Cheap Bastids Green Chili Pork Chop Taco

So it’s been a while since Cheap Bastid posted a recipe. Mainly because life has been frantic and goofy and Cheap Bastid hasn’t had a whole lot of inspiration. I’ve been cooking a lot but not working much on new recipes.

But, Sunday came and it’s been really busy. I spent most of the day doing yardwork at my Mama Stella’s house. Mrs. CB has only been home 2 or 3 nights the last couple of weeks. She’s been staying a lot at Mama Stella’s who was recently diagnosed with a serious, systemic cancer.

Anyway, I was home alone and hungry. And I wanted something easy. I took out a pork chop with the intent of making sweet and sour pork. Then I thought to myself, “Self, let’s do up some tacos with the pork chop.” So I did. What I wanted was something with some crispiness to it and with some flavor. And I managed to get it.



Now I didn’t take any pictures last night. I was tired and hungry and not thinking of a Cheap Bastid post. But, I managed to click a few tonight when I made leftovers. And tonight I used some left over flatbread rather than tortillas (especially since the tortillas I used last night had been frozen so long that they were kind of tough and crumbly). So here’s what I did:

Cheap Bastid’s Green Chili Pork Chop Taco
• ½ lb pork chop (I used a boneless sirloin chop)
• 1 cup Lettuce
• 1 tomato diced
• ½ cup diced onion
• Tortillas or flat bread
• Juice from 1 lime
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• Chipotle or cayenne
• Chili powder
• Salt
• Salsa Verde or Chili Verde (I used canned because it’s what I had)



Tenderize the porkchop in a plastic bag (whomp on it with a sauce pan or meat tenderizer until it’s about ½ inch thick). Cut the pork chop into ½ inch cubes. Put the cubes of meat in a bowl and add the lime juice, chipotle/cayenne, chili powder and salt along with a good squirt of vegetable oil (a tablespoon or 2). Stir to coat and then add the cornstarch and stir it up again. Let this sit for a bit.

Next cut up your veggies. Dice the tomato and onion and cut or tear the lettuce into strips.



Put a sauté pan on the stove over medium high heat. Add a couple of tablespoons of oil and let the pan get hot. Then add the meat. Stir it so that the individual cubes separate. You want a bit of heat so that the cornstarch helps the meat to get nice and crispy. This will take 5-7 minutes to cook. When done, remove the pan from the stove and you’re ready to build your tacos.


Heat the tortillas or flatbread in the microwave for about 20-30 seconds on high to get them warm and pliable. The lay down some meat, lettuce, tomato, and onion. On top of this, add some salsa verde or chili verde. Now if you want a bit more heat, go ahead and add some hot sauce or more cayenne or whatever floats your boat. These were good with a hint of heat and a hint of acid from the lime. You can even add shredded cheese if you want.

This was just something I made up and threw together. It was actually really, really tasty. And really, really cheap. This made a half dozen tacos—enough for a dinner for 2 (actually for dinner last night and a good mini-meal when I got home from work Monday night.



The Cheap Bastid Test: Well, the chop was a half pound and I bought it for about $2.50 a pound, so it cost $1.25. The can of salsa verde was $.89, the tomato cost about $.35 and the onion was about $.20. And let’s just say that the tortillas cost about $.75. So what was the total? If my arithmetic is correct, it was $3.49. Not bad. These would have cost about 2 bucks each at our favorite taco joint or $8. And I definitely liked the way the lime and seasonings and salsa verde played with each other and the meat to create a terrific taste.

That’s the Cheap Bastid Way: Eat Good, Eat Cheap. Be Grateful!

Cheap Bastid's What to Feed A Hungry Kid

Megan’s no kid though. She’s 21, as tall as I am at 5’8” and ain’t no anorexic stick girl. She works and works out and could probably whup my fanny. She also likes to eat. Fortunately she likes Cheap Bastid’s cooking. It’s hearty and there’s plenty of it.

