Single White Meals – The Introduction

For the latest step in my never-ending quest for blogosphere domination, I’d like to introduce the next major feature I’ll be working on regularly.  As most of you know, I’m quite the amateur chef – maybe not Masterchef good yet, but definitely better than most of the pipsqueaks on Junior Masterchef..  Basically, I’m just like a gay Martha Stewart, without the evil (or the rap sheet).

The thing is, in a post-Julie & Julia world, every blogger worth his salt (COOKING PUN ALERT!) thinks they can write a cooking blog.  So what’s going to make this one different?  Well, I’m glad you asked..

Basically, like a lot of single guys in the city, I work long hours, am time poor, have never been properly taught how to cook and (dinner parties aside) only have myself to cook for.  But I also have a bit of a fetish for tasty food with fresh vegetables (like, real vegetables – not nutritionally pointless ones such as Lettuce or Potato).  The difference between me and a lot of other young professionals is that in the last few years I’ve pretty much mastered the art of making quick, easy meals for one that are both healthy and super tasty.  So that is what I kind of want to share.

Pan-fried Barramundi on a bed of Grilled Asparagus and Organic Tomatoes.  Took me 12 minutes from opening the door of the fridge to having it photo ready on my plate.  Simple!

So, for each entry, I’ll kind of be doing the following :-

* List of ingredients that will be made up of stuff you’ll already have lying around plus fresh meat and vegetables.  Plus, easy substitution hints for ingredients and tips on what does what so you can understand the flavors and uses.

* Photos outlining step by step of the process so you can tell what to do (in addition to text, obvs)

* A running timer through the whole thing with 0:01 being ‘Opening the Fridge’ to whatever time the meal is plated up and ready to eat.  Just to show how quickly and easily the whole thing can really be done.

* Recipes that are primarily my own creation based on what I know works from being a total food junkie.  It’s pretty pointless for me to just photocap someone else’s recipe when I could just link to it instead.

* Snarky and irreverent commentary throughout the whole thing because, you know, it’s kind of my thing..

The thing is, I’ve been very lucky to have a Mother who not only is genuinely an AMAZING natural cook (Hi Mum!) but one that made sure at a very early age that I understood the fundamentals of cooking so I could always fend for myself.  Since I’ve been living by myself for seven years now, I’ve had a lot of time to practice.  I’m also lucky that she taught me a lot about how amazing and full of flavor fresh vegetables can be when you know how to cook them.  There are so many people who don’t eat anywhere near enough of them just because they either don’t understand how to cook them or they’ve never realized how tasty they can be.

So that’s what I’m looking to do in a (medium-sized) nutshell.  The first one will be up in the next day or two, so if you have any suggestions or features you’d like to see, just drop me a line..