SPICY PUMPKIN PASTA (one pot recipe) It's autumn, so I thought at first I would tell you how I use pumpkins. Normally what we have here as "pumpkin" is the butternut squash variety, but I think every sweet-ish edible kind should work. Make super sure it's not the strictly decorative type.
Here we don't really have the canned stuff, so my first step is cutting up your pumpkin to pieces, putting them in an oven dish (I usually put baking paper under everything, to be safe), preheating the oven to 200°C (about 390°F) and letting them go for a good 40-60-ish minutes. This is not science, keep checking. Once they are soft and there is some of that nice color on it, you are done. Cool it a bit, spoon the cooked flesh into a bowl and mash it up with a fork or one of those potato molester things.
Yes, you read correct, no seasoning or sugar or anything. Why? Because that way we can use them for both savory OR sweet dishes.

From now it's easy.

• 60 g of bacon cut small (about 2 oz)
• an onion, cut small
• 2-3 cloves of garlic either through a press or chopped
• 400 g (14-ish oz) of pasta (make it one of those curly little shapes so the sauce gets all up in them cracks)
• 4,5 cups stock (I usually make it warm water + 1 chicken stock cube)
• salt, pepper, nutmeg, basil, cayenne pepper, oregano, parsley... you can add other herbs to your liking, but I live in a rosemary-phobic house, so yeah. I personally think the cayenne is a must, it works super well with the pumpkin taste
• either cream cheese or mozzarella (or both if you want, I'm not your mom)
  cream cheese makes it more creamy, mozz makes it more cheesepull-y.
  I either put in about 125 g of the squishy mozz balls (4,5 oz) or 100 g cream cheese (3,5 oz)

In a pot you fry up your bacon cubes. The key to crispy bacon is to not have the heat too high, just be patient.
Once it's done, take out the bacon bits to a plate. If you are lazy, you can leave it in, but it's going to cook soft. The flavour will stay, though, so no biggie. Add your onion and garlic and sautee them in your bacon grease.
Add your pumpkin mush and stir around a bit, then pour in the stock. Add the spices and stir it around. You just made a very watery pumpkin soup. YAY.
Add your pasta right into the soup. You are going to cook your bone dry pasta on medium heat in this stuff. As the pasta cooks, the sauce gets thickened. Stir it from time to time so it doesn't burn to the bottom. (If your pasta is not cooked, but the sauce is too thick, just add a bit of water, no big deal.)
Once pasta is cooked and sauce is thicc, turn off your heat and add your cheese product + your bacon if you took it out. Mix it in.

As someone who BEFORE Trump was elected was considering learning how to make hardtack, properly salt meat and other centuries old preserving techniques without electricity, I'd like to see some less....survival recipes lol.

I hit upon a surefire pumpkin pie recipe that yields a pie of similar consistency to those bought in the store but with much better flavor.

Easy version: 1 can pumpkin puree (15-16oz), 8 oz cream cheese (soft), 3 large eggs, ½ cup butter (melted), 1½ cups brown sugar, 2 tablespoons cinnamon, 4 teaspoons ginger, ½ teaspoon ground clove, ¼ teaspoon allspice, 1 teaspoon salt, 2 pie shells, optional: mix a few tbspoons cinnamon and sugar as a topping

Preheat oven to 350°, mix all filling ingredients in large bowl (electric mixer will keep the filling smooth, otherwise you will get tiny bubbles of cream cheese), fill shells and bake ~45 minutes. You're looking for the filling to be mostly firm but still wobbly in the center. If you're doing the cinnamon-sugar topping then put it on now. Turn off the oven and let the pie cool in the oven with the door slightly open for another 45 minutes or so.

Hard version: same as above but with 1-2 sugar pumpkins instead of puree, and make your own pie shells (not covered here). Cut pumpkins in half, remove the tough outer layer and boil the flesh either in water with a few tablespoons of butter, or in beef broth. I recommend the latter. Boil for 20 minutes then strain thoroughly. Pumpkin should be soft enough to mash, but not soft enough to disintegrate.

tasty food is good for your general well-being and making it so is not only a skill all adults should have in my opinion (you are strong, independent adults, learn life skills that make you depend less on everyone else), but it can also be fun.

