~ If It Is Saturday – It Must Be Recipe Day! ~

Vegetarians look away.

knife & fork (Photo credit: Elena Karelova)

I have told you about our “family cookbook”–the one that for about ten years all of my family contributed to at the behest of my sister Peggy. She covered binders in beautiful cloth for each of us, and only asked that every year at Christmas we contribute three recipes. Some years I was inspired–and some years I thought I was a comedian.

In 1995, it was a “comedian” year. So here was one of my contributions (I was young, I was stupid, I needed the money–okay this last one does not apply here):

*John K’s Favourite Meal #1

Ingredients: 1 very large steak, sufficiently marbled to cause a flare-up on the barbeque

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

1 bottle of HP steak sauce or Heinz 57 sauce

salt

Method:

1. Tear off plastic wrapper.

2. Put on barbeque.

3. Cook on high. Burn. Turn over when flames reach three feet or neighbours call fire department.

4. Done when brown inside (better known as well done). If particularly hungry, done while still dripping in blood and transferred to microwave. Done when brown inside.

5. Put on platter. Enjoy with copious amounts of steak sauce and a Lot’s wife size amount of salt.

*John K’s Favourite Meal # 2

Ingredients: 1 very large slab of prime rib roast

gravy

salt

Method: roast beef in oven until brown. Make gravy. Flood plate with said gravy over slabs of prime rib. Add enough salt to kill a horse and horse radish.

My cooking skills have since improved to the point where we no longer cook steaks or roasts until they are well done. We are sophisticated now–we like a little red in the meats that having a little red will not kill you, or send you to the emergency ward to have your stomach pumped.

My husband’s Neanderthal tastes have also been tamed. He now eats fruits and vegetables. His repertoire is not wide in these areas, and I am sure if left on his own, he would not need to supplement his meals with those pesky things like potatoes, rice, vegetables and salads. Good thing he has me–a mediocre cook who sometimes serves salad in a bowl, which he has to finish before he gets the rest of the meal.

Okay–here is one for the vegetarians, if you happened to read down this far:

Ingredients for salsa. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Salsa

5 cups coarsely chopped tomatoes

3/4 cup of chopped spanish onion

3/4 cup of sweet red peppers

1 hot pepper

1 large clove garlic

5 1/2 oz can tomato paste

1/2 cup white vinegar

2 tablespoons white sugar

2 tablespoons lime juice

1 1/2 teaspoons pickling salt

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp oregano

Cook until thick.

Note: We also add hot sauce and extra hot peppers for more spice.

This was a recipe included in the Family Cookbook and submitted by Mark and Chrissie who are my nephew and niece by marriage. I have never made it as it has more than five ingredients–but I am positive it is good–because anything I have ever eaten at their house has been exceptional. Unfortunately, when I get a hankering for salsa, I buy it. The medium spicy. Unless Mark and Chrissie give me jar of theirs. Then I am in salsa heaven.

*my husband

Do any of you have stories to tell about your days before you became gourmet cooks?