Recipes for Dorm Life

Pre-Cooked Lasagna

1 package lasagna noodles
(I don't believe the "pre-cooked" label on these noodles, unless you are cooking at 250 F, and are using tomato juice instead of sauce, the things are going to taste funny, and will have the consistency of the world's funkiest snack food. If you are a college student, are stuck cooking with a toaster oven , or are a bachelor or bachelorette living with your buddies, I guess you have an excuse. Yes, I am one of those strange people that cooks the pre-cooked lasagna for seven minutes in water while it is bringing itself up to a boil, and then for three more minutes while it is boiling.)

Dr. Stupid's Lasagna with a Straw
1 Package Pre-Cooked Lasagna
1 pint tomato juice
1 8 ounce or 10 ounce can diced tomatoes
1 4 ounce package pre-shredded mozzarella cheese
1 half-pint of vodka
For sandwiches
8 slices white American cheese
1/4 pound turkey
1/4 pound ham
1 large beefsteak tomato
1 4 ounce or 8 ounce package of salad greens
oil and vinegar if you purchased the 8 ounce package of salad greens for the small salad
mayonnaise and mustard to taste
loaf of Italian bread
6 pack of beer (to drink while waiting for lasagna)

Assemble ingredients on table, make sure you have everything you need.
Line the pan (It could be something square, like an 8" x 8" x 5", or something rectangular, like a meatloaf tray - just something that looks like it will serve two or three starving college students)with olive oil, place first layer of "pre-cooked" lasagna noodles in pan. Gently pour tomato juice on top of first lasagna noodle. Then add some diced tomatoes and some pre-shredded mozzarella, with a spoon or with clean hands. Make the layer about 1/2 inch thick of tomatoes and mozzarella, then add the next noodle, and add some more tomato juice, enough so that the mixture is completely covered with tomato juice, then add more diced tomatoes and more mozzarella. Keep on repeating until the mixture is 1/2 inch to 1 inch from the top, being certain to add the tomato juice last.
Then, place the dish in the oven carefully, being careful to keep all of the juice in the lasagna tray or meatloaf pan. Turn the heat on to 250 F. (If you are also cooking the brownies, they will cook for 1/2 hour, just like the lasagna.)

Save the vodka for the lasagna, you will need it, drink the beer while the lasagna is cooking. Hide the vodka if you need to in the kitchen cabinet by the oven, or inside the flour canister. The lasagna will taste much better with the vodka in the lasagna. You do not want to cook the lasagna with the vodka inside of the lasagna, unless you have bought the cheap stuff. If you are scraping the bottom of the barrel, by all means, dump the vodka onto the lasagna, and try to avoid cursing yourself out for purchasing stuff that Siberians shower with. Taste tests show that nobody knows the difference, and using vodka in your cooking helps to sterilize the ingredients, remove the alcohol, and inoculate yourself prior to accidentally imbibing the stuff. (You're in a college dorm, it happens.)

Now, you can make a couple of sandwiches and drink some beer while you are waiting for the lasagna. Cut the Italian bread into four pieces vertically. Now, open up the six pack of beer, and offer one to everyone in the room. You will not be disturbed while you are cutting each of the four slices horizontally. Be sure to place each slice on a cutting board or on a dinner plate prior to slicing horizontally. A tip is to place the bread white side face down on the cutting surface, which also leaves a white side facing up. Now, you are able to slice it just like regular bread. If you do this operation for four plates, you already have four plates ready for dinner. Take the salad mix, place it in a bowl, add a couple of large spoons, or salad tongs, then invite your guests in to prepare their own sandwiches.

Everyone should be finished with their meal around the time the lasagna is finished cooking. Get a dishtowel on your hands if you do not have an oven mitt or a potholder. These pans are hot when they are in the oven. Take the lasagna out of the oven, and allow to cool for a few minutes. Then, take a large soup scoop or a small teacup and strain out the extra tomato juice into a large bowl. Add the vodka to the lasagna and to the tomato juice. You are in business, as long as the sink is not overflowing with dishes, or your dinner buddies are not dancing on the countertops or the table.

