Get More Bang for Your Food Budget Buck Part IV: Augmenting Recipes in a Cost Effective Manner

Beef up your Main Courses with Veg

We hear it all the time on television, the Internet, and in the news: Americans consume far too few fruits and vegetables, while consuming way too much meat (particularly red meat). This problem contributes to a multitude of health problems ranging from obesity, heart problems, cancer, and ultimately, death. It’s not a pretty picture.

Aside from the health problems related to over consuming meat, the cost can be staggering. I was shopping for ground round (beef) the other day and it was $5 a pound. In Texas. Where there are more cows than people. I can't even imagine what they are paying in...say...New York. This got me thinking, how can I cut back on using meat without hearing this:



This is going to take a bit of ingenuity. I'm not a fan of "sneaky" cooking; I think it only leads to trouble. I know I'm not a mother yet, but I believe, in my heart, that open communication about food will lead your children into making better choices on their own. When you sneak in ingredients to familiar foods, the taste will be altered to some degree, kids will comment on how the food tastes "funny", and will feel manipulated when it comes out that you slipped spinach into their brownies or brussel sprouts into their macaroni and cheese. When you are upfront and honest with your family about trying something new, you may get initially rebuffed, but curiosity may get the best of them. I could go on heaps on my opinions regarding kids and food battles, but I am going to save that for another time. Let's get back on topic.

There are several recipes you can beef up with veg that are totally legitimate. (I've got to find another term for beefed up! LOL) I think pasta dishes really lend themselves to this because the sauces really permeate the vegetables, giving the impression that they are integral to the dish as opposed to competing with it. Some of my favorite vegetables to add to pasta dishes are squash, zucchini, and eggplant. Let's look at two plates of spaghetti below. Which looks more appetizing?





Option A

 



Option B

I'm going to hope you chose Option B. This choice is not only better for you, it uses less meat AND will be more filling because it contains a lot of vegetable fiber. Squash, Zucchini, and Eggplants have a very firm flesh that really lends itself being a meat substitute. In saucy recipes I usually dice it into small pieces and let it simmer in my tomato sauce while I attend to other parts of the meal. They absorb a lot of the tomato flavor and have a good toothy feel.

Let's tackle another one. A classic crowd pleaser for decades: Lasagna! When we think of lasagna, we typically think of 4 things: Tons of Meat, cheese, sauce, and pasta. Truth be told, ANYTHING can go in a lasagna. Lasagna simply means "to stack". This is a great meal to have kids help out with because they help by sprinkling in the ingredients that you have laid out. By helping to prepare the meal, they are more engaged, and will be more likely to consume what is made. When it comes to cooking mise en place very important, but for lasagna, it is wicked important. When putting a veg layer in, I generally use veg that is cut into thin disks. This helps the layers stay nice and flat. Alternate meat and veg layers and you will find that you need 1/2 the meat you normally do, but you have managed to put in 3-4 squash, zucchinis, or 1-2 eggplants. I've even used cucumbers once (by accident) and it gave the final taste a bright, summery flavor. Chopped spinach leaves can be dispersed sparingly throughout for a hint of color.

Let's do one more. Let's talk about some of those casserole type meals like Pot Pies. Whenever I am making my chicken pot pie, shepherd's pie, or soups/stews, I ALWAYS throw in more veg than recipes typically call for. For example, my beloved Julia's recipe for Beef Bourguignon (beef stew) calls for only 1 carrot. Honey, please. People are already expect there to be vegetables in these types of dishes, so why not add a little more? They add a color, brightness, and flavor. Adding an extra couple of carrots or 1/2 cup of peas while pulling out 1/4 lb of meat isn't going to throw off the balance of these meals. If you cooked every single day, in one week you would have saved almost 2 lbs. of meat. At the rate that I listed above, that's almost $10.

What other recipes could you (legitimately) beef up with veg? Let me hear your ideas!

