Making Ratatouille is bullshit.
What I'm Up To (Milestones), What I Reflected On (Lazy Recipes), and What's Occupying My Mind (Deb Liu's Story) - all part of Allen's Friday Flights
HELLO to my Friday Flights
WOOOO. Welcome back to my personal updates around the random things I do. And for the new folks subscribing, come back Wednesday for the Crypto stuff.
Ciao!
Allen
Past Friday Flights
What I’m Up To
TL;DR: A collection of announcements and wins.
The Things:
I am part of the inaugural Alumni Advisory Board for the Learning Brew. Here’s my LinkedIn post about that.
I am proud to announce that I am an investor in Gocharlie.ai. Here’s my LinkedIn post on that too. It is currently #1 on Product Hunt (9/22/2022).
I’ll be speaking at the 7th annual Los Angeles Institute of Internal Auditor conference. Something about Blockchain. Thanks Tina. Here’s my LinkedIn post on that.
Not 1, not 2, but 4 different announced to me within the last 2 weeks that they all have new jobs. That’s just awesome. This doesn’t even count the promotions!
I did not forget about the 21st of September. I also did not forget about Hobbit day.
Marty I know you read this; I went back to that place you took me to and had a lot more food. Thanks for the rec.
As a result of some specific work, I know about FDII, GILTI, and QRE after constructing the underlying workbooks and summary face for it. I don’t know if I like knowing that I know this.
My online ecommerce business passed $4k total sales this week. Not bad for something I forgot about.
I ordered a 2nd steamdeck, and I have 48 more hours from the time you are reading this to confirm the order. Once paid, I’d be getting it in less than 2 weeks. But, I don’t think I need it, I just wanted it. Anyone want to buy it off me?
What I Reflected On
TL;DR: Making Ratatouille is bullshit.
Making Ratatouille is bullshit.
You see this dish I made? It took 2.5 hours to make. This dish is bullshit, don’t make it.
Instead, let me save you from making ridiculously long or complex recipes with low reward and by offering you a sliver of my lazy recipes.
Listen, I love cooking.
I do. I’m the one that likes to take my sweet time making the dishes that I love.
I’m also one of the laziest cookers you can meet where most of the time, if I can do the easy way, I will do the easy way. I’m also one of the most illiterate cookers of all time who can’t be bothered to open a recipe book (of which I have many) and follow it.
The struggle is real.
And when it comes to weekday meals, well, you can say life is a challenge.
Now there are those who subscribe to meal prepping. I can’t even do that. At best, I can eat what I’ve batched made for about 2 days 2 meals. This includes the original meal, so really I’m only giving my food one more shot as left-overs.
Afterwards, I will promptly ignore it and it will sit in the fridge for a while before finding its way to a better place.
I also know its not feasible to constantly eat out, especially when you live in a place where you’ve exhausted almost every single eatery that is “light/healthy/moderate/not too pricey”.
So the big loom question I ask myself all the time is “What’s for lunch”; and until recently, that was rather challenging question when cooking at home. It used to be some form of Trader-Joes Frozen entrees or H-mart goods.
I’m happy to say I’ve evolved, and I’m here to share some of the lazy hacks I have. They usually require an air fryer, and understanding that I focus on least amount of my energy involved, even if the trade-off is longer cook time.
Weekday Basic Chicken Thighs
Using Skin-on with bone-in Chicken Thighs from Trader Joes, take the pack of 4 chicken thighs and drain the red liquids.
Add directly to Air Fryer, skin-side down.
Season it with salt on the side facing up while it is in the Air Fryer. Oil is not necessary.
Air Fry it at 375-390 degrees Fahrenheit for 21 minutes.
At minute 15, flip it for crispy skin. You can ignore this if you’re lazy.
Voila, you’re done. If you let it sit for 2-5 more minutes, the chicken gets better. But you don’t have to.
Oh this recipe sounds too easy? You god damn right it is. Its a banger.
Weekday Chicken Stir-Fry
Get Boneless Chicken. Freeze it. (Thats right, you can freeze it).
When hungry, add boneless chicken to a microwave safe bowl. Add random seasonings including salt, and any other Asian seasonings. Cover it, and Microwave at 50% power for 8 minutes.
5 minutes in, get a skillet out and start heating it up.
Randomly cut up and toss green-leafed vegetables into it. Cabbage, spinach, the 5 forms of choi, etc. Add garlic too but if you can’t be bothered to cut it up and are out of store bought, you can use the powder.
When the Microwave is done, immediately transfer the chicken with the juice contents directly into stir fry.
Congrats you just made some bomb stir-fry. Put it on top of rice or noodles.
Weekday Seared Ahi Tuna
At Whole Foods or H-Mart, you can buy Tuna Steaks. Don’t buy the Trader Joes one, those suck terribly for this recipe.
Make sure they are defrosted before doing this recipe.
Turn on a skillet, high heat. Add Olive Oil (not the Extra Virgin one though) or Grapeseed Oil. Something something high smoking point.
Salt and Pepper both sides of your Tuna Steak. Do not slack on that Pepper, murder it.
Put it on the skillet. Count to 30 seconds.
Flip it, count to 30 seconds.
Remove and let it rest for a minute or 2 (or many) as you go figure out your side dishes.
Cut with a big knife. Don’t worry, no matter which angle you cut, you are wrong. Accept that.
Enjoy.
Weekday Vegetables
I buy frozen vegetables or canned vegetables. They have the same nutrition as fresh, and last a lot longer.
When Air Frying a chicken, I will Air Fryer a random amount of vegetables in the Air Fryer too, always airing on the sparse side. Without space, your Air Fryers will steam instead of Air Fry. That is not desirable.
Add salt. Without salt, any vegetable in the Air Fryer basically sucks.
Air Fryer at 350 for 10 minutes. You can vary the time based on the stubbornness of the vegetables.
When done, congrats you have roasted veggies. They are good as they are or you can put truffle powder, mushroom powder, or whatever seasoning you got. Enjoy.
Weekday Potatoes
Potatoes are incredibly nutritious and beat rice and noodles. Where the noodle recipes at? That will have its own post.
I do yellow potatoes or fingerlings.
Dice it up, and if you’re like me, you’ll do an okay job. No I don’t de-skin these tiny potatoes.
Toss in olive oil, paprika, and any dried green seasoning like basil or oregano. Don’t forget to salt.
Put in Air Fryer at 375 for 20 minutes. They may take longer. It depends.
Enjoy.
Bonus:
Weeknight Mac and Cheese
Get 3 ingredients. Your choice of pasta, your choice of cheese (cheddar I guess) and Sodium Citrate.
Boil the pasta. Undercook it by 2 minutes. Unless you like it soggy. You masochist.
Drain the pasta water, but reserve 2 cups of the liquid.
Heat a pan (or reuse the one with the pasta) and add your cheese. Shredded of course.
Add a pinch of Sodium Citrate.
Mix like hell.
Congrats you have 3 ingredient Mac and Cheese that doesn’t have milk or cream. Credit to this guy’s recipe.
What thing is on my mind
TL;DR: What They Don’t Tell You about Maternity Leave by Deb Liu
Read that. Hope you become a better leader, partner, friend, and/or colleague because you read it.