You may want to clean the table, or wipe off the lasagna tray, or add water to the kitchen utensils that you want to avoid placing in the circular file bin.

Chaos may ensue after this lasagna is served.

If you are using a toaster oven, this will suffice for a meal. Just be certain to use a meatloaf pan to cook it in. No, this will not cook in a George Foreman sandwich grille, that's a really stupid answer for a question that nobody ever asked me.

Ren's Crispy Chinese Food

1 can crispy chinese noodles (or 3 bags crispy noodles from local Chinese restaurant meals)
1 can water chestnuts, opened and drained of liquid
1 can bamboo shoots, opened and drained of liquid
1 can mushrooms, opened and drained of liquid
1 can baby shrimp, opened and drained of liquid
(If you find the liquid to be tasty enough to be drinkable, the vegetable-flavored water might be a source of vitamins)
optional, leftover chinese rice, leftover soy sauce packets from Chinese restaurant meals

Place crispy noodles on plate(s), spoon the chinese vegetables on top of the crispy noodles, microwave each serving for 1:25 seconds, or 2 pizza slices.

Serve

Tip: always remove the metal handle from the chinese rice container prior to microwaving.

Breadcrust Pudding

Save your bread crusts for this recipe! (up to sixteen crusts of bread)
No need to purchase bread.

Save your sugar packets for this recipe! (add sugar packets slowly)
No need to purchase sugar.

milk (up to one pint)
eggs
soy powder (add slowly, by the spoonful)
optional butter, margarine, lard, or oil
optional raisins
optional cinnamon
optional pure vanilla extract
optional pure almond extract
optional artificial rum extract

Cook on the stove top, at low heat. If you think you added too much milk, add another egg, and cook at low heat for five more minutes.

Your probable cooking time will be twenty minutes on the stove top. Then, grease a cake pan, and place the mixture into the cake pan, do not overfill the cake pan, nor worry about the mixture rising. Cook the mixture at 250 Fahrenheit for 1 hour, and it will be of a cake-like consistency.

In the meantime, you can play with whatever is left in the pot. You might have about 1/4 cup of mixture left. If you place it in a coffee cup, and add a shot of coffee, a shot of whiskey, and whatever else you think would be tasty, there's dessert already!

Print out this guide, and make up your own recipes. Sebd them back home, your family will love you for it.

Couscous

1 cup tomatoes, washed, cored, and chopped
1 cup couscous (from a package, read the instructions, please)
The amount of water you are instructed to add on the package.
Green spices, up to 1 tablespoon of what you have in stock
These may include:
peppermint
spearmint
rosemary
dill
oregano
basil
thyme
crumbled bay leaf
(mince 1/4 cup green pepper if nothing else is around or add 1/4 cup of green peas or 1/4 cup minced broccoli or 1/4 cup chopped spinach)

If the package instructions are in a foreign language, or if there are no instructions, here is a set of instructions:

Make sure the countertop is clean.
Clean off the kitchen table, the placemats, the place settings.
Inspect the cooking pot (for stovetop cooking) or dish (for microwave) quickly for cleanliness. If clean, use - if not clean, wash until clean.

Place all of these ingredients into the cooking pot or dish. Then add one cup of water, herbal tea, or generic beer to the dry couscous, and bring to a boil, then turn off the heat and allow to sit for one half hour, or cook for two and one half minutes in the microwave and allow to sit for five minutes. Then, add another cup of liquid water, herbal tea, or generic beer, and for a conventional stove, add one tablespoon of oil or lard or butter or margarine and bring to a boil, then turn heat down to medium heat for five minutes while stirring, then turn off stove top and allow to sit, while serving a round of drinks and appetizers to guests. If for a microwave, just repeat the first set of instructions for the microwave.

Couscous goes well with hummus (soft chick peas mashed in a blender).