Are you making any changes you that you have read about? What did you do, how much did you save, and what did you learn? Tell me about it in the comments!

Get More Bang for Your Food Budget Buck Series Part III: Turning Cheap Cuts of Meat Into Stellar Meals.

The Art of Braising

Meat is usually the most important expensive part of an entire meal. However, you don't have to live off ground chuck and bulk boneless, skinless chicken breasts to save a few bucks on meat. We've already talked about turning your single chicken breast piece into 2 portions by making cutlets, but we can do better. Let's talk a little about braising.

Braising is a fancy term that basically means cooking a piece of meat at a low temperature for a long period of time. (Low and Slow). Braising is not the technique you want to use when you are trying to whip out dinner in thirty minutes. However, if you are going to be working around the house all day, say on a weekend, putting a hunk of meat in the oven to braise all day will result in an awesome meal by dinner time. What's also cool as this big effort will likely produce leftovers you can eat on a couple days, or freeze for another time. You also don't have to constantly be checking on these meals. Check on them every hour or two only! Here's the low down.

Braising was developed as a method for cooking cheap, otherwise unpalatable cuts of meat. Some cuts of meat that are commonly braised are roasts, briskets, pork butt (which is really the shoulder by the way), stews, dark meats on birds, or meats that have lots of connective tissue. These meats are tough because they are big muscles that the animal uses a lot. Think of a man with 6 pack abs, if you punched it really hard, it would be really tough. Same concept. 

So how does braising work? Think of braising as similar to a hot sauna. When you first walk in you are totally shocked by the heat and you tense all up, but after awhile your muscles relax and you just turn to putty. That's basically braising.

So what special tools do you need to braise? Truth be told, you don't need any fancy equipment to braise; however, there are a variety of ways to do it if you do have gadgets gathering dust. You can braise in a cast iron dutch oven, corning ware (ceramic dishes), earthen ware pots with lids, and a crock pot. Lost the lid? We can work with that, too.

Okay, I am not going to do any specific recipes for this post. Don't be scared though, I will provide you with the basic steps that will get you through any braising process.

10 Steps for Braising:
1.  Don't even THINK about doing this technique if you only have an hour to cook. Just a friendly reminder.

2.  Season the meat with a dry spice combo that you enjoy. Don't know much about spices? Use salt and pepper. Cover the whole dang thing really well.

3. Heat a few tablespoons of oil or butter in a heavy pan or your Dutch oven.

4. Sear your meat in the pan on medium-high heat until the meat browns on the outside only. Make sure to brown all sides. DO NOT freak out if it sticks a little. That crusty crud is important for later!

5. After your meat is seared, move it in your braising pot or crock pot. If you seared it in your dutch oven, disregard this step.

6. This sounds fancy but don't panic! You are going to deglace the pan. WTH does that mean? You are simply going to get the crusty crud off the bottom of the pan by pouring broth, beef stock, wine, water, or juice and scraping with a spatula. Why? Because brown food is delicious and that crust = flavor, flavor, flavor.

7. If you notice a bunch of oil floating to the top, don't worry, we can skim that off later. Pour the liquid and crusty bits into your braising pot, careful not to rinse off all your meat's seasonings.

8. Add a cooking liquid (water, stock, wine, juice or some combination) to the half-way point of the main ingredient.

9. Add some chunky cut, aromatic veggies to the pot. Perhaps an 1-2 quartered onions and 3-4 rough cut celery stalks. Cover and place the meat on the middle of a rack in an oven that has been pre-heated to 200-300 degrees Fahrenheit. Lost the lid to that pot? Simply wrap the top tightly with foil. Remember, we want a sauna!

10. Cook until completely tender. This can range from 1 hour to 6 hours, depending on the type of meat you are using. Check on the meal every hour or two. If the liquid has boiled out, turn down the heat and add more. It will be tough and dry without the liquid. Feel free to spoon some liquid over the top of the meat when you check it, just for fun. Beef takes the longest to cook, followed by pork, then birds.

