primitives discuss boxed foods

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=236x67893

Oh my.

madmax  (1000+ posts)      Sun Aug-16-09 10:16 PM
Original message
 
I know most of you if not all are serious f*****s.

Just wondering if there are any box, frozen or store bought foods that are decent. I'm looking for deserts and side dishes. Just to make it easy. My Granddaughter is coming for a week. The entrees will be homemade but, will cheat with the rest, if I can.

I've never tried this but, I bought a box of Duncan Hines Deluxe Carrot Cake... well it's deluxe! I'll give it a test shot before she comes. Oh well, Poppi can take it to work for his buddies 

Today I made meatballs and gravy that I'm freezing and will use for lasagna when she's here. Ashley isn't a f****e but, she won't eat pork or beans. Her one request was chili - NO beans! Otay baby! She loves potato pancakes and pierogies but, I'm not into grating or making dough. Have a great recipe from the Frugal Gourmet but, not going to make it this time.

To make it easy for me, Grandpoppi wants to just order in or go out to eat but, I want to cook for her! And have snacks to nibble while we catch up.

Or maybe you guys have some easy homemade sides and deserts. Any ideas welcomed.

First up to bat, the sparkling husband primitive who really should be watching his wife playing with her chemistry set, instead of hanging around Skins' island:

Stinky The Clown  (1000+ posts)        Sun Aug-16-09 10:46 PM
Response to Original message
 
1. I'm not sufficiently familiar with brands, but I can say that there are plenty of good ........

...... convenience foods at the soopermaket. I dare say most people who post here are not averse, out of hand, to such products.

We have found very nice convenience foods with both Costco's and Safeway's house brands - Kirkland and Safeway Select/Primo Taglio.

There are also plenty of very nice items not of those brands.

Have at it! And let us know what you find.

The defrocked warped primitive:

Warpy  (1000+ posts)        Sun Aug-16-09 11:27 PM
Response to Reply #1
 
2. I second the req for Costco

Skip the frozen foods section and look for the in-store prepared foods and some of the refrigerated prepared foods. I haven't gotten a single stinker when I've gone that route on "it's too damn hot to cook" days.

If you do go the frozen foods route, just be careful how much salt is in the stuff, it can be a huge amount.

Grandma, who's getting ready for a primitive get-together in the wild woods of Arkansas in a few weeks:

hippywife  (1000+ posts)        Mon Aug-17-09 06:23 AM
Response to Reply #10
 
12. Oh, yaaaa!

I spent so much time with my gran in the kitchen as I was growing up. They are my fondest memories.

Glad you found a carrot cake recipe. I shred the carrots for carrot cake in my food processor, but before I had one I used to cut them in small pieces and shred in my blender a little at a time.

Cooking doesn't have to be hard at all and it could be a great influence on her in this world of convenience, if you are able to manage it. Maybe a little advance prep before she arrives will make a better convenience. I don't mind using something prepackaged once in a great while, depending on what it is and the ingredient label but the two of you could have real fun together.

Enjoy your time with her and at the beach.

Edited to add: I don't consider myself a serious f****e. The things I make aren't too difficult, just wholesome and tasty. Once I got a real rhythm for it, it was easy to start building on and not as much work as yesterday was. I was just faced with a use it or lose it scenario with the tomatoes and peaches so I had to add them to my usual Sunday repertoire.

The wired gassy primitive, spending the summer on a farmette up in Wisconsin:

grasswire  (1000+ posts)      Mon Aug-17-09 12:26 AM
Response to Original message
 
4. Let me make a case for Zatarain's from New Orleans

I think their boxed rice mixes are available in most supermarkets now.

The jamabalaya is so easy, and you can add chunked chicken or some kind of sausages for a whole main dish.

The red beans and rice, black beans and rice, and dirty rice are perfect side dishes. Or they make a great beginning for burritos, with some cheese and other things.

The golden rice and caribbean rice (with pineapple and coconut) are y***y good, too. Both go great with chicken or pork or fish.

They have a lot of other stuff too!

Here's their product page: http://shop.zatarains.com /

Lots of recipes are on the web site, too.

The sparkling husband primitive, pretending to know more than he really does:

Stinky The Clown  (1000+ posts)        Mon Aug-17-09 08:30 AM
Response to Reply #4
 
14. OhYeah! Zatarain's!

Good stuff. Read the label to see what's in the box and what you need to add.

buzzycrumbhunger  (611 posts)      Mon Aug-17-09 04:57 PM
Response to Reply #14
 
29. Zatarain's is full of MSG

Lots of prepackaged rice dishes are, which I discovered when I got the wrong brand of yellow rice and spent the next two days belching fire (proved to me that those Prilosec commercials aren't just making up crap to sell PPIs--real reflux is scary!) I have a friend who has heart attack symptoms from MSG, so I figure it's something to avoid even if you don't have a sensitivity to it.

