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Health consciousness and an aversion to eating store food have led to many of us spending more time in our kitchens. However, the main disadvantage of home cooking is that we often end up spending way “too much” time in the kitchen; time that can be more valuably spent in other activities with family and friends. Another major downside to cooking at home is that it often ends up costing way too much because you end up buying special ingredients for dishes of which major portions expire before they are used. To remedy both these downsides of cooking at home, we provide you here with a couple of simple recipes and ideas for entrees that are not just fast and easy to make, but can also be made with regular ingredients that you always have on hand.

Noodle and Pasta Soups: While a soup can always be served before a meal, you can convert the soup dish to a main course by adding noodles, vermicelli or pasta to your soup. Check out our entry “Cooking Recipes: Make A Three Course Meal In Less Than An Hour” for a Simple And Nutritious Tomato Soup Recipe. You can put in noodles boiled in salt water to the tomato soup once it is done.

Or you can prepare a nice Hot And Sour Noodle Soup in fifteen minutes. Take three cups of water, about 75 gms of instant or fast cooking noodles, finely chopped onions, beans, carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, bell peppers, peas and corn and boil for four to five minutes. Once the veggies and noodles go soft, add salt to taste, a little pepper, a teaspoon of soy sauce, a quarter spoon of sugar, a teaspoon of red chili sauce and two to three heaped spoonfuls of tomato puree. You can also use ketchup if you do not have puree, but in a smaller quantity. Add a little cornstarch to thicken you soup, boil for a minute more and your hot and sour noodle soup is ready. The recipe is perfect for winters and is a good alternative to hot chicken soup when you are down with a cold. You can make umpteen variations by experimenting with vegetables, chicken broth and by using different types of non vegetarian foods with the veggies.

Casseroles: Casseroles are not just healthy and nutritious; they are a great way of taking care of leftovers as well. Take cooked noodles, spaghetti, pasta or rice as a base for your casserole. Add in chopped vegetables and cooked chicken, beef or sea food. To save time, use store ready peas or corn kernels and for flavor, use shallots, tomatoes and bits of ginger and garlic. Mix with some broth or your favorite soup, add in herbs or sauces that you like and feel would complement the other ingredients. Top the casserole with dried bread crumbs or sprinkle all purpose flour, cover with grated cheese and bake till the casserole bubbles. Garnish with fresh herbs and serve your family a healthy, nutritious and balanced meal. You can make a wide number of variations with casseroles depending upon what you like and what you don’t and you will very soon have your own collection of recipes for quick and tasty casseroles.

Valentine’s Day is just a couple of weeks away, and if you are on the lookout for some quick and easy recipe ideas to impress your loved ones with, then you have come to the right place. Even people who do not usually cook, should be able to take some cooking ideas and turn their Valentine’s Day meals into something memorable and momentous.

Since love and Valentine’s Day are generally accompanied by heart shapes, the color red and loads of chocolates and other sweet somethings, this is what we will concentrate upon when suggesting love recipes that you can use to impress your loved one on this special day.

Cooking Ideas For A Valentine’s Breakfast

Strawberries have long been known as an aphrodisiac, and the color that they impart to food makes them the perfect ingredient for a valentine breakfast. Cranberries are also another tasty and healthy choice for a breakfast ingredient. Make sure that you serve some cranberry juice during breakfast to add color and romance top the meal. One simple love recipe that you can try for breakfast is strawberry French Toast. Beat together two eggs, a cup of milk and a tbsp of sugar. Dip some fruit or regular bread in this mix and shallow fry in butter or vegetable shortening. Chop fresh strawberries and top the French Toast with these and some strawberry preserve or sauce to serve a tasty and lovely looking brekky. You can also make heart shapes with the strawberry sauce or pieces on top of the bread. Serve along with red roses on a breakfast tray and your lover will be floored!

If your guy or gal likes pancakes, then here’s the recipe for an easy and tasty one that you can serve on Valentine’s Day. Whisk together 2 cups of baking mix( buttermilk), 2 eggs and a cup of milk till the mixture is smooth. Drop in chopped cranberries/chocolate chips/ strawberries into the mix and pour this batter onto a greased frying pan. Turn over when the mix bubbles and cook till lightly browned. Cook some berries with a little sugar in a thick based pan to make your own topping. Serve your pancakes with berry toppings or with oodles of chocolate sauce for a sexy looking breakfast.