Here are 2 braised meals I made one day Chopped style because I was at Jon's parents. (Chopped contestants have to plan and cook an meal with the basket of mystery ingredients). The meal fed 13 people for only $30. The sides were rice and mashed potatoes. In The bulk of the cost was 10 chicken thighs with legs. The remaining was for the celery and a sack of potatoes. Everything else, I thought on my feet and pulled from their pantry. No recipes, just thinking on my feet. Total cost per person: Less than $3.

Seasoned with rosemary, salt, pepper, and butter, seared in butter, and braised at 300 with celery carrots and onion. Covered with foil. Total cook time: 2 hours. Results: A rich buttery flavor and velvety texture.

Seasoned with salt, pepper, and brown sugar. Seared in olive oil. Covered with onion, BBQ Sauce and Bacon bits!!!! Braised at 3oo degrees covered in foil. Total cook time 2 hours. Result: A sweet and salty BBQ flavor, tender and moist.

Rotten Bananas: Take 2

We buy an awful lot of bananas around this joint, and dammit if they don't go bad before we get a chance to use them. I think I've Banana Breaded out everyone, so I thought perhaps a banana pudding would be a better way to go this time. I know it's almost foolishly simple to list how to make it here, but there are some people who cook so bad, they may need my assistance in getting it right. So, here we go.

Ingredients
1 box of instant vanilla pudding
2-4 medium sized bananas that are as spotty as a Las Vegas Grandma's forearms, chopped into small discs
1 box of Nilla Wafers Cookies
2 cups of cold milk

In a bowl, whisk together the instant pudding and the 2 cups of milk. It will soft set in about 3 to 5 minutes of whisking. When it soft sets, put it in the fridge to chill.

Next find you a good casserole dish or a large bowl to make make the final product in. You can get all Polly Perfect on it and make concentric circles of wafers and thin banana slices if you like. I, on the other hand, just made a bottom crust of cookies, the slapped a good mess of naners on top of those.

Fuck Polly Perfect

Then, you will need to add your chilled pudding. You can do a thin layer, then add some more bananas, wafers and more pudding. Or, you can just dump in your pudding like me. No appreciates your artistry here.

After that, you can add a nice layer of bananas and wafers to the top portion. I like to crumble a few for texture and prettiness. You don't have to. You can be all pirate's treasure on yours and trick your guests into thinking they are just eating plain pudding until they chomp into some mystery item. Is it banana, cookie, or toe nail? Only you will know the truth and you can giggle menacingly at their psychological torture. BWAHAHAHAHA!

On Nom

Sunday Suppers: Homemade Veggie Broth to Chicken Noodle Soup

A recent gift of homemade chicken broth got me thinking about how to make my own stock at home. I go through so much stock nowadays because of all these high-falutin' recipes that it is becoming rediculous to spend that much money on a can/box of stock. I thought the easist broth to make would probably be vegetable, plus it would clean out all those random veggies that were racing sneaking towards going bad. There, how's is that for being green and not wasting money?

I found a simple recipe that basically says take any aeromatic veggie, chop into 1 inch chunks, and boil with some spices for about 30 minutes. They listed a variety of vegetables you could include, but here is how I rolled:

4-5 ribbs of celery with some leaves
1 large onion
3 large carrots
5-6 cloves of minced garlic
Hefty sprinkle of thyme and parsley
2 bay leaves
a good pinch of salt

Nom

Some other veggies you may consider including: Green onions, mushrooms, potato peels (washed of course), bell peppers, chard, pea pods, basil, fennel, eggplant, corn cobs, asparagus butts, you name it.

First thing you got to do, aside from cutting your washed veg into 1" chunks, is throw about a tablespoon of olive oil in the bottom of  a soup pot and heat to high. Then, throw in your 1" chopped veggies. Enjoy how aeromatic your house is about to smell. I seriously dragged Jon off the couch while he was The Sweet 16 to come and smell. I was in foodie heaven. If Julia Child's house had a smell, it probably smelled like this...and butter.

