Third Recipe: Yellow rice mixed with beans, steak, and spicy potatoes

I was very excited about making this dish. Very

You have no idea. Well actually, you just might. COME WITH ME ON THIS JOURNEY.

So I had to thaw the steak, which I did earlier in the day. Once I got home, that junk was ready to go!

This is seriously the most pleasing picture I could take.

 I chopped those suckers up before seasoning them with a mixture of soy sauce, red wine vinegar, adobo, garlic, and pepper. This was going to be the best steak you've ever eaten. And you don't even get to eat it. Next, I cut up all of the potatoes,

The stains on side of the fridge were from the 

potatoes trying to escape.

and put them in a bowl. Now, this recipe called for olive oil and salt, but I was like eff that: I'm making these potatoes SPICIER THAN YOUR MOM. I found my spicy seasoning and went to town on these little potato quarters. I wasn't about to let them win.Once the seasoning was sprinkled, I had to shake the bowl up so every potato was covered. Oh, and did I have fun with that.

So much fun the picture got blurry!

FUN BEING HAD!

Them potatoes was shook.

The next step was boiling the rice - my worst enemy. 

 Don't let its appearance fool you - it's a dick.

I was determined to get it right this time, come hell or high water...what the hell does that even mean, anyway? Either we go to hell or drown? What if we didn't repent our sins...doesn't that mean we'd drown and then go to hell anyw- you know what, who cares.

I measured the water and put it into the pot, letting it get to a boil. 

 Yeah, that's uh...that's water getting to a boil.

Once that happened I slammed some garlic cloves and sazon into it to turn that water into a reddish liquid of flavor and love. LOVE.

Above: Flavor and LOVE.

At this point the water really began to boil, so I added the rice and a can of beans, let it boil just a bit longer, then lowered the heat and went on my merry way.

With everything going accordingly, I preheated the oven for the spuds.

The right temperature to PARTY.

 

As soon as the oven beeped, I dropped those bad bastards onto a tray and forgot about them for about 30 minutes. The last piece of the puzzle was up: cooking the steak.

By now, the steak was deliciously marinated and ready to be heated to a respectable temperature for devouring. I heated up a big pan with some oil and got straight to cooking. 

This is always my favorite part~

The steak always cooks quickly, so it was done in a matter of minutes. As this was all coming together, I should note that I was feeling rather BOSS about this whole event. It was smelling great in the house, I felt like a pretty housewife waiting for their husband to get home (no lie, I felt like this. whatever man, I can cook.), and I figured "Hey, since I'm waiting...what the hell, lemme take a shot of some Hennessy and be a straight up man right now".

I got the bottle from our little rickety liquor cupboard and got a glass, filled it to an appropriate level (i.e. not enough to get me drunk) and down the sucker. 

I immediately regretted that decision.

The devil.

I thought I might get sick, but the feeling never came over me. In its place, however, was shame. At this moment I did realize that I could never be an alcoholic, but I also realized that I don't like hard liquor. Like, at all. I'll stick to my cranberry vodkas, thank you very much...

Okay, so the finale. I checked on the rice to make sure it was coming out well.

It looks like the sultan of Agrabah.

Lookin' pretty good, I thought. Last on the list: the potatoes. I open the oven door...

Ah, yeah- that's nice.

Everything's done! I place it all onto a plate and decide to marvel in its glory:

OVERHEAD SHOT OF TASTINESS!

 

Everything came out swimmingly. Rice was still too soft, but it was great. At least I know that, when I'm older, I'll be able to gum that shit down. That is what we call a perk.

Second Recipe: breaded chicken, rice, and beans

Chicken, rice, and beans - The staple of many a hispanic diet. I happen to be of two different descents: Puerto Rican and Cuban. A Pu-cub-erican, if you will. I LOVE chicken, rice, and beans. If anyone ever questioned me about being hispanic, I would tell them I adore this dish and be exempt from whatever judgment I was about to receive.

That being said, I decided to do my own take on the dish. Nothing too fancy- I opted to bread the chicken before frying it up. So, without further ado...let's get on this boat.

Firstly, the chicken: As I was starting this dish, I thought to myself "Hans (yeaaaah, you remember ;D), you ALWAYS season the chicken before cooking it. Same seasonings, over and over...you're a boring individual."

I said to my inner dialogue "Hey, shut up. You're INSIDE me, and I don't see you attempting any big changes. You suck just as much."

As I sat there with a quiet debate going on through my head...and possibly looking like a creeper...a solution came to me.

Chop up that goddamned chicken and add an egg to that bitch. Then breadcrumb the hell out of it until it looks like bleached brains.

Yeah, that's bleached brains, all right.

I mean honestly, this stuff was lookin' kinda gross.

Obligatory Myspace photo! People still use that network, right?

I cleared the stove next, since I always seem to have crap cluttered on it.

 Yeah, I'm talking about you, tea kettle. Where do you get off?

