Quick and Easy Meals for One, Bachelor Style

Despite dietary guidance from my Sawbones, every once in a while I give in to my craving for something I know I'm not supposed to be eating. Near the top of my list of forbidden foods...

Chicken Fried Steak

Get This Stuff:

3 pounds cube steak, watch the bargain bin at your local grocery store
2 large eggs
3 1/2 cups milk, 1 1/2 for the egg wash and 2 cups for the gravy
3 cups flour, plus about 1⁄ 3 cup for the gravy
2 teaspoons seasoned salt
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Freshly ground course black pepper to taste
1 cup canola or vegetable oil for frying


Do This:

Break out the meat tenderizing mallet and pound each piece of cube steak out until they are a quarter inch thick, plastic wrap is handy for this task but if you're ok with little bits of pulverized meat flying all over the place don't bother with the plastic wrap. Don't want to "beat your own meat?" Look for Swiss steak in the meat department instead. Combine eggs and 1 1/2 cups milk, beat with a fork until well combined. Mix seasoned salt, paprika, cayenne, and black pepper into 3 cups flour. Lightly season each piece of the meat with salt and pepper. Dip both sides into the egg-milk mixture, then dredge meat in seasoned flour, coating thoroughly. Repeat the egg wash, flour dredge a second time so the final product will have a nice crust on it. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat, I like using a cast iron dutch oven for this task. Cook each steak one at a time for 2 to 3 minutes on each side until golden brown. Remove to a paper-towel lined plate and keep warm.

Once all of the steaks are fried, pour off the oil and reserve it for future use. Without wiping the pan, return it to the stove over medium-low heat. Add ¼ cup used oil back to the pan and allow to heat up. Sprinkle 1/3 cup flour evenly over the oil, and then whisk to make a golden-brown roux. Pour in 2 cups milk and freshly ground black pepper while whisking constantly. Let the gravy come to a slow boil. The gravy will thicken gradually. Serve the steaks on top of a heaping pile of mashed potatoes and cover with gravy. Great with sweet corn or green beans on the side.

Looking for a hearty breakfast/brunch? Prepare the steaks and gravy the same but serve over hash browns with eggs any style on the side.

Believe it or don't, I can't eat three pounds of chicken fried steak plus all the trimmings in one sitting and this is a dish that doesn't freeze well so I often cut the recipe down to a third but it also multiplies well if you need to feed a group of people. Because I find it works best to fry each steak on at a time it means a large group won't be eating at the same exact time but I suppose you could try serving buffet style and cooking well ahead of the expected meal time.

I scored a deal on pork chops on my last trip to the grocery store. I was going to dry rub them and grill them up but I had a couple of wedges of corn bread left over and a few other things in the kitchen that I wanted to use up instead of letting them go to waste.

Corn Bread- and Bacon-Stuffed Pork Chops

Get This Stuff:

6 bone-in pork rib or loin chops, 1 to 1 1/4 inches thick
6 slices bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/2 cup medium yellow onion, chopped
1/2 cup fresh Jalapeno pepper, chopped
1/2 cup frozen sweet corn
1/2 cup corn bread stuffing crumbs
1/2 cup chicken stock or water
1/2 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
Seasoned salt and freshly cracked black pepper to taste
Cayenne pepper to taste

Do This:

Heat oven to 350°F. Make a pocket in each pork chop by cutting into side of chop toward the bone. Cook bacon over medium heat until crisp. Stir in onion and Jalapeno pepper. Cook 2 to 3 minutes then remove from heat. Drain off most of the bacon grease then stir in corn bread crumbs and Chicken stock or water until well mixed add the cheese last.

Sprinkle both sides of pork chops with seasoned salt, black pepper, and Cayenne pepper. Fill the pork chops with about 1/3 cup stuffing. Put the chops in the pan and brown them on both sides.

Place pork chops in a baking pan, cover tightly with foil, and bake for about 45 minutes. Uncover and bake about 15 minutes longer or until pork done to your liking but be careful not to over cook so you don't end up with dry pork chops.

I like these chops with sweet corn and au gratin potatoes on the side, a little bit of your favorite barbeque sauce doesn't hurt either. I prepared all 6 of the chops but only browned and baked two of them, the other chops are individually wrapped in plastic and stored in my freezer for some meals later on.

Saint Patrick's day has come and gone for another year. What to do with the left over corned beef? I like to keep to bigger slices for Reubens and the smaller pieces for hash. Here's my favorite recipe for...

Reuben Sandwiches:

Get This Stuff

Corned beef brisket, I like it cut thick across the grain of the meat
Sauerkraut, use what you like I generally open a can and drain it
Swiss cheese
Marble rye bread
Butter
Thousand island salad dressing

Do This:

If you're making several sandwiches a griddle is the ideal tool for cooking these sandwiches, if you're making one or two then a large non-stick skillet or cast iron frying pan works just fine. Portion out the corned beef and sauerkraut, I like a 2:1 ratio of meat to sauerkraut.

Put the kraut and corned beef in the frying pan and heat it through. Slice the bread to the thickness you want, butter one side of each slice, shove the corned beef and kraut to one side of the pan and put the bread in buttered side down. Put a slice of Swiss cheese on each slice of bread and let it toast until the cheese starts to melt.

