Doing Things the Hard Way

I keep seeing pins for "life hacks" about how to do things easier or quicker, so I thought I'd toast to my own insanity and blog about a few things I do that are actually much harder than necessary. I wrote a really funny article recently for Wide Open Country called "20 Ridiculous Pinterest Projects That Ain't Nobody Got Time For" and this is sort of the opposite of that. I like to cook and bake, so every once in a while I do things the hard way because I think I do it better. So, without further ado, here are my favorite ridiculously over-complicated recipes:

Cinnamon Rolls

Yeah, you can totally buy these from the grocery store, but dammit they always have raisins and I HATE raisins. Seriously, ew. I could buy them from a bakery but they'd be expensive, and I'd have to get up at the crack of dawn, because if you sleep in all the cinnamon rolls are gone by the time you get there, no matter where you go. Because cinnamon rolls are awesome. This recipe requires a yeast dough, so you have to wait for it to rise. Sometimes I make this the night before I want to eat it and leave the rolls in the pan in the fridge overnight, but they really do taste better made and baked on the same day. So these are for like, when you don't really want breakfast until 11 but you'll still be up at 7. *Sarcasm Font* Totally practical, right?

This recipe is originally a Paula Deen Recipe, don't look at me like that, you can hardly taste the racism. Plus I started making this before that came to light, so my innocence is grandfathered in, right?

Click Here for the Cinnamon Rolls Recipe

My changes:

Sometimes I use coconut oil instead of butter in the dough.

I use half granulated sugar and half brown sugar.

I use milk instead of water in the icing recipe.

I only cook these for 15 minutes, because at 30 minutes they have the consistency of hockey pucks.

I leave out the raisins and nuts.

Lasagna

My mom really only cooks on holidays, and one of her specialties is homemade lasagna. I didn't eat frozen, boxed lasagna until my husband bought it after we were married. Gross. Stouffer's should be ashamed of themselves, because that crap is nasty. I had never had it in a restaurant because I was certain it could never be as good as my mom's, until 2010 when my hubs took me to Little Italy in New York City. I figured if there was ever any place that would be worth trying restaurant lasagna, it would be on Mulberry Street, and was I ever right. I have never been so close to heaven. I have been trying since then to recreate it, but I don't have a drop of Italian blood in me, and I lack the prerequisite Italian grandmother to help me out, so I'm still working on this recipe. I've ended up combining my mom's recipe with one from the New York Times, partially because these ingredients are really hard to find in Texas, and partially because I am too lazy to do it properly (but not lazy enough to ever allow my husband to buy Stouffer's again).

Click Here for the New York Times Lasagna Recipe

My changes:

I use bacon instead of pancetta because it's damn near impossible to find in Texas, and really expensive.

I use cottage cheese instead of ricotta because that's how my mom did it, and I find cottage cheese less annoying to work with than sticky ricotta.

I use ground Italian sausage and ground beef, and don't always bother making the meatballs, but it's better if you do, just more time-consuming.

Chicken Pot Pies

This I got into because my husband practically begged me to make him some homemade chicken pot pies, and I've found that, though it's far more time-consuming than sticking a frozen one in the oven, it's not only lower calorie, it's also way more delicious. I don't make my own pie crust though, I'm not completely crazy.

Ingredients:

You will need four soufflé dishes, like these - I bought mine four to a package from Garden Ridge (now called At Home) for less than $10.

2 Pre-made, rolled pie crusts in box, such as Pillsbury (but I use the HEB brand because I find them to be better)

Carrots, celery, potatoes, corn, peas, green beans or whatever you want in your pot pie, the amount you use will depend on how many veggies you want, I usually use about a half a cup of all of these. You can use canned veggies, and I usually do with corn and peas, but with everything else i generally use fresh and then I sauté the green beans and boil the potatoes, carrots and celery. You want the veggies to be cooked when you put them into the pies. If you use canned, they can be cold out of the can though.

1 chicken breast

1 recipe white gravy, you can use my own recipe from my article on Wide Open Country for biscuits and gravy.

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Take one pre-made pie crust out of the box and roll it into a ball, kneed it until all the flour on the outside has been absorbed back into the crust. Cut the ball into four equal pieces, then roll each out. 

Form each pie crust inside and around the edges of each soufflé dish, you'll want to make certain to fold a little bit over the top of each dish so that the crust doesn't simply slide down into the dish as it bakes. 

Using a fork, poke holes in each pie crust and put them all into the oven to bake for about 7 minutes, or until the crust looks done, as in, no longer raw.

Take the pie crusts out of the oven and set them aside (you'll want to leave the oven on).

Sautee, boil or otherwise cook whatever vegetables you want in your pot-pie.

Cook the chicken (I pan-fry mine) and dice the chicken once it's cooked.

Prepare the gravy (see linked recipe above for instructions, omitting the sausage and bacon added).

Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl until gravy covers everything, then spoon the mixture into the cooked pie crusts. 

Take remaining pie shell and kneed it until all the flour on the outside is absorbed, then cut the dough into four equal parts, and roll them out.

Place one raw pie crust on each prepared pot pie, pushing the crust down so that it sticks to the cooked pie crust. Cut four small slits in the top of each raw pie crust to vent.

Cook each pot pie again until the top crust is cooked, 7-10 minutes.

Pizza

Once I mastered cinnamon roll dough, pizza dough was a breeze. The great thing about this recipe is that it doesn't need to rise, so this doesn't take much more time than any other made-from-scratch dinner. It's still longer than opening a box and turning on an oven, but I get to put as much cheese on it as I want, and I loooove CHEESE. I've also used half the dough to make a thin-crust version, which is really good too. The great thing about making your own pizza is that you can put whatever you want on it. I've made this as a standard pepperoni, a sausage and green pepper, and even a chicken alfredo bacon pizza.

Click Here for the Pizza Crust Recipe

Pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees

Roll out the pizza dough and then put it in your pizza pan

Cover in desired sauce (You can make your own, but I usually just buy pre-made spaghetti sauce)

Cover in grated cheese of choice (I have found that grating your own cheese makes it melt better than buying pre-grated cheese at the store)

Cover in meat (make sure it's cooked, unless it's pepperoni, which usually comes pre-sliced and pre-cooked)

Cover in sliced veggies if you want, these don't have to be cooked.

Put the Pizza in the oven and cook it for 15 minutes.