Well, with the chicken ready and raring to go I moved onto the next step: Boiling the water for rice. 

 

Oh, I wasn't kidding. We're taking pics of EVERYTHING tonight.

Rice and  I have a problem with each other: I wanna cook it to perfection, and then eat it, and rice is a goddamn jerk. Every time I attempt to make rice, it either comes out too soft and mushy, like porridge, or hard and practically raw, like a dead dinosaur's pelvic bone. I'm not even sure about that simile and what it means, but I'm going with it. I was determined to get it to work tonight, however.

So, with the water being boiled, the rice settled in at the appropriate moment, I move onto making the beans. I heat the oil in another pot:

 Real artsy picture, right here. Real artsy.

and pull out the can of beans and tomato sauce.

GOYA! BANDITOOOOOO!

If I'm ever questioned yet again about my hispanic heritage, all I need do is pull out a can of this shit. They may just give me their prettiest virgin. I also took a pic of the tomato sauce:

I wasn't kidding. Pics of EVERYTHING.

I pop all of that shit into the pot and let it do what it does best: become delicious. With everything going as planned, I feel like a mah-fuggin' boss cooking this meal. However, as the chicken fries, I notice that the breadcrumbs aren't really...well, pronounced as I thought they'd be.

It's still pale, like bleached brains. Slightly more edible, however.

Slightly nervous, I give it a taste. not so bad, but it's kinda...eggy. I take out some Adobo (no picture of this, unfortunately; I didn't want to scare everyone with all of these hispanic shenanigans going on.) and sprinkle it adequately about the chicken.

Another taste. Amazing.

Everything is finally how I want it, albeit the chicken didn't brown as nicely as I wanted it to. The meal finishes rather quickly:

Admit it: You would sell a child for this meal.

It tasted great! I was proud of myself~ My only complaint would be that the rice was just a slightly bit hard; nothing to break dishes over, but I can feel my rice making powers getting stronger. I will get there...soon...

Oh yeah, and throughout this whole meal making process I was accosted by a tiny beast:

There is actually a shank inside that ice cream bar.

First recipe: Manicotti

Manicotti, or MAN-EHHH-GOT! as my Italian American friend Frank would say, didn't seem like it would be a hard meal to make. I checked the box for the recipe and I figured "What the hell, I'll probably do a better job than I think".

So away with the box, and the recipe along with it. IT'S GO TIME.

So things start out simple enough: Make the sauce, boil the noodles, preheat the oven; you know, the damn basics. I zoom through it because, well...it's pasta. If you can't make pasta then I'm sure nobody's ever loved you. My sauce, by the way-

-is the greatest sauce ever. It comes from the finest jar of pasta sauce you'll ever find at a supermarket. I remember making my own sauce once: quite delicious, but it took so long I fell asleep while eating. Don't ever do that; you'll get it all over your clothes. Or eat naked, whatever's easier.

SO! everything seems to be coming together nicely when I realize...I have no idea how to put filling into the manicotti noodles.

Shit just got real.

I made an attempt to go to the trash can to retrieve the now soiled and germ covered pasta box with the recipe on the back, but I pull myself together. "No, Hans!" I shout to myself in my head.

I uh, I sometimes call myself Hans.

"Steel yourself, sir! You came into this believing in yourself-don't give up hope!"

Like a mental slap across the face, I tighten my apron, I gather my tools, and I say with my chest "I shall prevail!"

Mind you, I still don't know how to effin' fill these noodles. Also, I dropped some on the floor.

Yeah, some of that happened.

No matter: A few casualties in a war I know in MY HEART I'm going to win. After the noodles boil, I drain them in the colander and prepare to do battle with their soft, noodle-y forms. I had to bring in reinforcements, however:

This is Yosef. He's seen a few fights in his time, but never have I encountered a braver man than he.

This is his wife, Agnes. I originally thought it was a boy assistant, and that the old man, well...well he had some questions that needed to be answered. It was by chance that I found out this was a woman...and by god, she is ugly.

Anyhoo, I filled the manicotti as best as I could, braving scalding meat sauce, the dangerous noodle nemesis I created, and an oven that was waiting for its next doomed entrant. When all was said and done, I managed to make these:

These have got to be the ugliest manicotti ever made. And I've been to some shitty italian restaurants.

Also, Agnes fell. I like to think that she got drunk on some cooking wine and stumbled into the corner of the kitchen, with Yosef shaking his head and cursing the direction his life went down. Because they have problems, you see.

How the hell did these two noodles get into the corner like that? It looks like they tried to make a break for it, the smug italian vagabonds...

30 minutes later, the meal was done. I hoped that, at the very least, the manicotti would look somewhat presentable and hopefully delicious.

Meh, good enough. Maybe I HAVE seen shittier manicotti, because these...well, they're not any better, but they were damned delicious.

Oh, and these were the dishes I had to do afterward. I don't even get paid for this crap.