I know a lot of people out there think that garlic powder is only for the poor proles who don't have fresh garlic on hand, and I'm here to tell you that they're incorrect. Well, mostly. Garlic is a delightful herb, or perhaps even a delightful necessity. You'll hear people talk about the amount of garlic they add to things in terms of heads, rather than cloves, and yes, there are plenty of dishes where the more garlic, the merrier. You might not want to kiss your date after you eat them, but garlic is the basis of their flavor and if you don't use enough, you aren't getting the full effect. That said, fresh garlic is sometimes hard to keep on hand. So you can shift to canned garlic, or jars of garlic paste, and sure, they're a fine substitute in some ways. But they still require you to have the means to store them and in many cases the time and space to use them. Garlic powder keeps forever, it doesn't require refrigeration, and it seems like it's t...

So maybe you've got a favorite spice rub that they don't sell anymore. Or maybe you thought you had another bottle of that seasoning blend when you planned for this recipe but you can't find it anywhere. Whatever the reason, we've all wanted to make some more of a blended spice that we didn't make ourselves. First off, the best thing to do is to supplement before you start using. Don't season half your meat with the blend and then the other half with something totally made up. You're never going to match it precisely, so it's better to mix up more and then mix what you've got left of the original in. If you've got most of what you need, or if you're adding it to a dish throughout the cooking process (remember, spice early, spice often ), you can usually just stretch it with a bit of the major flavor. For an unfortunate number of spice blends you're likely to find in your local supermarket, you can just add some salt, pepper, or sugar, or ...

  Don't judge my bowls. They were cheap and they hold a lot of stew. This recipe is a bunch of cans and bags, comes together in a snap, and tastes like you simmered it for hours. Plus, depending on the ingredients you use, it's vegetarian, but hearty enough to satisfy even meat lovers. Plenty of veggies involved too, and I can't stress enough the fact that we all need to eat more vegetables. Tuscan? Well, the Tuscans eat lots of beans, and this is a hearty bean stew which uses plenty of rosemary, so I'm calling it Tuscan. If you changed the flavors a little, you could call it whatever you want, and we'll discuss those flavor alterations a little later. You Will Need: Beans Cream soup Onions Peppers Tomatoes Garlic and Spices Salt and maybe Sugar Oil Beans Traditionally things called "Tuscan beans" usually are meant to be cannellini beans in the US. They're fine here, but I actually prefer Great Northern or other small white beans because the skins are ...

Let's get this out of the way right now: white people, it's me, your brother in lack of melanin. Please stop telling people with more interesting culinary heritages that bay leaves are pointless. If you think bay leaves are pointless and have no taste, at least one of two things is true: 1) your bay leaves are older than dirt and thus taste like dirt; 2) you've never experienced the bay leaf flavor up close and personal so you think it doesn't add anything. As I am about to do, try chewing on one and see if you get no flavor from it. I bet it'll surprise you. Rant over. Please stick around to find out more about bay leaves. Bay leaves are widely used in dishes from all over the world, but most people don't do more than add one when the recipe calls for it, and if that's you, you're missing out. You can sometimes find fresh ones in international markets (or maybe even your local grocery store if you're lucky) which pack a major punch. India in particu...

I'm shamelessly stealing elements of this recipe from America's Test Kitchen, who did a version of tamale pie a while back that looked delicious but was, let's face it, too small. But they took garden-variety tamale pie, which is a bunch of cans dumped into a casserole and baked, and elevated it. I'm going to take it back down a few notches because let's face it, tamale pie doesn't need to be elevated that much. It's hearty and delicious, but there's no reason we have to content ourselves with garden-variety. You Will Need: Beef? Beans Tomatoes Onions Cilantro? Spices Oil Cheese Cornbread Beef? You can make this vegetarian and it won't lose much. Much. But it's better with beef. You could also make it with ground chicken or turkey, but you may need more oil to bloom the spices and keep things from drying out. I used pre-portioned frozen hamburger, 80-20, because I had that available. Frozen absolutely works, and don't let anyone tell you diff...

You may notice that the plate isn't clean; I couldn't wait to eat these, so this is the second batch.   Falafel is delicious, relatively easy to make, and a good way to get people to eat beans. These patties are adjacent to falafel in that they're delicious, relatively easy to make, and a good way to get people to eat beans, but they differ in some aspects, including the need to deep-fry and the need to soak beans overnight. They also include some other ingredients besides chickpeas, so they're a complete meal instead of a thing you need to make sandwiches out of, though you absolutely can make sandwiches out of them. The main reason I created this recipe is because soaking beans is a pain, and falafel really should only be made with soaked dry chickpeas. If you feel like preparing something in advance, by all means get yourself some dry chickpeas and make falafel. Come back here when you've got to prepare a meal in a relative hurry. You Will Need: Beans Rice Spinac...

It's been a bit on the nippy side recently, and the depths of winter are upon us, so what better time to make split pea soup. I like mine with ham, but with a few alterations we'll discuss it's very easy to make this a vegetarian dish. Dried split peas, like lentils, are cheap and easy to find, plus they cook without any additional preparation and they're filling. You Will Need: Split Peas Ham? Onions Other Vegetables? Spices Oil Salt/Stock/Bouillon Cubes Water Split Peas If you happen to have them, you can make this soup with toor dal instead (toor dal is just split pigeon rather than green peas) but the traditional way is with split green peas. Buy them dry in the supermarket, and there's no reason to pay more for a brand here; the generic will do just fine. One pound makes four healthy servings, particularly if you have a nice crusty bread to go with your soup, but this soup freezes well and making more is just as easy. Ham? The best way to make this soup is with...