My grandad could cook, sew, knit, woodwork, and a whole host of other things, a lot of which I am quite aware I cannot do nor do some of them as well. However he was part of the RAF in WW2 so being actually competent and skilled adults was a far more common thing back then 👀

As much as I would love to feed you all, that's obviously impossible

Unless... 🤔 I'm sure we can do something with the time machine.

but I work a full time jerb that's not ASMR whisper cooking on Tiktok in a peasant dress.

Aw... Rip Bulba's ethot phase. It would have to be completely in Hungarian with no translation or subtitles, though. People should work for their dinner!

some inauthentic shit that will get you cancelled

Now I'm definitely interested 😅

Also as per my post when originally suggesting this, u/DomitiusOfMassilia please pin this.

I made the Japanese curry recipe you posted in another thread the other day and it was a hit with my wife who usually doesn't like it when made with the store bought roux blocks. She said it tasted 'richer' and 'more authentic', so I'll be keeping that in my back pocket.

I'll try the ones you post in this thread as well at some point. Thanks!

I cook a ton, generally eat like a king too. Close to a year ago I went from eating out probably seven to ten times a week to no more than three. Oftentimes one or two of those three are business dinners I wouldn't avoid anyway. It was for health over money for me but I enjoy it.

Always curious for new things. I can figure out the closest to Hungarian food I've had. Not been to Hungary (yet).

I've been using this bread recipe for a while and it usually turns out good. https://youtu.be/Z-husjZkxHw?si=sqZlOV50PeyLb8Jy

One thing to make sure of is get multiple oven thermometers to test your oven temps because my oven thermostat was under by 30 degrees which made for bad results until I figured it out.

I generally cook Saturdays and make enough for most of the week. Could always use some new recipes.

A bacon clanger.

Tbh I think this would go well with the sausage gravy that goes over American scones, I mean biscuits. Haven't tried it that way yet though.

You'll need some suet crust pastry.

200g self raising flour. 100g beef suet. 1/2tsp salt 1 tsp level of baking powder 125ml cold water.

Combine, kneed until smooth and roll into a vaguely rectangular shape about 1/4cm thick.

On top add strips of streaky bacon, sliced onion and sliced mushrooms. Roll it like a jam rolly polly and stick it in a baking tray and brush with milk or egg. It goes into a gas mark 6 oven (no idea what that is in yank) until the tops golden.

I have plenty more but little time right now. Maybe tomorrow.

My mom's cousin just popped in and she promised her BF some cake or something, so I super quickly mixed up some chocolate cookies. Might as well share while it's chilling.

170 g butter at room temperature
150 g brown sugar
100 g granulated sugar
130 g flour 1 tbs cornstarch
1 egg
a splash of vanilla extract
70 g unsweetened cocoa
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsb baking soda
1 tsp salt

• 1 tsp instant coffee granules if you have it

1 100g bar of white chocolate
1 100g bar of milk chocolate (obviously you can swap your chocolate around, but the dough is REALLY chocolatey, so I think some sweeter chocolate pieces go well with it

Cream butter and sugars. Add the egg, vanilla and the instant coffee. Mix until combined.
Add all the dry stuff and mix until just combined. Roughly chop the chocolate and fold it in. I mix the dough by machine, but fold the add ins by hand to not overmix or crush them.
It's a softer type dough, don't be surprised. Chill for a good 30 minutes in the fridge.

Heat your oven to 175 °C (350 °F). Lay some baking paper on some baking sheets.
Make walnut sized balls of dough, put them on (they spread quite a bit) and flatten them just a little bit. Yes, it's a sticky dough still, trust me, it will be okay.
Bake for 12-15-ish minutes. Because of the high butter content, the cookies will be soft when you take them out. As they cool, they become stable, but they will be a softer kind of cookie.

I’ve made pasta a handful of times. It’s kind of neat, and it does taste good, but I don’t think it’s worth the time for me.

Oyster dressing is in the oven. Some weird 20th century American dishes. It’s basically layers of saltines, butter, oysters, cream, sauteed onions, baked in a casserole. I usually add some parm on top.