Moving on.

Let your veg weep (let go of water) for 5 to 10 minutes. Stir frequently lest you have a charred flavor to your broth. Add 2 quarts of water and then BTB-RTS as Chef Anne would say. (Bring To Boil - Reduce To Simmer). Simmer for 30 minutes uncovered. This is how it will start to look

Om Nom

The next step is to seive out the solids and take only the liquid bits.

"taking the liquid bits"

Then, you are left with all the veggie mush. The broth recipe said to discard the remaining veg stuff. I thought that was a lot of hooha. What a waste. I sat around and thought about what I could do with all that awesome veg, and EUREKA! I got an idea. All of that stuff goes into a chicken noodle soup, so that is what I made. Saved time and money.

Because we aren't big chunks of veggie eaters, I took about 3/4 of veggies and pulverized them in a food processor. That gave me a nice thick puree that fattened up the broth a little. I added some more water and some chopped up chicken breasts. Again, BTBRTS for about 30 minutes. Season to taste.

About 10 minutes before you are ready to serve, add some noodles. I, unfortuantely, added the noodles like 45 minutes ahead and they got a bit mushy. My bad, I was waiting on a loaf of bread to bake. Oh well, lesson learned. Not bad for a first try though.

Chicken Mush-Noodle Soup

Things I Have Been Accused of Lately: What is "Being a Such a Guy?"

Things at the hovel have pretty well deteriorated to pre-wedding conditions. Dishes are piled high in the sink, random take-out cartons litter the living area, and my kitchen generally smells like burned onions and failure. February has been a bit of a tough culinary month for me. My living quarters look somewhat like this:

Okay, maybe not THIS bad...at least I don't have Formica counters. Wait...*facepalm*

Since the Puck-cake incident, I have been pretty much on a cooking strike. As such, the consumable food in the house has changed from fresh and leafy to powdery, processed and/or once leafy, now black and rotten. "Meals" have since become quite unusual at the house. Jon is a big boy and can fend for himself in a bachelorish-like fashion. He has no problem eating a can of soup and being done with it. I, on the other hand, ate this for dinner the other day, okay 2 days:

Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.

Followed by a "sandwich"

More ice cream

16 straight TIVO'd episodes of "How I Met Your Mother" (HIMYM)

Jon finally had to say something when he caught me eating the following over the course of an evening:

One individual size serving of mac and cheese

-Eaten in front of TV during HIMYM.

One fun-size pack of Peanut M&Ms

-Eaten 30 minutes later while sitting under a giant load of  fresh-out-of-the-dryer laundry....who am I kidding, it was dirty laundry that needed to be sorted.

One single serving size bag of Doritos 

-Eaten 1 hour later while trying to understand "Labyrinth" while not being high, and trying to remember why I loved it so much as a kid.

~~~Passed out on couch from carb overload~~~

Woke up hungry 2 hours later and had...

One slice of buttered toast.

-while trying to get motivated to shower for the first time that weekend, and do a blog post for you guys. Eaten while walking down the hall to the computer room.

~~~I'm staring at my computer's blinking cursor...stomach growls~~~

"You know what I need?" I ask myself.
Self: "Some G.D. Self-esteem?"
Me: "Besides that."
Self: "Better personal hygiene?"
Me: "Shut up! I'll shower later."
Self:  "Bacon!?"
Me: Exactly!

~~Sneak back to kitchen as I have already been chastised for eating nothing but garbage for a week~~~

During a commercial Jon hears a sizzle in the kitchen.

J: "Whatcha' cooking babe?"

Me: "Nothing, I'm on strike."

J: "Ok, I just thought I heard something going on in there."

Me: "mmhmmm"

(His nose must have been really REALLY stopped up. How the hell can you not smell bacon.)