Cooking Ideas For A Valentine’s Dinner
 
You can make a Valentine’s Day dinner special by giving it a red color theme. Serve deep red tomato soup for an entrée. You can make a heart shape on top of the soup with a little cream. For the main course, you can serve some red hot tandoori chicken (if your partner likes Indian food) or a pasta dish with red sauce like Arrabiata if you are into Italian food. A seafood main course with oysters will not only be very “gourmet”, it might also be a sexy aphrodisiac.  While a typical Valentine’s dessert should be laden with chocolates and cream, you can try and keep it light and healthy by serving a selection of fruits topped with a little confectioner’s or brown sugar or dipped in chocolate. Remember that while you can always go for a rich dessert, a very heavy dinner might leave you both too full for any kind of action afterwards!

Setting up a new kitchen is no easy feat by any means. This is especially true if you have never cooked before, because often, you will never get to know what you need in your kitchen till you are in the middle of trying out a new recipe. Most beginners often shy away from buying cookware because they are generally unaware of what is good and useful and what is simply good to look at and costly to buy. Good cookware often does not come cheap, but with the beginners’ cookware buying tips provided here, you know what will suit your needs best when it comes to cookware.

What To Buy: If you are a new cook, then you might want to look at readymade cookware buying sets that generally include most of the basic cookware that you will need. Generally a set comprising of a saucepan, frying pan and a couple of pots will suffice of you are planning on regular American food. However, if you like Chinese, then you should definitely buy a wok as well. If it is Italian that you like, then you might need more than one saucepan because these dishes will require you to make different sauces. So decide upon the kind of food that you are planning to cook before you buy your cookware. If you want to cook what your mom does, then think of what she has in her kitchen when buying your own cookware.

What Size To Buy: Often, enthusiastic beginners end up buying pots and pans in sets of four or five with each set comprising different sizes ranging from extra small to extra large. However, this will not only empty your pockets, it will also clutter up your kitchen with a number of useless cookware pieces. Others might buy cookware pieces that are generally too big for their cooking needs thinking that they might have to cater for guests. However, cooking for a small number of people in a pan that is too large will often end up taking the taste and pleasure out of your recipes. The key too determining size is to buy medium sized pots and pans where you can easily cook a meal for one or two and go up to at least six people. Mid size is the way to go for almost all cookware that you are buying in single pieces. Buy a set of three to four different sizes for one item that you plan to use the most, like the saucepan or the pot.

What Material To Buy: While pots and pans are available in almost all kinds of materials ranging from copper and aluminum to steel and cast iron, you will find that most have their own advantages and disadvantages. Most people buy steel cookware because it conducts heat evenly, is long lasting, strong, non reactive and economical.  If you are into quick and easy cooking, then a combination of steel and non stick pots and pans should do it for you. You can pass on copper and cast iron till you move to more advanced cooking.

Most people do not realize it, but having the proper cooking equipment really makes a difference to the way your dishes turn out. No wonder then, you might have noted that most world renowned chefs pay utmost importance to the equipments they use and many even travel with their favorite equipments for shows and exhibitions instead of taking a chance with new ones. Therefore, if you are stocking up your kitchen, then make sure that you at least get the basics right. This way, you will never have to give up making a dish in the middle just because you do not have the proper equipment. At the same time, your dishes will turn out just the way they are supposed to instead of turning out to be surprises (often unpleasant ones).  We provide you here with a basic cooking equipment guide. This is stuff that every fully operational kitchen should have. You can go on adding equipments based on the kind of cooking that you do and the recipes you make.

Pots and Pans: Having the right type and the right size of cooking utensils is extremely important since they influence both the cooking time and the taste of your food. The list of essentials is as follows:

· One large, one medium and one small pot, with lids
· A medium sized saucepan with lid
· One large and one small frying pan, preferably non stick
· Two to three oven proof baking dishes in different sizes. Or buy at least two of the same size.
· Buy a pie pan and a cake pan –both medium sizes—if you plan to bake
· A set of different sized microwave proof bowls for storing and heating leftovers.
· A roasting pan and rack if you are into roasts

Knives: Most people do not pay as much attention to knives as they deserve. Buy the right kind of knives, good quality ones, and they will not only increase the quality of your output, they will also increase your efficiency in the kitchen.

