Cooking up a feed during Coronavirus Covid-19 lockdown
I'm a backpacker. A budget traveller. I am good at getting to places around the world.
I organise visas on the road and I take public transport to places where high profile bloggers love to report that "There are no buses. You must take a taxi".
Staying put is not something I am comfortable with. But we are living a new normal just now so I have had to adapt.
The 2 major inconveniences are being stuck and the never-ending uncertainty. A 3rd, slightly less major, inconvenience is feeding myself.
I am not fond of cooking.
I spend my time in the poorer parts of the world and hostels and guesthouses generally don't have self-catering kitchens available. I eat out. It is normally cheaper anyways. When I have been able to buy ingredients to cook up a feed, I spend way more than I would than if I went to a hole in the wall restaurant.
I can cook a basic meal. Just that I don't have much creative flair.
And the new normal here is that I am in a guest house that in the beginning, provided breakfast. I'd eat so much that I only needed to eat a late lunch at a small cafe and devour half a packet of biscuits early evening. Then they provided me with lunch and dinner. They needed to use the food up before it went to waste. So for 2 weeks, I didn't even go to the cafe or the supermarket.
The situation changed. They moved me from my treehouse to an 'Appartement'. The rains were destroying the treehouse and mice were taking up residence in the roof and pooping everywhere. And then the food stock ran out. I had a fridge and a gas stove. I could fend for myself. Easier said than done.
It's not like I can get microwaveable meals or a pizza. Here you buy raw ingredients.
I tried various types of beans and lentils. I asked the old cook on how I should prepare. I bought some rice.
Cooking rice in England is easy. Boil up the water, add the rice, cook for 20 mins and drain the excess water. Or just get boil in the bag rice.
But here the rice is cooked in a way I have never managed to master. You wash and then soak the rice, boil it up until the water has been absorbed. I get a big congealed lump of soggy rice and have a saucepan which takes me an hour to clean afterwards.
Then I found some Vietnam rice. Wash then soak for 30 minutes. Boil it up and drain the excess water. It works perfectly!
I organise visas on the road and I take public transport to places where high profile bloggers love to report that "There are no buses. You must take a taxi".
Staying put is not something I am comfortable with. But we are living a new normal just now so I have had to adapt.
The 2 major inconveniences are being stuck and the never-ending uncertainty. A 3rd, slightly less major, inconvenience is feeding myself.
I am not fond of cooking.
I spend my time in the poorer parts of the world and hostels and guesthouses generally don't have self-catering kitchens available. I eat out. It is normally cheaper anyways. When I have been able to buy ingredients to cook up a feed, I spend way more than I would than if I went to a hole in the wall restaurant.
I can cook a basic meal. Just that I don't have much creative flair.
And the new normal here is that I am in a guest house that in the beginning, provided breakfast. I'd eat so much that I only needed to eat a late lunch at a small cafe and devour half a packet of biscuits early evening. Then they provided me with lunch and dinner. They needed to use the food up before it went to waste. So for 2 weeks, I didn't even go to the cafe or the supermarket.
The situation changed. They moved me from my treehouse to an 'Appartement'. The rains were destroying the treehouse and mice were taking up residence in the roof and pooping everywhere. And then the food stock ran out. I had a fridge and a gas stove. I could fend for myself. Easier said than done.
It's not like I can get microwaveable meals or a pizza. Here you buy raw ingredients.
I tried various types of beans and lentils. I asked the old cook on how I should prepare. I bought some rice.
Cooking rice in England is easy. Boil up the water, add the rice, cook for 20 mins and drain the excess water. Or just get boil in the bag rice.
But here the rice is cooked in a way I have never managed to master. You wash and then soak the rice, boil it up until the water has been absorbed. I get a big congealed lump of soggy rice and have a saucepan which takes me an hour to clean afterwards.
Then I found some Vietnam rice. Wash then soak for 30 minutes. Boil it up and drain the excess water. It works perfectly!
I bought some red lentils:
Wash and soak for 10 minutes. Boil up for 25 and drain excess water! So easy.
In the afternoon I cook up a ½ kilo of lentils. This is enough for 4 meals.
To prepare the meal of lentils, I use ½ a tomato, ½ an onion, 2 cloves of garlic, all heated up in some oil and then add some lentils. A little salt and pepper. Eh voila.
To prepare the meal of lentils, I use ½ a tomato, ½ an onion, 2 cloves of garlic, all heated up in some oil and then add some lentils. A little salt and pepper. Eh voila.
I use my little bowl to make my meal a little more presentable as seen here, warming the plate too whilst the lentils are cooking:
Served, it looks like this:
This is a very filling meal. It's very nutritious. The proof is also in the pudding. I shared some with the girl staff member here. She loved it.