I make myself 4 1/2 pieces of bacon and sneak back to the computer.

Jon's spider senses start tingling. He knows something is up. The smell of bacon always lures a scavenger. I'm deliriously om nomming my bacon in the back when suddenly he sneaks up behind me and scares the piss out of me.

J: "What are you doing!"

Me: "Blogging..."

J: "Is that bacon? Did you just fry yourself up a whole plate of bacon?!"

Me: "No..."

J: ~with a hint of disgust~ "You are such a guy." (Not meant as a compliment)

THEN he does the unthinkable, he tries to steal some bacon. The boy is obviously crazy.

Important Digression: When birds of prey make a kill, they do something called mantling to make themselves look bigger and scarier to potential threats. It is basically a bird giving other animals "the bird". Mantling looks like this:

Look at me protecting my noms! Now leave me & the cheezeburger in peace & no one will get hurt!

I do not know what came over me at that very moment, but I mantled over my bacon with my arms like wings and yelled "CA CAW CA CAW!!!" at the top of my freaking lungs. Seriously, I'm not making this up. God knows what the neighbors thought was going on. Jon did not take my threatening posture seriously and I was forced to do what any threatened animal would do. Violence ensued.

I told that bitch to back up off'a my bacon!

It wasn't pretty, but I kept my bacon. However, I started feeling a little guilty for being a greedy bitch, so I broke down and gave him a bite. Then I had a realization: When you're biting your spouse and not really sure why, something needs to change. That's it kids, I am back on the wagon. More cooking adventures coming soon.

Ghetto Dishwasher Among Other Hovel Accoutrements

Top tray will drop copious amounts of glass on your foot and floor.

Twist tie for holding on the top rack. Obviously, our landlord's solution works PERFECTLY.

For your listening pleasure, Eric Cartman sings, "In the Ghetto"

No Sincerer Love...

  “There is no love sincerer than the love of food.” 

-George Bernard Shaw

Happy Valentine's Day 

Recipes You Learn Along the Way...

Going through life and minding your own business, you sometimes pick up useful tidbits from unlikely places. When I was in high school for instance, I was madly in love with this guy (which by the way I was scheduled to marry him in June of 2001, but that is a train-wreck for another time).

Anyway, I would go over to his parent's house and try to be as helpful and pleasant as possible. There were 5 kids in this household in a pseudo-Brady Bunch situation, and me being frequently-visiting type I am made it six. His mom's pantry was always full of tasty consumables, but trying to have a proper sit down meal around 6 teenagers was near impossible. She did eek it out sometimes to the tune of this cheap recipe. It could be served as any meal, and none of us complained when it was breakfast the next day. (not that I ever had it for breakfast at that time. I had to be home by midnight on Friday and Saturday thank you very much!).

Today's lesson, kids, is how to make Stromboli a la Bobby's Mom:

You will need:
1 package of frozen self-rising bread loafs (the kind I buy comes 3 to a package)
non stick cooking spray and saran wrap
1-2lbs. of breakfast sausage in your favorite flavor  (substitute chopped ham lunch meat for a healthier version)
1 large pack of shredded cheese that you like

Distructions:
Depending on how hot your kitchen is, you will need several hours to rise the frozen bread dough. Some people, who live in really well insulated homes, put it out before they go to work and it's risen enough to get by when they return after work. Putting it out about lunch time is average. Place the loaf in a well greased bread pan. (1 loaf feeds 2-3 people so rise the number that you need accordingly.) Spray the top of the loaf with more cooking spray, and loosely cover with a large piece of Saran-wrap. This will prevent the dough from drying out and/or sticking as it rises. Let the dough rise until it is about an inch over the edge of the pan.

When the dough has risen, or nearly risen, go ahead and fry up that breakfast sausage. One pound is enough for 2 loaves.When the sausage is sufficiently browned, for the love of God let some of the fat drain off on a few paper towels while you do the next step. Your heart will thank you later.