Stinky The Clown  (1000+ posts)        Mon Aug-17-09 05:55 PM
Original message
 
I've never had a problem with it

I don't add it to anything I make. Don't even own any. But I know it is in lots of stuff and never bothered to avoid it, either.

Many, many, years ago I used to use it all the time.

buzzycrumbhunger  (611 posts)      Mon Aug-17-09 07:04 PM
Response to Original message
 
34. It's still a consideration

. . . if you're feeding someone else. The reactions can be so severe as to feel, if not life-threatening, damned close to it. There's a very good reason a majority of Chinese restaurants now make a big deal out of not using it these days.

I don't have a problem with the natural source of MSG, BTW. A sheet of kombu in my bean pot can add a lot of flavor without the side effects. There is obviously something about the artificial version that's just not quite right.

The imperious primitive:

The empressof all   (1000+ posts)        Mon Aug-17-09 12:34 AM
Response to Original message
 
5. Quick and relatively easy potato "cakes" using left over mashed

I mix left over mashed with lots of fried onions and then wrap in several layers of phyllo dough. Brush potato bundles (mine are usually round) with butter and bake at 350 until brown and lovely.

You also can use Egg roll wrappers to make small little potato pierogie wanna be's. I just use left over mashed with fried onion and butter. Bake until brown.

Now, why would one ruin potatoes with onions?

Eek.

Ick.

Bleah.

The Rita Hayworth primitive, dreaming of days of lust and love, and hopping around in the sack, with Cordell Hull:

Tangerine LaBamba  (1000+ posts)       Mon Aug-17-09 02:43 AM
Response to Original message
 
11. Stouffer's - a friend of mine is a food chemist, and that's the only brand of prepared frozen foods he eats.

I don't eat that kind of stuff as a habit, but whenever I've needed them, it's always been Stouffer's for me, and they're really good.

Spinach souffle is a big favorite around here. But there grub is not afflicted with preservatives and fillers. Billy is really fussy about food, plus it's his business, so he gave me some very good advice.

Here are the Stouffer's sides:

http://www.stouffers.com/Products/ProductSearch.aspx?Se...

As for dessert, get a box or two of Ghirardelli's Brownie Mix - OH MY GOD! - they are SO good! I'll never make brownies from scratch again. Check out the Dark Chocolate Turtle mix.

You're gonna have so much fun!

buzzycrumbhunger  (611 posts)      Mon Aug-17-09 05:03 PM
Response to Reply #11
 
30. I have a friend who swears by Stouffer's

She tried to insist that I needed a lifestyle change to go with my divorce--no more cooking from scratch or other martyr-type activities. Unless some nice man was treating her to an excellent restaurant, she eats nothing that doesn't come out of a box with Stouffer's on it. No muss, no fuss, and she thinks they taste fine.

Can't quite wrap myself around the white flour, processed food thing as a lifestyle, but their v****e French bread pizzas were good inspiration for a homemade version. 

[GOBUCKS]

Edited to add: I don't consider myself a serious f****e.

Sickening that the old bitch would drop the babytalk f-bomb.

[Carl]

Is there one thing in their lives that isn`t some sort of transcendental moment that needs to be weighed and measured?

Go to the frickin store and buy stuff like 99% of the population does.
If you don`t like one try a different brand or something else..sheesh make such a fuss over every little thing.

[LC EFA]

I've never bought a "box meal" or kit meal in my life.

How hard is it to read a recipe - make a list and go to the supermarket. Seriously.

Put some damn effort in and you can even make things taste pretty damn good, and the more you practice the better (and more importantly quicker) you get.

Once the basics are learned they can be modified and added onto, to produce quite exotic dishes.

[Freeper]

I've never bought a "box meal" or kit meal in my life.

How hard is it to read a recipe - make a list and go to the supermarket. Seriously.

Put some damn effort in and you can even make things taste pretty damn good, and the more you practice the better (and more importantly quicker) you get.

Once the basics are learned they can be modified and added onto, to produce quite exotic dishes.

Is that because they don't have kangaroo helper? 

[LC EFA]

Is that because they don't have kangaroo helper? 

HAH !

