Where's the beef??
How not to chicken out of cooking meat for yourself
Cooking meat just for yourself, in your own kitchen, can be kind of intimidating!
There’s a lot of risk that goes into just cooking even the simplest chicken breast. You have to wash your hands and utensils like a million times! It’s so hard to tell if it’s safely cooked! And what do you do with all the extra if you’re just one person??
I don’t cook a lot of meat, for precisely these worries. But I’ve found some recipes and methods that have helped me get over my fears! And I’m sharing them with you below.
Firstly, storage is key. Meat is an ingredient I really never want to waste. It feels sort of disrespectful. (Plus, it’s also expensive.) Enter, your freezer!! It has become my go-to way to store raw beef, chicken, sausage, and more.
When I buy ground beef, I like to ask the butcher to separate the meat into 1/2 lb bags. Then I can freeze them, and thaw a half pound individually when I need it. I typically won’t use more than half a pound at once for myself, so it’s a handy way to keep the extras fresh. Similarly, I’ll rarely make more than one chicken breast at once just for myself, so I like to freeze those in individual packages too. You can even freeze sausages, and just defrost them individually.
Next, embrace leftovers! If I’m cooking something like chicken breast or ground beef, I’ll expect that the recipe I’m making will be good for multiple days. And once it’s defrosted, meat doesn’t stay good for very long at all. This way, you don’t have to worry about what to do with half a defrosted chicken breast sitting in your fridge.
Lastly, start with recipes that call for simple meats and high heat. Chicken breast and ground beef are my go-tos—ground beef very clearly tells you when it’s cooked, and chicken breast is very easy to slice into and check for doneness. And I like to use recipes that ensure high heat and a long cooking time. I’m not about to make a medium-rare steak in my 4 by 2 foot kitchen. But I will make chicken tikka that’s baked at 500 degrees in the oven. There’s like, NO way that chicken can come out underdone!!
I haven’t ventured into fancy meats like short rib, or pork loin, or steak, but perhaps someday when I have more confidence, I will! For now, enjoy some of my go-to meat recipes for one person. They’re all easy, most of them make for fantastic leftovers (except the burger I guess), and they’re a great go-to if you rarely cook meat. Try them out and let me know if they help you conquer your fears too!!
Chicken 65
Time: 30 mins + marinating | Difficulty: 3/5 | Recommendation: Dinner or appetizer to share
This is an appetizer commonly served in Indian restaurants that has a vibrant red color, and a spicy (but not too spicy) exterior. I’ve adjusted the recipe so that you don’t have to gather 65 different spices (yes, hence the name), with the Tandoori masala doing a lot of work here! And let me tell you, this chicken is seriously TASTY! When I first made it, I thought it might be the best thing I’d ever made. The chicken itself stays really juicy thanks to the yogurt marinade, and the spiciness of the tandoori powder is really well complemented by the extra vinegary coating you give it at the end. I like to use chicken breast for this because it’s less fussy to prepare when you’re just one person at home, but you could use dark meat if you prefer. This cooking process has two steps: frying the chicken, and then quick cooking some onions and mustard seeds in a vinegary oil that you add the chicken to for a second cook. If you’re planning on leftovers, I’d hold off on the second step until you’re ready to eat them! It’ll keep the crispy exterior intact for the next day.
Ingredients/Tools:
1 chicken breast, cubed
Vegetable oil
1/2 a red onion, thinly sliced
Curry leaves (optional)
Mustard seeds
Cumin seeds
Rice vinegar
For the marinade:
Two cups or so of plain yogurt
1 clove garlic, grated
A hunk of ginger, peeled and grated
Tandoori masala (I use this one)
Cumin powder
Coriander powder
Salt
Pepper
1 tbsp rice flour
2 tbsp cornstarch
For the vinegar sauce:
1 tbsp or so of rice vinegar
1/2 clove garlic, grated
Some grated ginger
Tandoori masala
Salt
Pepper
1/2 tbsp water
A big bowl
Wok or skillet
Method:
Marinate the chicken: in a big bowl, add all the ingredients together except the rice flour and cornstarch, then add the chicken and leave in the fridge, covered, for at least an hour (or up to like, five hours!)
After marinating, add the rice flour and cornstarch.
Heat about 3/4 inch of vegetable oil in a skillet, enough to cover almost the entirety of the chicken pieces. When the oil is hot enough (drop in some of the batter to test it), add in the chicken, a few pieces at a time. Let the chicken fry, turning occasionally, until it’s nicely browned and cooked through (165° for white meat if you are measuring!). Drain on paper towels.
Meanwhile, make the vinegar sauce by adding all the ingredients together in a little bowl.
When the chicken is done and draining, drain the pan of most of the oil (save about a 1/2 tbsp). Add in mustard seeds and cumin seeds and heat until the mustard seeds start to pop.
Add in the onion slices and curry leaves. (Scallion greens or green garlic also would go great here!) Sauté until the onion is starting to get translucent. Then add in the vinegar sauce and let it all bubble up a bit.
Add the chicken back to the pan and stir it all to combine and coat. Serve with some raw onions, a squeeze of lemon, and some naan on the side!!
Chicken Tikka
Time: 2 hours, +marinating | Difficulty: 2/5 | Recommendation: A slow weeknight or weekend
This is a typical appetizer at Indian restaurants, that’s basically just chicken, marinated in yogurt with lemon juice and a bunch of spices, and baked a really high heat. Traditionally it would be made in a tandoor (a super hot clay oven), but this recipe achieves the same crispy, charred exterior and soft, juicy interior, just using your oven and a grill pan! This recipe is for one person, but for me it makes a bit more than a meal—so leftovers also works great in a sandwich, either as a naan-taco or with normal bread.
Ingredients/Tools:
1 chicken breast
Yogurt
Chickpea flour/besan
Lemon juice
Peanut oil
Spices: Tandoori masala, cumin powder, coriander powder, turmeric, ginger powder, paprika, salt, pepper
Wooden skewers
Grill pan (you can usually find one in the drawer under your oven!!)
Method:
Chop up the chicken into 1-inch cubes or so, and put in a bowl.
Add a good amount of yogurt (about 1.5x to twice the amount of chicken), a tbsp of chickpea flour, and stir well.
Add in all the spices and stir until well mixed. Then sprinkle in some lemon juice and about a tsp of peanut oil. Mix and marinate for at least two hours, or overnight.
When you’re ready to bake, heat the oven to 475°. Soak some wooden skewers (skip if using metal), then skewer the chicken pieces.
Brush the grill pan well with peanut oil. Place two skewers and bake for about 25 minutes, until the outside has little charred bits and the inside is at least 165°.
Enjoy with yogurt, or raita, or sliced red onion, or a parotta or roti or naan, or potatoes, or ANYTHING!!
Tandoori masala goat-cheeseburger
Time: 45 mins | Difficulty: 3/5 | Recommendation: Lunch!
I’ve gotten really into making burgers ever since I found a really quality meat place near me!! Turns out, a burger is not too hard to make at home, as long as you have a hot skillet and some open windows. It’s actually pretty ideal to just make a burger for one person, because I think making multiple would set all the smoke alarms off… Also, for one person, you can use as little or as much beef as you want, so it doesn’t have to be too expensive an endeavor. I like to use about 1/6 of a pound. I know that sounds weird, but I keep my ground beef frozen in 1/2 lb sections, and halving that was too much for one meal, so I split it into 3! Also, tip for one person, keep your burger buns in the fridge! They last much longer.
Ingredients/tools:
1/6-1/4 pound ground beef
A clump of goat cheese (preferably spicy goat cheese!)
Tandoori masala (I like this one)
Some sliced cabbage or lettuce
Coriander chutney
Lemon juice
Saffron mustard (or add some curry powder to regular dijon and make curry mustard)
Sliced red onions
Burger bun
Vegetable oil
Potatoes, for fries (see skillet recipe here, or an oven chips recipe here!)
A skillet
Method:
Make the fries in the skillet first, if making, or get them going in the oven.
In a little bowl, add tandoori masala and salt to the beef, and mix well.
Separate the beef into two little spheres. Press down on the middle of one sphere so it’s sort of like a disc, and put a clump of goat cheese on there. Then put the other sphere on top of that, and seal the edges very well.
Heat some vegetable oil in a skillet. When the oil is very hot, plop the beef patty on the skillet. Cook for a couple minutes on one side, then carefully flip to the other side once the first has nicely browned. You can press down on the burger to get it a bit thinner, so that you don’t have to worry about it being undercooked inside. You can also cover 80% of the pan with another pan, upside down, to get all the heat radiating back into the meat (like you would with a grill lid!)
Mix the cabbage with the coriander chutney and lemon juice to make a slaw.
When the burger is done (temperature should be 145° for a burger with no pink inside), set it aside to rest briefly.
Put the burger bun in the hot skillet and let them toast while the patty rests.
Lastly, layer up! Bun, patty, cabbage, onions, and some mustard on the top bun.
Irish Tacos
Time: 2 hrs | Difficulty: 4/5 | Recommendation: Weeknight meal project!
These tacos are soooo yummy!! They’re loosely based on corned beef and cabbage, and inspired by a recipe by Sam Sifton—but here, I added potatoes and some pickled onions, and the meat isn’t corned beef, just “quick pickled” ground beef. Which means the recipe takes a couple hours, not a couple days. Plus, portions here are for one person. Also I’ve discovered pickling spice and wow it smells so good?? And flavors this ground beef SO nicely! Theres lots of elements here so I’ll clarify—optional: cheddar, pickled onions. NOT optional: beef, potatoes, slaw.
Spaghetti tacos
Time: 1 hour | Difficulty: 1/5 | Recommendation: Weeknight meal
My mom used to make this spaghetti with meat sauce about once a week. At some point, inspired by the iconic Nickelodeon show iCarly, my brother and I thought… what if we put the spaghetti…in a taco shell?? Thus, the real-world spaghetti taco was born. It’s an amazing combo! This recipe makes 3-4 servings so you can have leftovers—you can make them interesting by changing up the pasta each time, or adding taco shells. But feel free to cut it in half if you don’t want so many leftovers!
Below is a collection of the new recipes you can find on my site! You can click through to get the full recipe, or you can always find them in my Recipe Archive tab at the top of my site.
Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes with Bailey’s cream cheese frosting
These cupcakes are DELICIOUS. They’re so moist and chocolatey, and have a deep, nutty flavor that comes from the Guinness. The cake recipe is adapted and scaled down from Nigella Lawson’s Guinness Cake recipe, where you make the whole thing in one big pot, and then transfer to a cake pan. I prefer making this recipe in cupcake form, because they’re way easier to store, they’re already portioned out when you want to eat them, and you can frost them individually when you’re in the mood for one. And a bonus—this recipe uses Guinness, Jameson Irish Whiskey, AND Bailey’s Irish Cream. Talk about a trifecta!!!
Tamarind-glazed trumpet mushrooms
I love figuring out new ways to cook mushrooms. Trumpet mushrooms are amazing because they’re really big, and really meaty, so they can be used as a substitute for things like chicken or even thin strips of beef. But you can also embrace them as the perfect mushrooms they are, and highlight their unique texture and their ability to really soak up flavors!
Turmeric Colcannon
Colcannon! It’s so delicious. Just mashed potatoes and cabbage or kale, with scallions, but you can do a lot with it, like adding turmeric here like I did! This recipe was adapted from a basic one from Lucy Madden’s “The Potato Year,” but I made a few adjustments: I sauté the cabbage instead of steaming it, to avoid the stinky cruciferousness you can get from introducing cabbage to hot water. I also added turmeric to the cabbage, because it’s a great flavor complement for both the cabbage and the potatoes. And I sautéd the scallions in a touch of butter before adding milk and boiling it for the potatoes.