So this has to be one of my favorite quick meals, and its incredibly simple. So who doesn’t love a good bowl of mac and cheese, but sometimes they can be a bit boring, so why not spice it up with a few small additions.

First, make the mac and cheese as you normally would, you can use regular pasta and velveeta if you have that. Once the mac and cheese is done you simply add your favorite salsa and enjoy. Another thing that I normally do with this is cook up some chicken in some spiced water and add that at the end as well.

To cook the chicken just put one thawed chicken breast in a pan with enough water to cover it, and then add your favorite mix of mexican spices (I use the one featured in Poorboys Ep 2). While the water is boiling out break up the chicken with a wooden spoon or other non scratching utensil. Once all the water is boiled out, you should have some nicely spiced shredded chicken that you can add to your macaroni and queso.

Enjoy!

Yesterday I filmed another episode of poorboys, I made some awesome pasta with a spicy garlic and onion marinara sauce. But of course, I had some leftovers today. So I wanted a bit of a snack and I thought of putting some pasta in between some bread, and then tossing it in a panini grill. It was awesome. You could really use any sort of George Foreman grill and put the sandwich in there. No butter necessary.

It gets the sandwich nice and grilled on the top and bottom and warm in the center. A perfect snack for a Saturday afternoon. You could toss any sort of variation on it, like putting a few slices of pepperoni in with the pasta, which would be really tasty as well.

Sandwiches are probably one of the easiest things to make for lunch. Quick, easy, satisfying and alot of options to customize. That’s why they are one of the things that I make for lunch several times a week, including today. So what the heck can you do to make them not so drab and boring? I do two things: Buy good bread, and toast the sandwiches.

When it comes to good bread, it’s really up to you. I usually try to buy rolls or some sort of baguette. These typically don’t cost much more than your typical 99 cent loaf of white bread. Of course if you do go the route of using cheaper breads, try and stick to a whole wheat bread.

Making the sandwich can be all up to you, typically I make turkey and ham sandwiches, turkey on bottom and ham on top. Ham on top because its more fatty and when you toast it, some of the juices and fat will be released, giving you a more flavorful sandwich.

Turkey, ham, red onion and cheese, those are the 4 things I put on before I put it in the broiler for toasting. All of those should be on one side, with the other piece of bread essentially being just toasted. After you put it in the broiler and the bread is nice and golden and the cheese is melted, add any other ingredients like pickles, tomatoes, lettuce, etc. to top off the sandwich I usually just put lettuce and tomato and then add a bit of italian dressing or any sort of vinaigrette that is in the fridge. After that, I put on the toasted bread and enjoy a nice hot sandwich, much like the ones you get at subway or quiznos, but much much cheaper.

Start making those sandwiches and enjoy the food you’ve made.

So today I made some Chili (with rice) with my housemate Nicole. We made it in a manner that I prefer to call “Gong Show” Cooking. We essentially grab a bunch of ingredients that we think would work and toss ‘em in to a pot.

Another thing I like to do is supplement the chili with rice. When you pour the chili over a bed of rice, it makes the meal much heartier, as well as stretching out the amount of servings you can get from it.
Our ingredients were as follows…

– 1 Lb Ground Beef
– 1 Large Onion, chopped
– 6-7 Cloves of garlic, diced
– 1 28oz Can of Diced Tomatoes
– 2 14oz Cans of beans, strained (most any will do, we used kidney and pinto)
– 1 14oz Can of whole kernel corn, strained
– 2 Jalapenos, chopped (you can also use pickled jalapenos or any pepper you prefer)
– 1 14oz Can of Beef broth
– 1 14oz Can of Tomato Puree
– Spices (3 tsp Cumin, 3 tsp Chili Powder, 2 tsp Ground Coriander, 1 tsp Cayenne, 1 tsp Oregano Flakes, 2 Bay Leaves)
– 3 Cups of long grain rice
– Shredded Cheddar Cheese (optional)

Directions: Brown the beef with the onions and garlic. Add the spices, and mix until thoroughly integrated. Add the rest of the ingredients, except the rice of course, bring it up to a boil, and then turn the heat down and allow it to simmer for a 30 to 45 minutes. With about 20 minutes left, make your rice. Once done, put the desired amount of rice in the bottom of your bowl, and then pour the chili over the top to finish it off.

The more rice you add, the more servings you get out of the chili, but a 50/50 mix was probably about right, you could go up to 70/30 and still have a tasty meal. Top it off with some cheddar cheese if you desire and enjoy. This meal was awesome and will yeild about 10-14 servings depending on your appetite.

Total Cost: Approx. $10.00, Cost per serving, ~$0.70-$1.00