Pour some of that shredded cheese on a prep-plate, or just have it ready to get out of the bag, whatever.

Now this next bit might seem a little counter-intuitive after the whole, wait 10 hours for the bread to rise bit, but hear me out. The next thing you do is pop the dough and make a little trough in the middle like so:

Pop!

n' trough

 The next step is laying down a layer of cheese, followed by a layer of meat, then more cheese.

 

Okay. The next two steps are tricky, so pay attention Myrtle. You are going to now seal up the loaf so that its guts are neatly encased. Simply fold over the edges and pinch them together. Gently now, don't get too rough:

Pinchy, pinchy

Now, if you're a bit lazy like myself, you can just pop it in the oven as is, and cook according to the bread bag's suggestions (usually like 20 minutes). But if you are a Polly Perfect and want to impress your son's girlfriend with your culinary skills, you can do the flip. Very carefully and oh so quickly, slide your hand under the entire loaf and flip it over so the pinchy side is down. Behold:

Now is not the time for pinching.

Flop! *raspberry noise*

Bake immediately as the teens are probably growing restless and pilfering bits of dough and cooked sausage. When it's done, slice it into pieces like any old loaf of bread. If you're a natural, it will look something like this:

I suppose could have put peppers and onions and other veggies in there if you like.

As a mom, you can try to do the respectable thing and serve this with a salad or something green, but let's be honest here, we're Americans. Grab a coke from the fridge, sit down in front of the tv, and enjoy the stromboli for what it is.

Empty Fridges and Other Wordlessness

The two containers have expired food.

Visiting Jon’s Parents, Mishaps and Mayhem

Every time I visit Jon’s parents, a culinary marathon is waiting for me. For some odd reason, I am always caught off guard.

We are visiting this weekend because there is a hard freeze, and his parent’s must keep their small town hardware store open for the whole town to fix their 60 year old busted pipes.
Since I know nothing about hardware, busted pipes, or cash registers, I always volunteer to take on the meals. Jon’s mom hates to cook and is better at the store. No big deal... until she calls an hour into my cooking…

You see, Jon’s parents do a lot of philanthropic work by volunteering their time and resources to help mostly religious charitable events. This is where I come in. Jon’s mother always volunteers to make 2-3 desserts for the Knights of Columbus Chicken Fried Steak Dinner or the Catholic Daughter’s Scholarship Fundraiser. What ends up happening is I get this call while I'm lazily making tonight's family meal:
“Would you mind making a dessert for Daddy’s Knight’s Dinner tomorrow? I don’t want to put you under too much trouble…I just told them I would bring a dessert and I am so busy at the store…”


This happens EVERY time I come over. EVERY TIME. It’s not that I mind the cooking. Really, it’s okay…fodder to blog about, but it's the slight feeling of manipulation that bothers me.



“What would you like me to make?” I inquire.

 “Oh well I actually need two desserts, something easy that won’t be too much work and your good at,” she says.

“Um, ok well what’s popular among this crowd?"

"Well, mostly pies and cakes because they are going to be put on little plates and sold individually. No cookies, they never sell. Not that pumpkin cake you make because it has to be scooped out. Nothing that has to be scooped out. Something that will hold its shape on a plate,” She says.

*I stare blankly into space...*

“Um, okay. I’ll look through the cookbook.”

“I’m sure whatever you make will be fine, long as it is none of that other stuff. Thanks! *click*

*Facepalm*

Another thing that you must know about Jon’s parents is that they are big “use what we have on hand” kind of people. If they are making a recipe and don’t have one of the ingredients, it is just getting left out. Simple as that. I have eaten soups at their house that have consisted of chicken broth, flour, and egg yolks. That is it. “Dumpling Soup” is what they call it. It looks like white worms in chicken broth. Call me spoiled, but I like ummm more full-bodied food.