When the cheese has begun to melt add the corned beef and then the kraut to one slice of bread for each sandwich. Pour the Thousand Island dressing on the other slice of bread and start assembling the sandwiches when all of the bread is golden brown. Remove assembled sandwiches from the pan to plates and allow to rest for a couple of minutes, then cut in half and insert tooth picks in the middle of each half (or don't and figure out how to cope with the mess - these sandwiches self destruct if you leave too much moisture in the kraut or apply too much dressing).

I like to serve this with pickle spears on the side, homemade onion rings, and maybe some brown mustard.

Grilling up a mess of chops, steaks, and brats but didn't bring a pan to fry up the onions? Don't fret...

Onion in Foil on the Grill:

Get This Stuff:

Onions, I like the larger sweet white and yellow varieties
Butter, I suppose you could try it with vegetable oil spread but I wouldn't
Beef Bullion Cubes, one per onion

Do This:

Skin the onions and cut off the root and stem ends of each onion. Core out a cone on the stem end of the onion, the bottom of the cone should be close to halfway through. Get the foil and tear it into sheets large enough to cover and seal each individual onion inside it's own sheet of foil. place one bullion cube in the center of the onion and top with copious amounts of butter then wrap in foil and place on the grill in indirect heat zones.

Every grill and fire is a little different so you'll have to experiment to find the right places and figure out the timing for the onions to cook through. I like my steaks and chops big and thick but I also like my beef rare so I whip up one of these onions and get it on a screaming hot grill 20-22 minutes before I cook my steak (5 minutes on one side then 3 on the other for rare). Pork chops cook a bit longer but it's hard to get the onion wrong, you almost can't over cook one unless your foil job didn't seal completely or you put the onion over high direct heat.

If you got it right the onion will fall apart as soon as you unwrap it, tender enough that you'll be able to chop it up into little pieces with a plastic spork. Dump the onion and all of the remaining liquid in the foil right on top of your steak, chop, or brat and you've got an excellent meal! I suppose you could put it on chicken if you wanted a vegtibaliarian meal...

Want more flavor? The bullion cube probably exceeds a weeks worth of FDA recommended sodium intake but some Tabasco and/or some fresh ground black pepper are nice additions. Roast some whole garlic cloves in foil along side and add it to the mix and you'll really enjoy the meal but beware of the aftermath in the next 24-48 hours...

Do you have any good recipes for Pork Chops in the Crock pot? We just got one.

LOL wrote: Do you have any good recipes for Pork Chops in the Crock pot? We just got one.

Chops or a crock pot?

Both! LOL

I can cook them on a grill no problem. One time I tried Barbeque sauce in a crock pot and it was not too good. Gravy is probably better, but I'm a lousy cook.

LOL wrote: Do you have any good recipes for Pork Chops in the Crock pot? We just got one.

I generally grill, roast, or chicken fry pork chops. I have put raw chops in to a pot of sauerkraut or a pot of navy beans if I didn't have ham hocks on hand but both of those meals are slow and low in the dutch oven on the stove or campfire. A big pot of butter beans comes to mind, I'll have to give that a try over the next couple of days and see how that works out.

If you put chops in a crock pot I'm guessing you'd want to brown the chops first and cook them all day to be sure they get cooked through (it's stupid but I don't trust a plastic lid and a ceramic crock pot to get hot enough to do the job even though I know it can). I'm not sure it would matter what kind of chops you use but I'd probably either use bone in chops because they tend to be cheaper or maybe buy a pork tenderloin, carve it up into chops and maybe even cube a couple of those up the first couple of times to be sure the pork cooks all the way through.

Anyone else have any ideas? I'd love to come home to a meal of pork chops in the crock pot after a day in the office.

LOL, no go on the porky chops. I toook mine and rinsed it off with water and fried it in the pan. It was ok. The gravy and mushrooms were good. The GF said yuk it tastes like Liver. LOL :rofllol

Next up chicken, until its Grill time soon. mmmmm

If you're thinking about chicken on the grill give this one a try:

Beer Can Chicken

Whole chickens are almost always cheaper than the parts all cut up and packaged. If you know a little bit about how to use a knife and cutting up a chicken you could save some cash if you DIY. Know how to break a bird down but just aren't in the mood for the job? Why not cook it whole?

What you need:

1 whole chicken, plucked, head, neck and innards removed
1 empty beer can, top removed
1/2 stick butter
3/4 of a can of beer
teaspoon dried rosemary
teaspoon dried sage
two cloves garlic, minced

How it's done:

Prepare the beer can by drinking the contents and removing the top of the can, you could use a pair of tin snips or get one of those can openers that cuts through the rim of the can. Butter, spices, and beer go in the can. Can goes on the grill (preferably in the smoker), chicken "sits" on the can. Cook low and slow using indirect heat on the grill with the lid closed (if you do this in the smoker then 'nuff said). Don't check for an hour to ensure that it gets a good start and the liquid in the can has a chance to combine and reduce. After an hour look in every 15 minutes or so until it is done to your liking.

Add or delete spices, cover the bird in a dry rub or BBQ sauce if you want. Don't like beer (what the hell is wrong with you?!), try wine or chicken stock instead. One of the easiest ways I know to cook a whole chicken, even better you can eat it with your hands right off the grill so clean up is dead easy! Got a duck, goose, or turkey? Get a bigger can (Fosters or other large can) and give it a shot. My experience is that turkeys take a lot longer but the outcome is wonderful, never tried it with a duck or a goose but it ought to work...