I also add a dash of fish sauce or soy sauce to most anything that is savory (gravy, soups, meat, etc)

Most of what I know is simply descended from the old "Pilsbury bible" that pretty much every household of the 20th century had before micrawave ovens.

I've got one for you. It's a delicious one-pot pasta with bacon and spinach. It only has a couple of ingredients, prep time is minimal, and it's amazingly hearty. The measurements in this recipe make about 3-4 servings - it should be 4 but I always have seconds when it's fresh.

You'll need:

• About 250g (1/2 lb) of bacon, preferably in one piece, not presliced.
• 250g (1/2 lb) of pasta (dry, not fresh). You'll want some kind of complicated shape so the sauce can hang on to it: Fusilli, radiatori, farfalle, insalatonde, elbow macaroni will do in a pinch too. Don't use long noodles like spaghetti.
• 1 medium to large sized onion.
• 500 ml (2 cups) of chicken broth. (I make it out of dissolved bouillon jelly because I don't keep fresh broth on hand - this stuff. One of those pods will make 2 cups of broth.)
• 125g (1/4 lb, or about 3-4 cups) of fresh spinach.
• Grated Parmesan to taste.
• A pot with a lid and a wooden spoon.

You don't need extra salt because the bacon and the broth are going to have plenty of it by themselves. You might want to add a bit of black pepper and/or fresh crushed garlic if you want, you can't go wrong with those. Garlic goes with everything. Put garlic on ice cream.

Also, the bacon to pasta ratio can of course be easily adjusted. Keep in mind that a lot of the raw bacon will be fat which will render out while cooking, so you'll end up with less than you started with.

Prep:

• Cut the bacon into tiny cubes. By tiny I mean about 6-8mm (1/4 to 1/3 in) each side. Practically bacon flakes.
• Finely chop the onion.
• Wash the spinach and, optionally, chop it up. You can just dump the spinach in as it is, but I prefer the leaves to be smaller, so I give it a rough pass with a chef's knife.
• If you need to, prepare your broth/bouillon.

Cook:

• Start with the bacon - dump it into the pot and fry it up. Depending on how fatty it is, you may or may not need to put in a bit of oil, or preferably tallow. (RFK Jr. stare)

• Once it's sufficiently crispy - not completely carbonized but not too chewy anymore, take the pot off the heat and take the bacon out and set it aside for now. At the same time, remove most of the rendered fat, leave only about a tablespoon in. (Save the fat in a little jar and use it later to fry eggs, shit's cash.)

• Put the pot with the little bit of fat left back on the heat and add the finely chopped onion, and fry it until it's translucent. The onion will be releasing moisture as it fries; use that to scrape the remaining bits of bacon off the bottom of the pot. If you're adding garlic, do it as well, but wait a few minutes for the onions to soften up first - garlic cooks much faster than onion, especially crushed (tiny bits, burns fast).

• Once the onions are translucent, add the chicken broth. If you couldn't get all the bits of bacon off the bottom just with the onion, now's your second chance. When you're done doing that, add the raw, uncooked pasta, and stir it a bit so that everything is submerged. Bring it to a boil.

• When it's boiling, give it a quick stir, turn the heat down to low, cover the pot with a lid, and let it simmer for 10 minutes. Give it a stir every couple of minutes so the pasta doesn't get stuck to the bottom, and replace the pot each time - you don't want it to reduce.

• After 10 minutes, most of the broth should be absorbed into the pasta, with only a fairly thin layer of broth heavily thickened by the starch in the pasta remaining at the bottom of the pot. Give the pasta a taste - it should be nice and tender by now. If not, add about two minutes to the cooking time. Once you're satisfied with the broth and the pasta, add the spinach and mix it in.

• Finally, add the bacon back in and mix it in as well.

• Eat.

• Regarding the parmesan: This depends on whether you'll be finishing the entire pot while it's fresh or if you want to save some for later in the fridge. If you're eating it now, grate a shitload of parmesan right into the pot and mix it in. If you want to reheat it later, I recommend giving each portion you're eating at the time a sprinkling of parmesan after you plate it up - it doesn't reheat so well if you mix the cheese into the broth, I find it ends up having this weird gummy texture. Your mileage may vary.