That being said, I go and see what they have already available. Flour, sugar, soda, baking powder, pecans, lemons, powdered sugar. Hmmm…I pull out the recipe book that I got tonight's jelly roll dessert recipe from. As I flip through the pages of old world recipes that require a minimum of 50 ingredients, sweat starts to bead up on my forehead. I start to get the kolache panic. I am not going to be able to pull this off.

Now, one may wonder why I just don’t run to the grocery store and pick up a ready made cake, pie, or confectionery delight. The answer is this: In this small town of mostly Czech immigrant families, they KNOW when you cheat. They can take one look at a slice of store bought cake and tell you 50 reasons why it tastes like sugared cardboard. Your dessert will be shunned and ignored. (Except by maybe the great-grandchild that eats that crap at school every day.) You don’t want your name associated with that. God, I love small towns.

You may also ask, “Why does it matter?” Well, good food goes a long way in this town. At the Catholic Church’s annual bazaar, some desserts bring in hundreds of dollars in live auctions. There is a lady who makes a fried cookie known as a “Rosette” every year and puts 20 in large pickle jar. Last year they brought in over $1000 to the church. Another old lady makes a German chocolate cake, $800 if I remember right. It doesn’t matter if the quality is sliding because of their age. What matters is that is Mrs. X’s Rosettes and they are worth it. What also matters is that small towners talk to each other about everyone. If I bring a sub-par dessert, I may not be “good enough” for that Vacek boy. He might be better off dating the pretty Hlavinka girl down the street.

No pressure.

But I digress. I find some reasonable looking recipes: Banana Nut Cake and Carrot Cake. Miraculous, they have carrots and a can of pineapple on hand.

I sent the youngin’s to the store for bananas and a few other items. Let the cooking marathon begin…

Broke Food

Broke Food: n. -to have to eat whatever is in the pantry because you are too poor to go the grocery store. As in: Andrea is a graduate student and has no money, so she must eat broke food.

Classic "Broke Food" Entrees:
Pasta with tomato sauce
Hot dogs, boiled no bun
Mac and Cheese if you're high falootin'
Ramen Noodles if your not
SPAM (Stuff Posing As Meat)
Bagged Cereal, with milk that is just a little expired
Rice
That mysterious can in the back of the pantry that lost its label circa 1986.

For today's misadventure, I have the luxury of trying to whip up broke food as a dinner for two. I am quite lucky that I have chicken breasts, quite unlucky in the fact that I have little to spice up and serve with them.

Solution:
1.) Slap chicken breasts in glass dish.
2.) Rummage through cabinet and stumble upon taco seasoning best used by....3/10/11 WOOHOO! Still good.
3.) Cover chicken with taco seasoning and pour on salsa left over from unknown party.
4.) Bake

Side: Located a can of beans: Refried black. That's kinda Mexicanish. Like my Mexicanish chicken.

Carb: Found a box of cornbread in the back of the pantry. Unfortunately no tacos or tortillas. Crap! The bread needs an egg, and I had just thrown out all the eggs because they expired 12-05... :-/

Maybe there is an egg substitute like...oil? Excuse me I am off to Google...

Ok back! Little known fact: 1/2 a banana can substitute for an egg. As well as these lovely choices:

Applesauce: use 1/2 cup of applesauce in place of an egg in sweet baked goods. Add an extra 1/2 tsp baking powder to the recipe to help with rising.

Tofu: use 1/4 cup of mashed silken tofu in place of an egg in baked goods. Add an extra 1/2 tsp baking powder to the recipe to help with rising.

Soy flour/ corn starch: use 1 heaping tablespoon of soy flour/ corn starch blended with 2 tbsp water in place of each egg in baked goods.

Flax seeds: blend 1/3 cup whole flax seeds in a food processor, then slowly add 1 cup water to the food processor. Blend until it becomes thick. Makes 6 "eggs".

Of course I have none of this stuff. Gonna try butter and see what happens. Fat is fat right?