Anyway, I was off this last weekend and that means it’s time to cook. There was a prediction of bad weather, which finally rolled in on Sunday but I made plans to cook up a batch of lasagna Saturday. Now lasagna’s not hard to make. It takes just a little bit of prep and assembly. It’s also not the cheapest dish around, but it makes a lot of food and when all is said and done it’s really reasonable at about 75¢ per serving.

So I made it a point to pick up the necessary cheeses at the grocery store Saturday morning and double checked to be sure that I had the other ingredients. OK, I didn’t photograph the entire process. In fact, I thought to take pictures only after dinner. We got hungry. Meggie really tore into it. Here’s what was left of a 9 x 13 pan after the 3 of us got done:

Everybody’s got a recipe for lasagna I would imagine. For years I just did the recipe on the back of the box. Now I pretty much do it out of my head. I don’t try to get fancy. And this isn’t a recipe that my Great Grandma used to cook in Sicily or Naples or anything like that. It’s just good old basic Lasagna with 3 cheeses and uses canned sauce.

Yes, canned sauce. Have I ever explained why I use canned sauce rather than making it from scratch? It’s simple. Making it from scratch is delicious. It takes the better part of a whole day, or longer, to simmer properly and get the full, rich flavor. But I quit making it from scratch (which I used to do all the time) about 25 years ago when I discovered one thing.

What was the one thing? My kids couldn’t have cared less that it was homemade sauce. Dinners with little kids needed to be cooked quickly and served just as quickly before the little ragamuffins starved to death right before my eyes. So I went to prepared sauce.

Then it took me about another 17 years to figure out that the canned stuff was not only 1/3 the price of the jarred stuff but that I liked the way it tastes a lot better—more like real tomato sauce with just a bit of acid still in it rather than the over-sweetened stuff in a jar. There are only so many glass jars that I can stuff in my cupboards for future use anyway. Besides, the canned stuff I buy was on special for 75¢ for a 26.5 oz. can this week anyway. I bought 6 cans.

So if that’s too plebian for your taste that’s all right with me. Because I’m the Cheap Bastid. If you want to foo-foo your lasagna with all sorts of stuff, that’s OK too. Have at it. Use more expensive and better quality cheeses. Do a gourmet sauce. All that’s fine. Mine tastes good and sticks to your ribs. Plus it’s cheap.

Cheap Bastid’s Lasagna
Ingredients
• 1 lb ground meat (I used ¾ ground beef and ¼ ground pork) or Italian sausage
• 1 package lasagna noodles
• 1 can/jar prepared pasta sauce
• 1 8 oz. can tomato sauce
• 8 oz shredded mozzarella
• 4 oz grated parmesan cheese
• 1 16 oz container cottage cheese (4% fat preferred)
• 1 egg
• Spices: I use crushed red chili, cumin, dried parsley, dried basil, garlic, thyme, fennel seeds and oregano


Directions:
Get out a 9 x 13 pan and grease it. Take out a large mixing bowl. Take out a medium sauté pan and your pasta pot.

Fill your pasta pot with about a half gallon of water (more or less—you know your pot). Put it on the stove turned to medium high and put the sauté pan on the stove turned to medium. Put the ground meat into the sauté pan to brown. Season the meat with salt, pepper, crushed red chili, fennel seed, garlic and cumin. (I know cumin is more of a Mexican seasoning but I like it!) How much spices? Enough! Do it to taste. Remember though, go a bit light. You can always add more but once it’s in you can’t take it out.

Keep stirring the meat up to brown it evenly. When pasta water comes to a boil, put the lasagna noodles in it. You’re going to par-boil it—really “as dente”. And stir it a couple of times to make sure the noodles don’t stick together. When the meat is done, scoop it into your large mixing bowl—fat drippings and all. Open the sauce and pour it in the bowl. Add the 8 oz can of tomato sauce. Sample and season it to taste. Stir it up really good.

When the pasta is al dente—about 8-10 minutes remove from the stove and drain into a colander. Now take the cottage cheese and put it into a medium bowl. Then add the parmesan, egg and about 2 tablespoons of dried parsley. Mix it all up together really good.

Take out your shredded mozzarella. Reserve a good handful for the final layer on top.

