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| I hate keeping an eye on something ‘to make sure it doesn’t burn.’ |
I hate cooking. Just putting it out there before we proceed.
This is in no way a hobby. Unless we are talking about
chocolate, I see food simply as a necessity. (When it comes to chocolate, it is
obviously a passion.)
I find cooking really boring, and I hate standing next to
a pot and watching it ‘simmer’. I hate keeping an eye on something ‘to make
sure it doesn’t burn.’ No thank you.
My hatred of cooking even extends to pasta. Yep, the food
known as the easiest thing to make, the love of all students everywhere. I
think it takes too long to cook. I take the term ‘al dente’ to its extreme and
often leave the pasta cooking for under five minutes because I hate waiting for it
to be soft and ‘edible.’
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| An actual real life meal I have cooked and consumed. |
Having made this disclaimer, I am now going to discuss some
recipes I have found that I can just about deal with cooking. Despite my
chocolate obsession, nay, my chocolate devotion, I am actually trying to keep a
balanced diet and eat healthily, meaning I can no longer just rely on my
half-cooked pasta with a sprinkling of cheese.
Although I’ve never actually met anyone who hates cooking as
much as I do, I’m sure there must be other lazy chefs out there, so if you are
one of us, please, put down the rock hard spaghetti, and read on.
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| Nom nom nom |
(I have included effort level because let’s be honest that’s
the only thing that matters. I have also done illustrations rather than taking
photos because my food often looks pretty grim.)
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| Add caption |
STUFFED PEPPERS
Ingredients:
- Two bell peppers
- Bulghar wheat or couscous or rice
- 2 spring onions
- Feta cheese
- Cherry tomatoes
- Pesto
- Coriander
- Olives
- Garlic
- Lemon
Method
- Cut the peppers in half, drizzle in a smidge of oil and put in the oven for about 10 minutes until cooked
- Cook the wheat/couscous
- Mix all the other ingredients in a bowl
- When the couscous is done add to the bowl
- When the peppers are done, put the mixture inside
- Drizzle lemon over
- Take a photo
- Consume
Cook Time
- Fry the onion and garlic in oil
- Chop all the vegetable up and chuck them in
- After a bit, put in the quorn and mix around
- After another little bit, put in the chopped tomatoes and chickpeas and curry paste
- Have a good mix until everything is cooked
- Nom nom nom
- It takes a while to chop up all the vegetables and even longer for them all to cook, particularly the sweet potato.
- You can cut cooking time by putting some of the veg in the microwave to soften but I always forget to do this until they are in the pot and it’s too late. #ohwell. #noragrets.
- Okay, despite this taking no time at all, I am still giving it a high effort level, because it’s a breakfast smoothie so you have to wake up earlier than you would usually to have enough time to make this before uni.
- I mean the mixer thing is really loud for early in the morning.
- But, still worth doing if you have a bit of time before a lecture.
-
Cut up the sweet potatoes and stick in the oven
until cooked
- Grate 2 limes to get the zest and then squeeze 3 limes to get the juice (the grating takes forever but is a good arm workout, so you don’t have to go to the gym as well, right?)
- Into the bowel of the limes put in chopped up mint and two table spoons of tamari sauce and mix
- Once the sweet potatoes are cooked, sprinkle with some salt and cover in the minty mixture
- Consume
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6 Eggs
- Chopped up mushrooms
- Chopped up spring onions
- 1 clove of garlic
- A blob of oil
- A sprinkle of parsley
- A shedload of spinach
- A blib of milk
- Feta cheese (obviously can minimise the calories by controlling how much feta is in this.)
-
Chop up the spring onions, garlic and mushroom
and fry until brown
- Add the spinach and parsley
- ‘Whisk’ the eggs and milk. (But actually just mix around a bit with a fork, this isn’t Masterchef.)
- On goes the feta
- Let it cook for about four minutes
- Put into a baking tray and into the oven
- Let it cook for about fifteen minutes until it’s all set and risen
- Eat eat eat
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- About 20 minutes
Effort Level
- 5/10
- Pretty darn good effort level. I’m a fan of this one. Minimal effort and it’s very filling and healthy.
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QUORN EXTRAVAGANZA
Ingredients
- Quorn chicken pieces (or actual chicken if you’re a carnivore)
- For this I pretty much use all the vegetables in the fridge that I want to get rid of in one go, everything goes well in this recipe, but some good ones would be: carrots, broccoli, sweet potato, baby sweetcorn, sugar snaps, red peppers, mushrooms
- A tablespoon of oil
- 1 Onion
- 2 cloves of garlic
- Chickpeas
- 1 can of chopped tomatoes
- 1 tablespoon of curry paste
- (If you are feeling extra fancy you can also cook rice and eat them together)
Method
- Chop all the vegetable up and chuck them in
- After a bit, put in the quorn and mix around
- After another little bit, put in the chopped tomatoes and chickpeas and curry paste
- Have a good mix until everything is cooked
- Nom nom nom
Cook Time
- It takes a while to chop up all the vegetables and even longer for them all to cook, particularly the sweet potato.
