I like the food column in the Listener each week. A nice mix of chatty information as well as a recipe or two.
A few weeks back the regular writer, Lois Daish, wrote about how for many families dinner (or tea) revolves around a simple repertoire of seven favourite meals. In the article she cites a couple of people’s lists of what these are and makes the comment,
The principal ingredients chosen by both women are amazingly similar. Their favourite meats are minced beef, chicken and lamb, and both regularly cook pasta and rice dishes that don’t include much meat. However, the way they approach these ingredients is rather different. Sarah seasons her food very simply but takes a particular interest in its texture, defining her food according to whether it is crunchy or moist or tender. Hester, on the other hand, enjoys more intense flavours, such as mustard, tomatoes and chilli, and most of her food is moist rather than crisp. For her, the story behind the recipe is important.
See Food: What’s for dinner? by Lois Daish | New Zealand Listener (September 9-15 2006 Vol 205 No 3461).
So, seeing as I cook most of the evening meals, I thought I’d try to put my list of seven meals that we tend to have regularly. (Not that I’m trying to start a new meme or anything, but I’d be interest in knowing what other people’s most frequent seven are and how many they cook for.)
Garner Repertoire of Seven Frequent (and Favourite) Meals (cooked for 2 adults and 4 children)
- Tex-Mex (Enchiladas, Burritos or Tacos depending on which child voices an opinion) plus salad.
- Breakfast sausages, onions, vegetables, and mashed potato.
- Butter chicken, green beans or peas, and rice.
- Boiled corned beef/silverside (not the tinned stuff) cooked with peppercorns, bayleaves and golden syrup in the water, potatoes and carrots cooked with the meat, and cabbage. Leftovers for sandwiches or another dinner.
- Casserole of some sort – Typically beef stew (with potatoes and vegetables in stew) or oven-cooked beef stroganoff with rice and vegetables.
- Cold meat (ham, salami, chicken, leftover corn beef), bread, olives, cheese and salad.
- Pasta meal – typically lasagne.
Now I like well-seasoned food, and particularly Mediterranean, Indian and Tex-Mex cuisine. But some of my family don’t, so we compromise and the food tends to be only mildly spicy (if at all), and I add sauces/pepper etc. to mine later at the table.
