Culinary Creations for Dummies 1: Chicken Macaroni soup
A common problem faced by overseas students is the cost of living. When living on a limited budget, having to pay for rent and school fees already causes a big headache! The last thing we want is to be bogged down by heavy living expenses from eating out. So I shall be a good Big Sister by starting a cooking series to help students save money! :)
If you're a local student with all expenses paid for, cooking is still a useful life skill to pick up so don't turn away from this page yet! :)
I will start this series off with dishes that involve only boiling. I personally find anything involving the oven or pan-frying slightly more complicated. So, this entry will be about chicken soup! It is easy to prepare, very nutritious and doesn't require much preparation time (approximately an hour).
The basic ingredients that are needed are:
1. Packet of raw chicken drumsticks
2. Mushrooms. Chinese mushrooms work best but if you're in a region where a packet costs 6 pounds at Chinatown, ordinary supermarket mushrooms will do.
3. Carrots
4.Vegetables
5. Macaroni
6. Salt, soy sauce
7. Onions
This serves one person.
Step 1: WASH ALL YOUR CUTLERY! This step is extremely important before and after cooking. Always. This is obviously to prevent pest infestations in your kitchen or E. coli cases in your house.
Step 2: Wash your drumstick (for one pot of soup, you only need one), put it in a pot of clean, filtered water and put to boil. The water should cover most of the drumstick but not fully.
(Note: Soup will never work without chicken bones. If you cannot get raw drumsticks on their own, a whole chicken will do, but the boiling time will take hours. But of course, you can also feed more people/have more meals with more soup!)
3. Chop up the onions and put them into the pot. Add salt and soy sauce.
(Note: Placing the lid onto the pot while it boils speeds up the boiling process and helps you save gas. Once the boiling gets rigorous, you may turn down the fire. Boiling soup must always be done on low fire.)
If the contents of your pot do not look like this (for unfathomable reasons), repeat from Step 1
4. Leave to boil for about 30-40 minutes. This duration works for me but you can cook it longer if the aroma of the soup does not appear after 40 minutes. In the meantime, cut the carrots and mushrooms but don't put them into the pot yet as they cook very quickly.
5. After about 40 minutes boil a pot of macaroni (about a handful or three depending on how much you eat) seperately while still leaving the pot of soup boiling on low fire. Add the carrots, mushrooms and vegetables into the pot of soup.
6. Once the macaroni is fully cooked, drain it and pour it into the soup. Tadah!
As you can see, cooking a healthy meal is relatively quick and simple especially if you're cooking just for yourself. Being student does not mean we have to sustain ourselves on instant noodles and unhealthy microwaved food!
Boiling is one of the easiest and healthiest ways to prepare your food and it's pretty idiot-proof. It is so difficult to go wrong and it is delicious too. If it fails, well practice makes perfect!
If you're a local student with all expenses paid for, cooking is still a useful life skill to pick up so don't turn away from this page yet! :)
I will start this series off with dishes that involve only boiling. I personally find anything involving the oven or pan-frying slightly more complicated. So, this entry will be about chicken soup! It is easy to prepare, very nutritious and doesn't require much preparation time (approximately an hour).
The basic ingredients that are needed are:
1. Packet of raw chicken drumsticks
2. Mushrooms. Chinese mushrooms work best but if you're in a region where a packet costs 6 pounds at Chinatown, ordinary supermarket mushrooms will do.
3. Carrots
4.Vegetables
5. Macaroni
6. Salt, soy sauce
7. Onions
This serves one person.
Step 1: WASH ALL YOUR CUTLERY! This step is extremely important before and after cooking. Always. This is obviously to prevent pest infestations in your kitchen or E. coli cases in your house.
Step 2: Wash your drumstick (for one pot of soup, you only need one), put it in a pot of clean, filtered water and put to boil. The water should cover most of the drumstick but not fully.
(Note: Soup will never work without chicken bones. If you cannot get raw drumsticks on their own, a whole chicken will do, but the boiling time will take hours. But of course, you can also feed more people/have more meals with more soup!)
3. Chop up the onions and put them into the pot. Add salt and soy sauce.
(Note: Placing the lid onto the pot while it boils speeds up the boiling process and helps you save gas. Once the boiling gets rigorous, you may turn down the fire. Boiling soup must always be done on low fire.)
If the contents of your pot do not look like this (for unfathomable reasons), repeat from Step 1
4. Leave to boil for about 30-40 minutes. This duration works for me but you can cook it longer if the aroma of the soup does not appear after 40 minutes. In the meantime, cut the carrots and mushrooms but don't put them into the pot yet as they cook very quickly.
5. After about 40 minutes boil a pot of macaroni (about a handful or three depending on how much you eat) seperately while still leaving the pot of soup boiling on low fire. Add the carrots, mushrooms and vegetables into the pot of soup.
6. Once the macaroni is fully cooked, drain it and pour it into the soup. Tadah!
As you can see, cooking a healthy meal is relatively quick and simple especially if you're cooking just for yourself. Being student does not mean we have to sustain ourselves on instant noodles and unhealthy microwaved food!
Boiling is one of the easiest and healthiest ways to prepare your food and it's pretty idiot-proof. It is so difficult to go wrong and it is delicious too. If it fails, well practice makes perfect!
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