- You can cut cooking time by putting some of the veg in the microwave to soften but I always forget to do this until they are in the pot and it’s too late. #ohwell. #noragrets.
Effort Level
- 8/10
- Yep this dish is high maintenance. Wears perfect eyeliner to a lecture type of dish.
- In my mind a dish that takes 50 minutes is a dish that has taken 45 minutes too long to make.
- But it is super yummy, healthy and gets rid of all the vegetable in the fridge you only bought to look good at Sainsburys alongside your mega size galaxy bar.
- 8/10
- Yep this dish is high maintenance. Wears perfect eyeliner to a lecture type of dish.
- In my mind a dish that takes 50 minutes is a dish that has taken 45 minutes too long to make.
- But it is super yummy, healthy and gets rid of all the vegetable in the fridge you only bought to look good at Sainsburys alongside your mega size galaxy bar.
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| (Instagrammable rustic mason jar not included in the recipe) |
BREAKFAST SMOOTHIE
This will give you loads of energy for the start of your
day. The oats are really nutritious and will fill you up more than just a plain
fruit smoothie.
Ingredients:
-
Oats
-
A smidge of honey (but leave this out if you’re really healthy)
-
Frozen fruit
-
0% fat yogurt
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Some milk
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2 teaspoons of peanut butter (unless you have an
anaphylactic boyfriend who ruins all your attempts at making your recipes more
interesting).
Method:
- Chuck it all in and use a mixer to joosh it until smooth.
Cook time:
-
Like 5 minutes
Effort level:
- Okay, despite this taking no time at all, I am still giving it a high effort level, because it’s a breakfast smoothie so you have to wake up earlier than you would usually to have enough time to make this before uni.
- I mean the mixer thing is really loud for early in the morning.
- But, still worth doing if you have a bit of time before a lecture.
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| Well done, Hudi, hold the frying pan with oven gloves. Now you look competent. |
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SUPER EASY STIR FRY
Ingredients
-
Tablespoon of oil
-
1 clove of garlic
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1 teaspoon of ginger
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2 spring onions
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Almost any vegetables can go in this. Carrots,
peppers, broccoli, courgette, baby sweetcorn.
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½ mug of water with a vegetables stock cube
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2 tablespoons of soy sauce
-
Ready to use noodles
Method
·
Heat the oil in a frying pan or, if you are very
fancy, in a wok
·
Fry the garlic, onion and ginger
·
Add all the other ingredients
·
Cook until they are cooked
·
Stir in the noodles and continue cooking for a
minute
·
Eat
Cook Time
·
25 minutes
Effort Level
- 4/10
·
Not bad, actually! The only effort is chopping
up all your vegetables but this doesn’t need any finesse so you can do it
whilst watching Made in Chelsea (which is the only measurement I need).
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SWEET POTATO AND MINT THINGY
Okay, this recipe seems really strange and I have been
mocked for cooking it before. But, my dear lazy cooking friends, it is actually
really yum, I promise. And you get to eat a lot of sweet potato which is really
healthy.
Ingredients
-
Sweet potatoes
-
Mint
-
Limes
-
Tamari sauce (or soy sauce if you’re not this
extra).
-
A sprinkle of salt
Method
- Grate 2 limes to get the zest and then squeeze 3 limes to get the juice (the grating takes forever but is a good arm workout, so you don’t have to go to the gym as well, right?)
- Into the bowel of the limes put in chopped up mint and two table spoons of tamari sauce and mix
- Once the sweet potatoes are cooked, sprinkle with some salt and cover in the minty mixture
- Consume
Cook Time
Effort Level
- 6/10
-
As I may have mentioned, the lime grating is a
task. Planning your day around putting sweet potatoes in the oven is also an
effort. But all worth it as the
actual cooking is non existent.
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MUSHROOM, SPINACH AND FETA FRITTATA
Probs the most complex of these recipes, this one actually
makes me feel so talented that I could open a brunch café.
Ingredients
- Chopped up mushrooms
- Chopped up spring onions
- 1 clove of garlic
- A blob of oil
- A sprinkle of parsley
- A shedload of spinach
- A blib of milk
- Feta cheese (obviously can minimise the calories by controlling how much feta is in this.)
Method
- Add the spinach and parsley
- ‘Whisk’ the eggs and milk. (But actually just mix around a bit with a fork, this isn’t Masterchef.)
- On goes the feta
- Let it cook for about four minutes
- Put into a baking tray and into the oven
- Let it cook for about fifteen minutes until it’s all set and risen
- Eat eat eat
Cook Time
-About 25/30 minutes
Effort Level
-
4/10
-
Actually so easy to do, all you need to do is
chuck everything in and mushrooms are absurdly fun to cut up.
So there you have it!! I know it’s not that mind blowing but
hey, it’s an improvement on pasta, right?
