Cooking with Jack: Air Pudding

Welcome to "Cooking with Jack", the cooking show sponsored by... well, this is me practicing for when "Cooking with Jack" is actually sponsored by somebody.

I was trying to come up with a fantastic recipe that's low-fat, low-sugar, low-calorie and low-everything and then I remembered a dish that my buddy Stephen at Who Ate My Blog just raves about... my famous Air Pudding.

 

Take two cups of distilled water. If you don't have distilled water, you can substitute tap water, rain water, snow water, filtered water, soft water, hard water or de-ionized water.

 

 

Now pour the water into a pot and cook at medium high-low heat until it's boiling.

Boil for 20 minutes or so, until the water is completely evaporated.

Pour the remaining mixture into a bowl.

Add a half cup of nada.

 

Pour in three-quarters cup of zilch.

A couple of squirts of diddley-squat.

One tablespoon of nought.

And one half teaspoon of nothing-at-all.

Whisk in one fresh goose egg.

And that's all there is to is. A fresh, airy, delightful dish that you can have as much of as you want and not gain weight. 

Bon air petit!

Next on "Cooking with Jack":

What To Do In a Kitchen Emergency

(Such As When You Squirt Ketchup All Over Your Hand)

Cooking with Jack: M-A-N-G-O, and Salsa Is It's Name-O

Welcome to another installment of the internet's least popular culinary show, "Cooking with Jack." As Julia Child once noted, "Got more time for misbehavin’….since I started microwaving…!!" Keeping that spirit in mind (and deciding it was too hot to turn on the oven), I've decided to share a quick and easy salsa recipe.

Take a mango. Did you know that mangoes are members of the Anachardiaceae family? You did? Then you're a bigger nerd than I thought. Well then, I guess you know that they're also distant relatives of the cashew, pistachio, Jamaica plum and (no kidding) poison ivy/poison oak. Ayyyyy! I got some on me!

 

This recipe is so freakin' quick and easy that I'm going to waste some time teaching you the coolest trick you can do with a mango. I'm serious! Cut each side as close to the core as possible, so that you have two big slices.

Now take your knife and slice a grid all the way to (but not through) the outer skin.

If it doesn't look like this, go back to the beginning of this post (do NOT collect $200!) and start over.

Apply gentle pressure from the back of the mango skin, and get ready...

...FOR ME TO BLOW YOUR FREAKIN' MIND!

Amaze your kids! Impress your guests! Get off to a really bad start at a job interview! 

Okay, enough fun and games. It's salsa time! Cut the mango up and put it in your own fiery salsa bowl.

 

Now take a cucumber. Hey, that reminds me of a joke: What's green and has wheels? A cucumber with wheels. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Okay, peel, seed and cut up the cucumber, being careful not to cut yourself from laughing so hard you shake.

You say "to-may-to", I say "luscious piece of summer deliciousity"...

Choppity, chop, chop.

(singing) It's beginning to look a lot like Salsa-mas.

Add a dash of lime and the juice from one salt container...

Si, El Diablo... I almost forgot to add the japaleño pepper. (Note: ever since I went to the Fair a dozen or so years ago and heard a vendor hawking "Fresh cornbread with jap-aleno peppers, " I've been calling them "japalenos". It's just more fun to say!

You can add cilantro if you (a) have cilantro and (b) don't hate cilantro.

SALSA'S READY! COME AND GET IT!

Next on "Cooking with Jack": 

What do you do with leftover mouse?

An Open Letter to Paula Deen

Dear Paula,

You seem like a nice enough lady. You kind of have that wacky aunt thing going, the loud and boisterous relative that you don’t mind spending a little time with at a family reunion.

And I hate to jump on you when you’re down. I recently read where you've been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, but continue to promote the kind of diet that… well… leads people down the path to type 2 diabetes.

I don’t normally watch your cooking show(s), Paula. However, I was flipping the channel while I was ellipticalizing at the gym one day and came across your smiling mug.

You were making some kind of crazy ham-and-cheese sammich. I was shaking my head because you loaded that puppy up with gobs of cheese and homemade mayonnaise and then started frying that bitch up with a stick of butter. A stick of butter!

I remember thinking, “Wow, how unhealthy is that?” but you, my dear, were just getting started. You broiled some more cheese on top of that rascal, and then plopped a big greasy fried egg smack on top.

And then… OMFG… you slathered creamy hollandaise sauce all over the top of it. Satan wouldn’t even serve that sandwich in Hell’s cafeteria, Paula. I’m serious. I had bad dreams for a week.

And what about your Donut Bread Pudding? Two cans of sugary fruit cocktail, a can of sweetened condensed milk, an entire stick of butter, a pound of powdered sugar and – are you sh*ttin’ me? – two dozen Krispy Kreme donuts. My cholesterol went up 20 notches just reading about it.


When I first heard this report about your health, I felt sorry for you, Paula. But it turns out you’ve known about your condition for quite some time and still promote and peddle your heart-attack-ready recipes. 

I dunno, Paula. That’s kind of like turning on the TV and seeing Mister Rogers teaching kids to roll their own cigarettes (actually, that would have been a better analogy if Mister Rogers had contracted lung cancer; let's just pretend, for the sake of my argument, that he did).

I sincerely hope you can get a handle on your diabetes, Paula. But just as important, I hope you come to grips with the fact that with great flavor comes great responsibility.

You could be an agent for positive change in this uninformed and unhealthy world, Paula, but the first ingredient on this quest has to be knowledge… not a stick of butter.