Granola

250 Fahrenheit (large, deep-dish cookie sheet)

So, you have a large canister of oatmeal in your possession, and you do not know what to do with it. You do not have a lot of money, so you are not going to turn it into tiny sachets, or hacky-sack type little toys. You need to figure out some way of making it edible, as you are not prepared to keep this thing around your kitchen until January, which is when hot oatmeal season really gets underway.

1 cup oatmeal per deep-dish cookie sheet (a safe rule of thumb)

Granola, ta-da! Granola is the sort of thing that you can heat up an oven to 250 degrees Farhenheit, place in the oven, and just turn off the oven, and leave there for a few hours, and it will cook enough to be a little bit tasty. This also helps for those times when you might be adding the raisins into the mix by accident. These raisins will blacken and bloat up like ticks. So, if you are missing out on the flavor of Chinese-style dessert insects, these raisins taste great. Aside from this, be sure to add the raisins after cooking the granola.

Once around the pantry list (pick a few)

raisins
brown sugar
mushy banana
leftover apple
jam packets
crushed leftover candies
dried fruit
almost empty jar of jam or jelly (add one teaspoon or so of boiling water, close lid back on jar, gently shake jar to "melt" jam or jelly)
last spoonful of pudding or tapioca
flax seeds
sesame seeds
sunflower seeds
pumpkin seeds
last spoon of peanut butter
poppy seeds

Here's the fun part - you can add all this stuff to the granola after you clean your hands, and knead it into the oatmeal, and play with it like it is clay or something, destroy your amateur art, then cook it, or you can cook it like it is mixed.

Write down your recipe and keep it for next time.

Soaking the Chick Peas

Preparing dried chick peas - a cheap source of protein

Fill bowl 1/3 full with chick peas. Place bowl on counter, write sign, saying, "Do not disturb". Fill bowl with water, cover bowl with plate overnight. The next day, rinse bowl containing chick peas out a few times, using a slow but steady stream of water, while chick peas are still in bowl. Take out a few handfuls of chick peas, and place them on a plate, or in another bowl, or in a blender to make hummus. Place the rest in the refrigerator, in the bowl, and add water to the bowl to the top of the bowl, or 1/4" from the top. Then, close the refrigerator door, and make certain that the door is shut, while avoiding closing the door on pan handles, or that bottle that is awkwardly placed in the refrigerator.

The chick peas on the plate may safely be eaten just as they are, as long as the tap water is of relatively good quality. If you would be afraid to drink 1/2 cup of tap water from your tap, then be certain to marinade (ie. cooking wine, vinegar, lemon juice) the chick peas on the plate, then cook them for at least five minutes prior to eating. You could also place a small pile (about a teaspoon) of paprika on the plate, and roll the chickpeas around in the paprika, just to see how it tastes. Or, you could place a bunch of chick peas on a toothpick. They make great snacks with beer, and cancel out the aftertaste of even the generic kinds of beer.

Maybe you are reading all about the health benefits of soy beans. Dried chick peas are available in most supermarkets, they cost less than soy beans, and are easy to prepare.

Brownies from a mix

1 package snack brownies
1 cup walnuts
1 cup raisins
1/4 cup minced chocolate ( hand-crumbled )
2 eggs
1 tablespoon olive oil ( a few dashes )
1 tablespoon water ( cover the bottom of a teacup with one drop )
1/4 teaspoon pure almond extract
Optional - 1/2 cup nutella hazelnut paste, or 2 scoops protein powder plus one mashed banana

Pre-heat oven to 325 F. Also check lasagna recipes. This cooks really well with a lasagna in the oven, too. Cooking two lasagnas ensures that nobody in the house seriously breaks their diet.

Grease the pan, mix together all of the ingredients. Gently place them all in the bowl, and mix them together, just as gently with a spoon.

Cook for 20 minutes. If still liquidy in the center, place back in the oven for five minutes. Check again, repeat as often as needed, by gently tilting pan to see if center is solid or liquid. Take a butter knife to cut the end of the pan, we know you have a hard enough time waiting for the brownies to cook as it is. Do not cut the center of the pan for at least thirty minutes, preferably one hour - allow to set, the brownies will taste better, too.