{"id":32494,"date":"2017-05-06T01:00:32","date_gmt":"2017-05-06T05:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=32494"},"modified":"2017-04-26T08:53:35","modified_gmt":"2017-04-26T12:53:35","slug":"qotd-cooking-for-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2017\/05\/06\/qotd-cooking-for-one\/","title":{"rendered":"QotD: Cooking for one"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote><p>You thought about cooking. You had frozen fish filets in the freezer and a rather nice-looking head of broccoli sitting right there in the produce drawer. But then, somehow, it was 8:10, and it all seemed like too much trouble, so instead you grabbed a bowl of Tostitos, a jar of salsa, and three slices of pepper jack, and you ate it in front of &#8220;Chopped.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Or at least, that&#8217;s the explanation that an NPD analyst gave <em>Marketwatch<\/em> for <a href=\"http:\/\/www.marketwatch.com\/story\/blame-these-people-for-americas-snacking-frenzy-2015-08-12\" target=\"_blank\">America&#8217;s snacking habits<\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<p><em>\u201cIt\u2019s hard to shop and cook for one.\u201d That\u2019s one reason why people are buying more snack foods, she says. \u201cThey are individually packaged and often have a very long shelf life. That, and an awful lot of people do not have cooking skills.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Those whitefish filets were probably going to be overcooked anyway. Tostitos, on the other hand, are always done to a turn.<\/p>\n<p>I have some sympathy. When the Official Blog Spouse travels, sometimes I make things he doesn&#8217;t like, such as tofu stir-fry. And sometimes, I surrender to the siren call of Trader Joe&#8217;s Mac and Cheese Balls, which require no effort and are every bit as good to eat as they are bad for my waistline. <\/p>\n<p>There are any number of articles and books that promise to tell you how to solve this problem. The best are merely adequate; the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Microwave-Cooking-One-Marie-Smith\/dp\/1565546660\" target=\"_blank\">worst<\/a> emit the quiet despair of an unmarked grave. I&#8217;ll concede that cooking for small numbers simply isn&#8217;t as much fun as cooking for a bigger group. Part of the joy of cooking is sharing the results. The labor-to-output ratio is lower for one or two, and you have to spend a lot of time fiddling with small amounts. Some things simply can&#8217;t be done efficiently for one or two people, which is why I save the rib roast for dinner parties. Other things <em>shouldn&#8217;t<\/em> be done for one or two people, which is why I am trying not to give in to the urge to make a layer cake this weekend. <\/p>\n<p>Megan McArdle, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloombergview.com\/articles\/2015-08-21\/friday-food-post-10-tips-on-cooking-for-one\" target=\"_blank\">&#8220;Friday Food Post: 10 Tips on Cooking for One&#8221;, <em>Bloomberg View<\/em><\/a>, 2015-08-21.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You thought about cooking. You had frozen fish filets in the freezer and a rather nice-looking head of broccoli sitting right there in the produce drawer. But then, somehow, it was 8:10, and it all seemed like too much trouble, so instead you grabbed a bowl of Tostitos, a jar of salsa, and three slices [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[74,41,73,13],"tags":[150],"class_list":["post-32494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food","category-quotations","category-randomness","category-usa","tag-obesity"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/favicon.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-8s6","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32495,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32494\/revisions\/32495"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}