Take care,

Jack

Tips for Cooking with Kids

•  It’s a good idea to let your child plan dinner one night, but I hope you like “S’more Casserole”.

• There’s a fine line between teaching a child how to follow a recipe and handing him a cookbook and saying "If you need me, I'll be at the movies."

• For safety purposes, only let child use Nerf® knife.

• Making a soufflé will teach your kid an important life lesson: nothing you do will ever turn out right.

• It’s an ideal opportunity to teach children about different spices and which ones (marjoram, cilantro) are poisonous.

• Don’t worry about making a mess in the kitchen; that’s why you hired a maid, silly.

• Praise them for the effort, even if the final result isn’t perfect: “You did a great job kneading that bread, but next time try not to pick your nose so much while you’re doing it.”

• Learning to cook is also about developing life skills, so take your children to the grocery store to help shoplift the ingredients you’ll need.

• It’s fun to teach kids things they don’t know about cooking, such as “Baking powder and baking soda are the same exact thing.”

• A child’s laughter is one of God’s greatest gifts, so show ‘em that trick where you break an egg with one hand.

• It's like the old saying goes, "Give a child a fish stick and he eats for a day, teach him to fish stick and he eats for a lifetime."

• Following a recipe can teach a child important math skills, such as “guesstimation.”

• It’s a chance to learn about the world’s cultures, foreign languages and geography; for example, if you make a box of Kraft® macaroni-and-cheese, you can talk about how it’s from the “United States” which is located in “America.”

• Finally get to crack line: “Hey, I made you… it’s high time you made something for me!”

Tricks to Help You Eat Less

• Eat off a smaller plate, using even smaller utensils, at a minuscule table inside a tiny house.
• Treat yourself to a Hershey's kiss every time you eat 100 celery stalks.
• Always take the first spoonful of yogurt and fling it at your child - (1) over time the calories will really add up and (2) the kid probably did something to deserve it.
• Every time you have a craving for something sweet, slam your finger in the car door.
• When you go out to eat, ask your waitress to bring half of your entree out as an appetizer, serve half as your main course and box up the remaining half for you to have as lunch tomorrow.
• You don't have to finish off that bottle of wine tonight; you can stick it in the fridge and it'll keep at least one more day.
• There's a simple way to tell if your serving size is too large:  it's ALWAYS too large.
• Drink a big glass of water before your meal and then a big glass of water instead of your meal.
• Ask your waiter: "What's your least popular dish?"
• When you're in the drive-thru at a fast-food joint, ask yourself “What the hell am I doing in the drive-thru at a fast-food joint?”
• Yes, it's a sin to waste food but I believe “gluttony” is on the big board as well.
• Chew each bite 20 times (or at least 2).
• There's one guaranteed way to make you eat less:  let me cook for you.

Cooking with Jack: Quesadill-icious!

Welcome to "Cooking with Jack," the cooking show with more flavor and less video. Today's special dish is "Spicy Corn Quesadillas". It should be noted that my recipe is remarkably similar to the one in Moosewood Cooks at Home with a few changes. Actually, all the measurements are doubled in my version, so it's radically different, if you ask me.

 
First, you're gonna want to take a couple of onions and cut them up. Since cutting up onions can make you cry, use my handy invention, The Extendablizing Knife.

 
It's pretty technical, but if you're interested, I can sell you blueprints for how you can make your own.

 
Now grab that bottle of vegetable oil from your bedside table.

 

Add a few galoomps of oil (a "galoomp" is roughly a tablespoon... measuring stuff is overrated).

 
And some garlic. A few cloves or, if you're as lazy as I am, a few squirts of squeezy garlic.

 
Next grate up a couple of carrots. I think carrots taste better if you use a really pretty grater, don't you?

 
*Insert your own carrot/lovely grater lady joke here.*

 
Now... take one of what I refer to as "El Diablo".

 
Now, saute it all up over medium heat until the onions are translucentated.

 
Add two pounds of frozen corn. (Uninteresting fact about corn: an ear of corn averages 800 kernels in 16 rows).

 
Add two pounds of coriander (actually, 2 tbs... I was just seeing if you were paying attention).

 
Four heapin' tbs of ground cumin. It was a superstition during the Middle Ages that cumin kept chickens and lovers from wandering.

And a dash of cayenne heat.

 You're supposed to add some fresh cilantro, but this is optional. I've hated cilantro my whole life, but Anita has always used it liberally in her cooking, until finally she realized 15 or 20 years later than I hate it. Only all that time of actually eating it has made me un-hate it somewhat. So it's your call...

Salt and pepper to taste (I'm sick of telling you how much of everything to put everywhere...)

 Now add it all together and cook for five minutes or so.

 Add two to three cups of cheese (preferably one with "Jack" in the name).

 

 Remove from heat and put a top on the pot. It should look something like this...

 Now I get to use the sweet-ass olive oil mister I got from Santa.

 
You just pump, pump, pump and...

 

...and then it shoots out olive oil mist? Wait... that's it? That's all it does?

 

Now take a big tortilla...

 

And slap some of the corn crap inside.

 

Fold it over and place it in a lightly-misted skillet.

 

Now cook it on medium heat until bottom starts to brown, then flip it over and cook until...

...it looks cooked. That's it! You did it! Well, technically I did it, but I couldn't have done it without you. Actually, I could, would and have done it without you, but now you can make it yourself!
Great with guacamole, sour cream and salsa.

Next on "Cooking with Jack": Jack fries up everything in the house!