· One chef’s knife 8 or 10 inches long
· One bread knife
· One paring knife
· One serrated knife
· One vegetable peeler

Spoons and Ladles: Having the right kind of spoons makes cooking very convenient. So make sure that you have the right ones for every process.

· Wooden spoons- with long and short handles
· Slotted spoons for deep frying- for non stick as well as regular pans
· Ladles
· Spatulas of different sizes

If you have non stick pans, then make sure that you buy spoons suited for such pans. This will save money since wood and plastic spoons can also be used with regular pans and pots.

Other Utensils and Accessories: No kitchen is complete without these necessities, so read on for more basic equipment that you need to stock your kitchen with.

· Grater with different hole sizes and some other basic functions
· Rolling pin
· Mixing bowls
· Measuring cups –one for liquids and one for dry items

There used to be a time when cooking with wines was left either for cordon bleu chefs or our Italian and French cousins. However, the scene is no longer the same with the average American using different types of wines to flavor food in his or her kitchen. Cooking with wine imparts foods a very distinct taste and flavor that cannot be achieved otherwise. If you use wine properly with your food, your cooking skills are bound to get noticed and complimented by your friends and family. However, cooking with wine, though not tough, is certainly a little tricky to say the least. But with our tips for easy and fast cooking with wines, you will become an expert very soon.

· One misconception that we should get rid of at the earliest is that your food tastes better with cooking wines. No, it does not. This is because your food tastes better with wines, not ‘cooking wines’. Cooking wines generally have a high sodium content and do not taste as good as the real thing. On the other hand, if you do not like the flavor it gives your food, you cannot even use it for drinking. Use only drinking wines for flavoring your food also. A little quantity of a good drinking wine, when added to food can impart great taste and aroma.

· The easiest and safest way of adding wine to your food is by putting it in a marinade. This would impart your meats a distinct flavor without your having to slave over it. The trick to remember here is to use just a little wine, instead of a lot and your dish will come up tops.

· When using wines in your non-vegetarian dishes, in marinades or for gravies, remember the wine and meat pairing rules. Use red wines for flavoring red meat and white wines for flavoring white meat, poultry and fish. As far as the quantity of wine to add is concerned, start with adding only a little and go along to please your taste buds. You can also use white wines to add acidity to white sauces and gravies.

· If you have never cooked with wine before, then you should start with using it in marinades and gravies. Many people start cooking with wine by adding it in place of water and you can also do the same. All you need to do in this case is add wine equal to the quantity of water. Try to use this procedure in dishes that do not require too much water though. This is not because the wine will intoxicate people who eat your dish (it will not, since most alcohol content evaporates with cooking and wine hardly has a lot to start with), but because you might not want to part too much with a good and expensive drinking wine.

· At the cost of repetition, we once again stress that you use only good quality drinking wines for cooking. Do not use sherry and sweet wines, unless specified in

There used to be a time when dinner was a leisurely affair where family members got together and shared information about their day. Alas, with everything being dictated nowadays by a shortage of time, both dinner and its preparation have become rushed. We hardly have time to cook after a hectic day at work and supermarket casseroles, frozen dinners and take outs comprise dinner for a large number of families more often than not. However, with a little planning, you can make delicious home cooked dinners within a very short time. All you need to do is follow these simple tips to cut your time in the kitchen without compromising on health and nutrition.

· When you go grocery shopping, it would help if you have planned your meals in advance and buy all the ingredients that you would need for cooking in the coming week. A lot of times, we forget to buy a crucial ingredient for a meal which results in that particular dish never being prepared as we go back to our dependence on take outs and frozen dinners bought from the supermarket.