They actually sell kangeroo meat , sausages , and premade burger patties at the local supermarket.

Of course - Kangeroo tastes disgusting.

We are still the only country that routinely eats BOTH the animals on it's coat of arms. 

[Chris_]

Hello folks.  I'm curious as to why the word f-o-o-d-i-e is ****'d out?   Please excuse any n00bness on my behalf.

[Rebel]

Hello folks.  I'm curious as to why the word f-o-o-d-i-e is ****'d out?   Please excuse any n00bness on my behalf.

Foodie?

BTW, you can uncensor words in your profile.

[franksolich]

Hello folks.  I'm curious as to why the word f-o-o-d-i-e is ****'d out?   Please excuse any n00bness on my behalf.

Because it's baby-talk.

[franksolich]

Foodie?

BTW, you can uncensor words in your profile.

GOBUCKS and I do that, to discourage the primitives from using baby-talk.

[franksolich]

Hello folks.  I'm curious as to why the word f-o-o-d-i-e is ****'d out?   Please excuse any n00bness on my behalf.

You see, the deal is, madam, the greatest proportion of the primitives on Skins's island are in their 50s and 60s, which is some decades too old to be using baby-talk.

Baby-talk makes the primitives look bad, and we don't want that.

So it's a kindness to the primitives.

[DumbAss Tanker]

I don't know that it's so much baby-talk as it is just a stupid word, after all it does not mean 'Food' plus some extra syllable, or extra syllable plus a rhyming nonsense word like real baby-talk would have it.  It means more like 'Wannabe gourmet.'  As pretentious as they are, I'm surprised they don't call themselves gourmets, actually; probably has too many Plutocratic implications to jibe with their Communist inclinations, I suspect. 

[Chris_]

Ah, so...got it, thanks.   I've never cared for the word myself.  It seems ridiculous to make up a cutesie word rather than the word one should be using; in this case, "epicure." 

[GOBUCKS]

As pretentious as they are, I'm surprised they don't call themselves gourmets

They can spell f****e. They love all things French, but silent letters get them all discombobulated.

[DixieBelle]

buzzycrumbhunger  (611 posts)      Mon Aug-17-09 05:03 PM
Response to Reply #11
 
30. I have a friend who swears by Stouffer's

She tried to insist that I needed a lifestyle change to go with my divorce--no more cooking from scratch or other martyr-type activities. Unless some nice man was treating her to an excellent restaurant, she eats nothing that doesn't come out of a box with Stouffer's on it. No muss, no fuss, and she thinks they taste fine.

  at the bolded part. WTH???

[debk]

what is "v****e"?

Why is this such a test for this woman?

Ask the kid's mother what she likes to eat, and fix it for her....or gee whiz...ask the kid! If she like corn...fix corn. If she likes carrots...fix carrots.

Kid would probably be thrilled if she went to MickeyD's every day!

[DumbAss Tanker]

what is "v****e"?

Why is this such a test for this woman?

Ask the kid's mother what she likes to eat, and fix it for her....or gee whiz...ask the kid! If she like corn...fix corn. If she likes carrots...fix carrots.

Kid would probably be thrilled if she went to MickeyD's every day!

I'm not sure this is actually a really little kid, kind of hard to tell from the way DUmmies talk.  Of course the DUmmie idea of what would be a great restaurant to hit might be a rude shock for a real small child, going to a coffee-and-crepes artsy dive instead of a Mickey-D's might convince the kid that the grandparents really are dangerously insane.

[GOBUCKS]

You see, the deal is, madam, the greatest proportion of the primitives on Skins's island are in their 50s and 60s, which is some decades too old to be using baby-talk.

Baby-talk makes the primitives look bad, and we don't want that.

So it's a kindness to the primitives.

franksolich is just a very nice guy, one of the nicest anywhere. Coach wants to help the DUmmies avoid
looking so stupid, because he doesn't like for anyone to suffer from looking stupid. He's just a
very civilized and thoroughly nice guy. I am not a nice guy like franksolich, which is just a cross
I have to bear. Unlike coach, I greatly enjoy seeing the DUmmies look stupid - encourage it,
in fact. And I wholeheartedly celebrate any suffering that befalls them, believing it to be
richly deserved.

I use the **** option when copying DUmmy posts with babytalk sweetsy cutesy nonsense words out
of regard for my own sensibilities. I find those words to be obnoxious and sickening. I can't prevent others
from using them, but I try to avoid contributing to the pollution of the language. I try to minimize my
babytalk footprint.