Now you’re going to build your lasagna. If your oven’s not on, then pre-heat it to 375.

Start with about a cup and a half of sauce on the bottom of the dish. Then add your first layer of noodles—running lengthways down the dish. Next put a layer of the cottage cheese mix on top of the noodles (about 1/2 of it) and then put a layer of sauce on top of that followed by another layer of noodles. Next sprinkle a layer of mozzarella (half of it) and some more sauce with a another layer of noodles. Keep building it. There should 2 layers of the cottage cheese mix and 2 layers of the mozzarella with each layer having sauce. The final layer is the last of the sauce with the reserved mozzarella and a final shake of parmesan cheese. One thing I like to do also is to put a couple of the noodle layers cross ways—fold the noodle or snip it off to length.

Cover the dish in foil and put it into the oven for a total of about 45 minutes. At 30 minutes remove the foil to let the top brown a bit.

Make yourself up a really great salad and some garlic bread or garlic toast. This isn’t “true” Italian cooking but it’s a good American version of an Italian classic that will feed a whole family, stick to your ribs and have you wanting seconds—or even thirds. It’ll easily feed six.

So, Meggie got fed. She came home from work starving, smelled the lasagna baking and her eyes lit up. I think it hit just the right spot because she managed to down 3 big hunks of it. I love it when people gobble up something I’ve cooked. Makes me feel good all over.

The Cheap Bastid Test: As I just said this dish will feed 6. It costs about $8 to make in my “Cheap Bastid” version. If you want you can get the price up there all the way to $20 or more if you go pricey on cheeses and sauce and meat. And $8 for a dinner that easily feeds 4 adults with left-overs is price effective in this ever more expensive world of ours.

So, there it is Cheap Bastid’s Lasagna. Other people will have their own versions and some will have versions that are far better. But that’s OK because I’m the Cheap Bastid. I’m looking for the best bang for the buck. And this will do it.

That’s the Cheap Bastid Way: Eat Good. Eat Cheap. Be Grateful!

Cheap Bastid's Brat Burgers

We’ve just about quit eating bacon at our place. Have you noticed how damned expensive it’s gotten this year? Our favorite brand (best quality and best price) at the grocery store has gone from $1.99 a pound about 6 months ago to $3.49.



Maybe I ought to check out pork futures on the Chicago Exchange or something but that increase is just ridiculous. I’ll just about guarantee that farmer’s aren't getting 75% more for their pork or that the cost of producing bacon at processing facilities hasn’t gone up 75%. Does the price increase have something to do with “foodies” watching every second of “Top Chef” and emulating everything those contestants do? It seems like on the cooking shows that everything is now accompanied by bacon. Or that bacon fat is considered the best flavor in the Western World and used in everything up to and including liquid nitrogen frozen ice cream.



The last bacon we bought was $1.69 a pound. I bought a pound and a half tray of “ends and pieces”. There was about a pound of good slices and about a half pound of trimmings including some almost pure fat and some almost pure ham. But that half pound translated into an incredible Spaghetti Carbonara. These guys are sure making it hard for a Cheap Bastid like me to stay cheap.

So, recently I came across a quickie recipe from one of the websites that send me stuff on food. It’s something I haven’t done in 25 or more years and we liked it so much that we did it again over the weekend this time taking a few requisite pictures for my occasional Cheap Bastid “Show and Tells”.

I’ve loved bratwurst for decades in all its forms and variations. And while this is almost the epitome of the kind of “proletarian” food I’m most fond of, bratwurst takes more than a bit of technique to cook so that it’s tasty and not some tube of charred plumbing pipe slathered with mustard on a bun. To me the “trick” has always been to parboil the brat first and then just to brown them on the grill—keeping the flavor and juiciness of the sausage.

Back in the time when I lived in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin and other parts of the upper Midwest, I’d come across brat patties occasionally—essentially bratwurst without the casing—and from time to time I’d buy some and cook it on the grill. Not too bad, but the “pre-made” patty often got over cooked and dried out just like it’s cased-cousin.

