The Lazy Gourmet

[Valka]

Back in the first season, it really was more of a survival situation. There was one reward challenge where the reward wasn't some exotic picnic - it was one slice of pizza. Just one slice. He (Jervis) won that, and instead of eating it all himself, he shared it with the rest of them - everyone got one bite, and they were very appreciative to get it.

[Buster's Uncle]

Jervis is pretty awesome - what was hilarious about the rat story was that he's not a "street" type - he'd been using his public 'white' voice, always, until one bite of rat leg.  Hunger has power...

I was always disappointed that that show was just a game show done cheap, instead of a soap opera done cheap.  Like pretty much all 'reality' shows -and I go back to the first four seasons of The Real World- it kept getting less interesting after the first season.

[Valka]

These reality game shows were much more realistic in their earlier seasons. The current season of Big Brother is on now, and there's a few of us on TrekBBS who watch and comment on the CBS shows.

I remember when BB had weekly food competitions, to see what the houseguests would get to eat for the week. It was interesting to see who would pick junk food or other tasty but less than healthy choices over a balanced diet.

Now they have weekly 'have-nots' who have to sleep in insanely uncomfortable ways and eat "slop" (no idea what's in that, but apparently it's completely tasteless and rather disgusting in texture).

Then there was the Amazing Race a few seasons back when one team complained about having to eat pickled herring... I love pickled herring! I wouldn't have had any problem with that task, as long as I had some antacid or plain soda crackers handy afterward (very acidic, pickled herring is, when you have to eat as much in one sitting as they did ).

[Buster's Uncle]

The game 'reality' shows leave me incredibly cold.  I lasted a few seasons of Survivor because it wasn't THAT obvious what it was when it began, but even the Real World -which began as charismatic people interacting, which interests me- got faker and faker and set up to showcase the part I liked least -the fighting- with deliberately casting drunken, broken people and lots of artificial conditions designed to foment conflict.  NO thank you.

I haven't mentioned food this time.  [shrugs]  I can split the thread if anyone, especially Elok, wants, or we keep talking reality shows, something I'm not uninterested in doing, seriously...  (I like the celebrity ones, and not because I'm a People Magazine reader type, or necessarily like the celebrities shown.)

[Rusty Edge]

Perhaps this qualifies as lazy, because it's essentially meat and dessert in one dish-

Candy Fried Pork and Apples ( basically bites of pork chop mixed with apple dumpling contents.)

*1 pound of pork loin ( or 4 chops ) cut into 1/2 or 3/4 inch cubes.
*1 teaspoon of cooking oil
*3 or 4 baking apples ( Granny Smith, Northern Spy, Cortland, and Empire for examples), cored and sliced into 1/2 inch slices.
*1 bottle of cinnamon flavored hard cider.

*1/2 cup brown sugar
*3 Tablespoons of cornstarch.
*2 T of Worcestershire sauce
*1/2 teaspoon of salt
*1/4 t of ground black pepper
*1/4 t of ground cinnamon

Heat the oil in a large frying pan. Brown the pork on all sides. Add apples and sauté for 3 minutes, while stirring now and then. Add 1/2 cup of cider. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes.

Mix another 3/4 cup of cider with the dry ingredients in a bowl. Drink the rest of the cider, or add it to the mix.

When the 10 minutes are up, add mix to frying pan and raise heat to medium. Stir constantly until sauce thickens, and serve, or reduce heat to minimum, until you can.

Obviously, the best pairing with this is hard cider.  What isn't obvious is that this is something you want to consume entirely while it's still hot, or at least warm, because it makes for slimy leftovers.

Maybe you object to the alcohol, or don't have any hard cider. You can substitute white wine, chicken broth, or non-alcoholic cider,   and use 1/4 cup of cider vinegar as part of the liquid in the mixing portion.

[Elok]

I'm cool with the conversation going wherever.

I used to do something fun with pork and apples myself, though I can't recall the details.  I know it involved cinnamon and brown sugar, so it was basically fried apples with pork thrown in instead of served alongside it.

I recommend that everybody who's serious about being lazy and/or impatient in the kitchen get a pressure cooker.  My wife got one called "Instant Pot" (it's Japanese or something and does not, to my knowledge, involve marijuana) off Amazon; it's a pressure cooker, slow cooker, and plain ol' ordinary cooker all in one.  You can set it to sautee and fry onions in this thing, and since it's heating from every direction but up it cooks onions, bacon and the like quite fast.

(why is there no lip-licking smiley here?)

[Buster's Uncle]

Because no one's asked - but wait; Geo asked for something very close, and I aim to please... 

-That's relish, lower-case, with a semicolon (you don't have to shift to type a semi, so I use a lot for smilie codes for ease of typing in) in front w/o a space between, and I'd venture that this thread needs that smilie...


I wish to note that my semi-recipe is a NORTH CAROLINA barbeque sauce semi-recipe.   I better edit that post...

[Lorizael]

Maybe because lip-licking smileys are always inevitably creepy.

[Buster's Uncle]

  I'M invariably creepy - so what?

[Unorthodox]

I'M invariably creepy

Hardly. 


I don't watch reality as a general rule, OTHER than Face Off.  It is pretty much a straight up talent competition (much more so than your singing BS shows) with very little to no 'drama' your typical reality show tries to play up.  It's judged by experts, no audience voting crap.  I'm disappointed Syfy didn't learn that's what makes that show great with their various spinoffs (one for SET design, and one for more muppet styled monsters) that amped up the personal drama at the expense of the talent show, and thus got swiftly cancelled.   

[Buster's Uncle]

Emphasizing the fighting at the expense of everything else is what wrong with reality shows, television and the world - don't they see what harm they do?

Leaving aside my personal repulsion, don't they see that?

[Metaliturtle]

?

[Buster's Uncle]

Time to change yer personal text for that...

[Metaliturtle]

Que?

[Buster's Uncle]

Read yer personal text, soony-me-lad.