i'll add prices in once i've gone to check at the store, personally though i keep all this stuff on hand haha

Ingrediants:
1package of beef ramen
1package of taco seasoning
3taco shells
1tsp of butter

Directions:
1.  Cook ramen as indicated on the package (aka boil the water add the noodles and boil for 3minutes)
2.  Stir in your 1tsp of butter and add half the beef ramen seasoning and add the same ammount of taco seasoning
3.  put your seasoned noodles in a taco shell top with tomatos/salsa/peppers some cheese and sour cream (if you'd like) and enjoy!

Pepper Chili and Pepper Party Dip

Okay so this is basically the same recipe with only a few minor difference, one of the minor difference being that when i made this the other day i supidly picked up the first can of Rotel i saw and didn't notice it was for chili until i had poured it into the mixture and smelled the spices haha anyways this is a spin on Rotel cheese dip and fajitas two of my favorite mexican themed dishes. The prices listed out to the side of ingredients is based on Walmart prices (before tax) as of Feb. 5, 2011.
So i feel like this would be a great first recipe to put out since i did come up with it on my own -w- (very proud of myself yes) lol and also tomorrow being the big Super Bowl game i figured a bunch of people would be looking for some yummy party dishes and what's better than a tasty dip or chili :D So in the instructions ingredients will be color coded so that you can clearly tell which is for the dip and which is for the chili, if it's in both i'll put a purple star out next to the ingredient. Basically it's very simple to make whether you're in a dorm or apartment and it's a yummy dish for vegans, vegitarians, and the rest of us who'll eat anything lol (i've listed out where each food group stops)
Ingredients for Pepper Party Dip and Pepper Chili:
1lb of Lean Ground Beef* ($3.50)
1can of Rotel Original diced tomatos and green chilis --For the Chili recipe use Rotel Chili($1.68)
1can of Black Beans* ($0.68)
16oz of Velveta cheese (or w/e melty cheeese ya want) ($3.48)
3peppers of your choice (i've used orange, red, and yellow in the pics)* ($3.50)
1pack of Old El Paso taco seasoning ($0.82)
1small container of Lite Sour Cream* ($1.18)
Directions:

1.  Of course step one is going to wash everything, your beef*, peppers*, dishes, hands, ect. we don't want germs speading or anything.  After everything is all washed up start cooking your meat* first it's going to take the longest.  After that preheat your oven to 425 degrees farenheight (dorm users you don't have to worry about this obviously we're going to cook yours in a mircrowave) and lets get our choping boards and peppers* on the ready.  For those of you who've never cut a pepper* before here's a little tip, cut a square on the top of the pepper this way you can just pull the center of the chili out and all those pesky super hot seeds won't set your mouth on fire should they accidentally get mixed into the dish...well unless you want that then add those puppies away! haha oh yes and now would be a good time to go ahead and open our cans of black beans* and rotel(chili rotel for those making the chili version) and add them to our dish.

 2. Mkay so now that our meat is cooking and our peppers* are chopped (anyone find the mickey mouse? i set it aside so it's kinda obvious hahaha) then we're ready to food process the heck outta these things.  Now you don't have to chop these up any smaller if you don't want to, personally though i like a finely chopped pepper* so i popped mine into my mini food chopper aint it cute! anyways on with the cooking! So now with all our peppers* copped and added to our dish which now contains: black beans*, rotel(chili rotel for the chili), and 3 peppers* this is where you would stop if you're vegan, for the vegitarians and meat eaters you may now add half of the block of velveta cheese* (diced into somewhat small cubes) and the vegitarians are now done, and then for the rest of us add that tasty tasty meat*(for those making chili don't add the taco seasoning the combined spices don't mix too well) (which should be done cooking now) to which you sprinkle on the package of taco seasoning and a smidge of water so that the meat is covered with the seasoning-sauce thingy (w/e you want to call it) and now your dish should contain all your ingredients (except sour cream that's last) and it should look something like the picture below:

YUM! almost done now :D
3.  Okay now that we have all that deliciousness ready in the contain which btw should hold about a quart and a half, 2 quarts container would be best there's a lot of stuff going into this and you don't want to be dumb like me and squish it all into a tiny 1qt dish like i did because then it might bubble over and make a big mess you have to clean up lol so now we're gonna pop a lid on it (or foil) and slide that deliciousness into our 425 degree oven for a total of 20minutes! For our dormers out there you should hopefully have put it into a microwave safe dish and you're going to have a bit more difficult time because microwaves varry so heat it up in incroments of 10minutes stirring inbetween so it doesn't explode...speaking of exploding i think it should go without saying but DON'T PUT TIN FOIL IN YOUR MICROWAVES! you will blow something up or set something on fire lol if you don't have a lid for your dish just use a paper towl or something microwave safe.

it looks icky i know but i swear it tastes amazing :D

Then we finish this off with a dolip of daisy lol and you're done! enjoy your delicious dip and or chili! Serve with chips or tortila shells or just eat with a spoon it's just that yummy haha

Total time: 30-40min

Total servings: 8-10 people

Total cost: $14.84    which is not bad considering how many it feeds :D

If there are any questions please comment and i'll answer your question ASAP thanks for reading! enjoy the food!!

Very first College Kitchen blog post!

mkay so those who've read the description know that the recipes i'll be teaching yall to make are intended for full kitchens (so basically those who live in really nice dorms or apartments) but i'll also give instructions on how to make it in microwaves and crockpots as well! i'm making this blog because i love to cook, and i think it's important to be able to feed yourselves something other than ramen and the deep fried foods (aka crap lol) that they serve in the caff.  i'll do my best to post pictures along with the recipes but i'm afraid i've lost my camera cord ^^; so i'm stuck with cellphone pics haha when i do find that cord though i'll post some better pictures.  also i'll be posting the prices of these meals and how much the ingredients cost, where i bought them, if they were on sale, ect. because let's face it all of us college kids are flat ass broke hahaha so anyways i'll be posting as regularly as possible and i hope we can all enjoy these delicious foods!