· Spend an extra hour in the kitchen on a weekend and you can find yourself saving at least half an hour everyday. Whenever you have some free time to spare, or when you get your vegetables from the market, chop them up first before putting them in the fridge. Take out your food processor and chop all the vegetables that you have bought. Store different vegetables in different boxes. Keep the ones you are planning to use within a day or two in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. This way, you would save yourself the hassle of washing your food processor everyday and chopping vegetables. All you need to do is take out the required box from the fridge and pop the already chopped veggies into your pan. Just make sure that you do not mix your raw veggies, otherwise they might turn bad.

· Another method of saving time spent in the kitchen is by washing and cleaning up as you work instead of piling up all the stuff that you get dirty to be washed up later. This way, at the end of the meal, you only have to wash plates and serving utensils. You can ask your family members to wash their plates and one serving utensil each if you want to and you will also have to wash just two pieces after dinner instead of tackling a huge load of dirty plates and pots.

· Before storing fresh meat in your freezer, divide it into portions, making one portion for every meal that you plan to make. This way, when you want to cook that meat, you will have to defrost only the required portion instead of the whole stuff.

· Defrosting meat also takes up a lot of time. You can avoid the delay created by this by taking out the meat that you plan to cook out of the freezer and keeping it in a bowl in the fridge while making breakfast. This way, you meat will be thawed and ready to cook by evening.

A lot of people are taking to cooking at home in their quest to get well balanced, tasty and nutritious meals. However, as a result of too much reliance on takeouts, supermarket frozen dinners and all kinds of meats, we are used to diets that are unhealthy and fattening. Most of us who are non-vegetarians shy away from vegetables and fruits while stuffing ourselves with sugary and fatty food. However, nutritionists and doctors have declared that it is important to eat a minimum of five to seven servings of fruits and vegetables in order to have a healthy diet. Eating such a large amount of fruits and veggies is quite difficult, not to say distasteful for a number of non-vegetarians. However, with our easy tips on making meals tasty and nutritious, you will soon start loving healthy eating.

· When we look at an average American’s diet, there are three things that are drastically wrong with it. Too much fat, excessive sugar and too little fiber. In order to remedy this situation, you will first have to look at your own diet and weight and think of the changes that you really need to make to your diet. The best way of adding fiber to your diet is by eating more fruits, vegetables and whole grain cereals. The best way to start this is by incorporating a small salad into every meal. This would not only add three to four portions of fruits and veggies to your diet, it will also add the fiber required to convert your diet into a healthy one.

· Coming to salads, while most salads are healthy, some salads drenched in heavy dressing contain fat that should be avoided if you are overweight. Try going for salads that have been tossed in transparent and light dressings instead of going for creamy dressings.

· Start having fruit salads. You can start substituting your desserts with fruits and fruit salads. This will have multiple benefits. Not only will this save you from consuming the excessive amount of sugar that you do with normal desserts, it will also add the required amount of fiber to your diet. Fruits are very rich in anti-oxidants and therefore help in controlling aging and increasing your immunity.

· If you find chopping vegetables a big chore, then you can always start using your food processor to do it. You can avoid cleaning your food processor every day by spending an extra hour in the kitchen on a weekend and chopping up all your vegetables one by one in your food processor. Store chopped fruits and vegetables in separate plastic containers; otherwise they might turn bad sooner than later. Unfortunately, you cannot cut and store apples, bananas, eggplants and potatoes etcetera since they oxidize very fast and will turn brown within minutes of being chopped.
· Start adding chopped fruits and vegetables to all the dishes that can take them. They will not only enhance their flavor, but also make them more nutritious. Try different fruit and vegetable mixes for your salads to add flavor and variety.

Most people nowadays look upon cooking as a burden rather than as an enjoyable chore. As a result, we not only cut down on cooking times by making short-cut meals and dishes, we also fail to pay attention to our own safety while in the kitchen. Having a safe cooking environment is the most important thing to pay attention to before you start cooking. Follow our tips to a safe cooking environment to avoid kitchen accidents.

Don’t leave your stove unattended: The leading cause of homes burning down in America is kitchen fires that have been caused by unattended stoves. In order to avoid this scenario in your life, never leave a pot unattended while it is cooking. If you have to rush off during cooking for a minute or two, make sure that you set the stove to lowest or dim it. If you have to leave the kitchen for more than two minutes, then turning off the stove is a better idea.