So I recently stumbled on an incredible solution. Make your own patties! Those looser, less precisely shaped patties that you make by rolling the meat into a ball and then pressing it into a patty with your hands. It’s looser and, like ground beef, makes for a better, tastier patty.

Here’s the “recipe”.

Cheap Bastid’s Brat Burgers
1 lb bratwurst or ground pork
1 can sauerkraut
Your favorite burger buns

Directions:
If using brats, slit the casings, remove the meat and throw out the casing. If using ground pork dump it in a bowl and then add salt, pepper and garlic powder to taste (or look up bratwurst seasoning online—spice recipes I found used salt, white pepper, mace, marjoram, caraway seed and onion powder). Form patties (I like a 5 to 6 oz. patty).


Dump the sauerkraut into a pan you use on the grill (or you can heat it on the stove or in the microwave). When grill is hot, put the patties on it & flip after about 3 minutes. Put the pan of kraut on at the same time. Two flips (a total of 6-8 minutes) should be enough.

You’re looking for a nice crust on the outside with a middle that’s hot and juicy.

Put the patty on the bun, squirt with mustard, slather a good thick layer of kraut on top and add some onion. Now, enjoy! We like to accompany this with a can of cheap beans doctored up with spices and some heat.


It’s that simple. And this is surprisingly good. Really flavorful. The crust creates a great texture to go with the juicy meatiness inside. The kraut mixes in with the meat a lot better than when the meat is still in a casing. It’s an instant Octoberfest in your mouth! I’m salivating just thinking and writing about it.


The Cheap Bastid Test: Well, the best brat prices I can typically find at the grocer are $2.50 a lb. on sale. Ground pork is $2.99 a lb. I’ve done them both ways. For us, a total of 3 brats made into 2 patties is about right as is about 2/3 lb. of ground pork. So, we spent about $2 for meat and a whopping $.89 for sauerkraut and about $.25 for the buns and a buck for the beans. So, all total, the price was $4.14. That’s not bad.

That’s the Cheap Bastid Way: Eat Good. Eat Cheap. Be Grateful.

Cheap Bastid's Corn Disaster

Sometimes you can be just too damn cheap. Like when sweet corn was on special last week at Fraiser Farms at 6 for $1. That’s the cheapest it’s been all year. So I bought some.

Well, last week was a busy week at work. I wasn’t home for dinner until Friday evening. My beautiful bride, Mrs. CB informed me that we needed to use up the corn which had been sitting in the fridge for a week. So OK, it’s going to be a sweet corn weekend. Great. We both love sweet corn.

So we proceeded to eat up all the sweet corn. Every day for 3 days. But hey, we both love sweet corn. We boiled it and we broiled it. I even offered to make corn fritters but Mrs. CB prefers it still on the cob. And even though it was starting to get just a bit old, it was sure good; still sweet, still juicy. I like mine roasted with some charring on the kernels, Mrs. CB wants me to just show hers to the grill to warm it a bit.

It was perfect last night with some sirloin and Friday night with homemade meatballs in tomato sauce. But, as we all know, corn likes to extract its revenge. I remember the many times I help Papaw slop the hogs when I was a kid vacationing at their farm in Kentucky. Toting the slops down to the troughs and then shoveling some field corn to the hogs. They love both. They’d loudly crunch the corn off the cobs and then leave the cobs behind.

Did I mention revenge? Well, this may start to get a bit indelicate but…for some reason we will announce news of our bowel movements to one another. Such terms from my “delicate flower” as “poopie”. Ah hell, we all know what a number 2 is, right? Well, if you do 2 of them the second one is a #4 (2 x 2 = 4) and if you do 3 then you just did a #6. And, I just did a great big TMI didn’t I?

The morning after snarfing down sweet corn you just gotta love the heady aroma of “Neutra-Air” spray wafting out of the bathroom.
Sweet corn season will be over pretty soon. And it’ll be 6 months before there’s anymore. We have to enjoy it while we can—and while it’s at a Cheap Bastid price.

When it’s all gone, here’s the only “sweet corn” we’ll have for a while: