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FEATURE
Tired of frozen dinners? Cooking for yourself doesn't always require natural talent or a big budget.
Cooking up a storm. Coming to college, most students find themselves needing to prepare meals for the first time. With time constraints and limited kitchen access, it can be difficult to concoct a tasty and inexpensive meal. To avoid eating ramen for the majority of your college years, consider selective grocery shopping and find ingredients that will make enjoyable and easy creations. If you find a passion for cooking, feel free to experiment.
Photo illustration by Karsten Lunde
It s 4:45 on Monday evening at Battenfeld Scholarship Hall. In the kitchen, Josh Patterson and Joel Haug stand over one of three 9 by 13 inch metal baking pans
sitting on the stainless steel kitchen counters; filled with ingredients for chicken pot pie. Patterson, Pittsburg junior, and Haug, Atchison sophomore, are on dinner duty tonight. In a couple of hours, they will feed 50 hungry Battenfeld residents. The hall's kitchen looks like one you'd find in a professional restaurant. There are industrial-sized ovens, a fryer and a giant fridge. The kitchen drawers have labels ranging from "measuring cups," to "Gloves! Like skin, but disposable!"
Patterson and Haug stretch out a sheet of crust dough between them, and slowly lower it onto the pan, covering up the gravity, chicken and vegetables that make up the filling. Patterson takes a knife and trims off the excess dough. He surveys his work for a moment. The food looks like the very definition of the word "hearty." "Beautiful," he says, before moving on to the next pan.
Patterson has been a dinner cook here since freshman year. He says he'd had some experience cooking at home before coming to the University, but cooking at Battenfeld proved to be very different. He's learned that some dishes don't work when cooking for 50 people.
"I tried making Weinerschnitzel." Patterson says. "It took a long time. It was messy. You have to tenderize the meat and make it flat, so there was juice squirting everywhere. I learned not to
be so ambitious."
Chris Worley, Columbia, Mo. senior, also lives in Battenfeld and has been a dinner cook off-and-on during the four yeats he's lived in the hall. He originally signed up to learn how to cook.
"When I got to college, I couldn't make mac and cheese," Worley says. "I can cook three or four good meals now without having to look at a recipe. I'm at a point where I can find a recipe online and say 'I want to try that.'"
Living away from home brings plenty of challenges. One of those challenges is food. Some of us come to college with no idea how to cook. Between class, homework and a depleted budget, sometimes it feels like the only thing you can make is a measly package of ramen noodles. If you're someone who likes to cook, life as a student can take a toll on enjoying the culinary arts. If you're someone who's just beginning, it can make the task seem even more daunting, but it doesn't have to be.
Careful grocery buying and researching recipes can allow a surprising amount of exploration into the world of cooking, whether your constraints are space, money or time.
BIG IDEAS, TINY STORES
Javon Shackelford loves to cook.
"There are some people who paint; some people who craft. I cook," the Salina freshman says. "When I start cooking, nothing else matters."
Growing up, both of Shackelford's parents worked, often leaving him home alone. Since he had to take care of himself, cooking was a skill Shackelford picked up quickly. He started with grilled cheese when he was six years old, and worked his way up to making risotto for the first time in seventh grade.
Now, Shackelford lives in McCollum Hall, and uses the dorm's basement kitchen to whip up his meals. The situation isn't ideal, but he doesn't let it limit what he makes.
Shackelford's biggest success so far has been goo bars, also known as gooey butter cake. It's made of a cake batter, egg and butter crust, and an egg, powdered sugar and cream cheese filling.
"If I am feeling kind of saucy, I cook pasta. If I'm down on my luck, I make Southern comfort food." Shackelford says. "It really just depends on what I'm craving and what type of mood I'm in."
STRETCHING A DOLLAR
Chelsea Mertz, Topeka senior, became a vegan in college after she found out she was lactose intolerant. This means she doesn't eat meat, dairy or eggs. Mertz is also an avid cook. She often makes meals with her brother and teaches a cooking class at the Ecumenical Christian Ministries center, where she also helps out with the organization's weekly vegetarian lunch.
Mertz says she finds veganism to be an inexpensive lifestyle, because she doesn't buy
specialty items, and it also helps her control her weight. She says she likes to make rice-based dishes, because they're healthy and the ingredients are inexpensive.
Mertz's monthly grocery bill is usually $50 or $60. To save money, she buys in bulk, because she can buy the amount of ingredients she needs. She buys frozen juice concentrate and uses dry beans instead of canned. Mertz also says that there are plenty of ingredient substitutions cooks can use to save money or cater to dietary needs, such as replacing the eggs in brownies with applesauce or bananas.
Kimberley Morales, San Francisco-based creator of the food blog "Poor Girl Eats Well," dedicates her site to sharing recipes that are inexpensive to make. In each post, she notes the cost per serving of her recipes, most of which are around $3. Morales, whose dishes for her blog include chicken in wild mushroom-chipotle sauce and cookies and cream cheesecake shots, says careful grocery shopping allows her to make all kinds of unexpected dishes.
"I've found things I never knew existed at such reduced prices, simply by looking carefully at everything that's in that particular aisle." Morales says. "I end up exploring interesting ingredient combinations and come up with some great salads, soups and other dishes. The sky's the limit!"
Morales says her cardinal rule of grocery shopping is to avoid any foods that have been cut or shredded already, such as pre-shredded cheese.
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