Play safe with oil: A large number of burns in the kitchen are caused due to oil spatters. While most of us who have ever ventured into a kitchen have been subjected to minor burns caused due to oil spattering, the same has proved fatal in many cases. Make sure that the pan you are using for deep frying is stable and sits properly on your stovetop. Change the stovetop or the pan if it doesn’t. When your oil is hot, drop food to be fried carefully, always dropping it in a direction against your body, rather than towards it. Take care not to drop water or use wet spoons in hot oil.

Keep your kitchen clean: Food cooked in a dirty kitchen is liable to be contaminated by harmful bacteria that could cause serious illnesses. Make sure that your kitchen, countertop, stove and utensils are clean before you start using them for cooking. If you use a chemical or commercial cleaner for cleaning your countertop, then do not keep either raw or cooked food on it since the residue from the cleaner can poison your food. Avoid cross contamination by washing your chopping board and bowls every time you use them.

Have the proper accessories on hand: In order to indulge in safe cooking, it is important that you equip your kitchen with the proper accessories. So make sure that you have strong tongs to handle hot pans and dishes and thick oven mitts for taking out hot dishes from the oven. Use only good quality stuff made of non inflammable materials. As far as cleaning cloths and mitts are concerned, use only cotton ones, since synthetics are very prone to catching fire.

Dress appropriately: The kitchen is not the best place to show off your scarves and boas. The proper attire for working in the kitchen are clothes that are made out of cotton and keep close to your body. Flapping or loose clothes, especially nylon and polyester mixes can spell disaster in the kitchen. So say no to long, bell shaped sleeves, extra loose tops, shawls and scarves in the kitchen if you want to avoid personal accidents and injuries.

With vegetarianism catching on fast as a trend, almost all of us now know friends and relatives who eat only vegetarian food. However, cooking vegetarian food at a party, especially when you yourself are a non-vegetarian, can be quite a confusing and intimidating task. This is because most non-vegetarians are generally unaware about what a good vegetarian dinner consists of. If you find yourself facing a similar situation, then stop worrying and read on for tips on throwing the perfect vegetarian dinner party.

· The first thing to do when you plan to make vegetarian food for a dinner party is what you would do in case of any kind of party—plan the menu. Just like a good non-vegetarian dinner would feature a soup, salad, appetizer, main dish, a side dish and dessert, so would a vegetarian dinner.

· You can find a lot of help on planning vegetarian dinners online. There are a number of websites that will provide you with complete menus for vegetarian as well as non-vegetarian dinners. Most good websites will also provide you with all the required recipes too.

· You can give your vegetarian menu a twist by sticking to a particular kind of regional cuisine. You can either go for Chinese, Mexican or Italian food, since these cuisines not only feature many good vegetarian recipes; they are generally favored by a majority of people.

· One more thing that you should keep in mind when planning your vegetarian menu is to keep it simple, especially if you are planning to cook yourself. Go for recipes that have a difficulty level of “easy” or “moderate” and a cooking time of less than 45 minutes (and remember, we are not talking soups here).  Also select recipes whose ingredients are easily available, otherwise you might find that you need to change the menu at the last moment because you could not find some crucial ingredients for a recipe.
 
· If you are planning to call people who eat non-vegetarian food also, then try to go for a main dish that goes well with both vegetables and meat. For example, if you are cooking Chinese, then you can keep noodles as your main dish with vegetable hot and sour and chicken or mutton Manchurian.

· In order to keep your vegetarian guests happy, try to abstain from using animal fats for cooking. Use vegetable oils as much as possible. Serve vegetarian dishes with their own separate spoons and take care that your guests do not mix up vegetarian and non vegetarian spoons. If your veg and non-veg dishes resemble each other in looks, or if it is tough to determine which is which just by looking, then try putting in small folded cards with the names of the dishes in front of each dish.

· Plan in advance. The main thing that you need to do in order to make any dinner party a success is to plan in advance. If you are not planning to take your day off work to cook, then spend an extra hour on the weekend chopping all the necessary vegetables and storing them in the fridge or the freezer. You can also go for cut and frozen vegetables to save time.