Bangers and Mash

[elemess]

I think Rachael Ray lives in a different dimension than ours. Or perhaps she simply lives entirely within the realm of Einstein's Theory of Relativity, where time and space are governed by rules different than those we deal with day to day

Comments

[halfass_johnny]

See, television moves at the speed of light, which makes time move relatively slower for Rachel Ray than it does for you, the viewer. Thus something that takes her two hours to do comes out more like ten minutes for you.

[elemess]

Yeah, see, I knew it had to be something like that. I bet the commercial breaks are really a half hour long in her world but only two or three minutes in ours.

[noangelshere]

I have tried two 30 minute meals, and neither of them were done in 30 minutes. The first, a pepper steak recipe, was very tasty and only took about 40 minutes. The second, a pizza with puttanesca sauce and smoked mozzerella, took forever and did not turn out well. The sauce was far too runny for a pizza, and smoked mozzerella should only be used when you want whatever meal you put it on to only taste like smoked mozzerella. However, with a bit of tweaking I could see the puttanesca being very tasty on pasta with some non-smoked fresh mozzerella.

[elemess]

This is the third or fourth time I've tried one of her 30 Minute Meals, and I've yet to finish them in less than 45 minutes. They're also really messy. But they've all turned out well, so I can't really complain. But I will anyway. It's what I do.

Smoked mozzarella should probably only be eaten by itself or with crackers. Pretty much anything smoked is going to overpower anything else it's served with.

[jrosehale]

I wish I could find it now, but I read a blog post recently (or Slate article? Same diff?) where the author was trying to make her recipes in 30 minutes. His conclusion: It's doable if you're super-confident in what you're doing and don't actually, you know, need to read a recipe. ;-)

But you're touching on something that drives me crazy--pan sizes in recipes. I swear to God, I don't know why recipes always say things like "a four-quart saute pan," when I have yet to buy a single pan that actual says its size on it. (Hell, even my cake pans don't say whether they're 8-inch or 9-inch.) How hard would it be? It annoys me that, even when they're that precise, there's no way to measure without other tools!

Ooh, timer's going off--dinner's ready!

[elemess]

Some pans have sizes on the cardboard they come in in the store, but once that comes off, who knows what it is anymore? Recipes would do better to just say "pot" or "pan" than to get too specific.

I'm sure Rachael can make her recipes in pretty close to 30 minutes, but she's the one who wrote them, or at least had some practice before filming. She totally cheats.

[galbinus_caeli]

She also has an hour worth of prep done before hand and leaves an hour worth of cleanup for afterwards. Lets see how long it takes if she has to leave the kitchen clean.

[elemess]

Exactly! I tried to clean up a bit as I went along since I have so little counter space, but it's hard to do when using so much stuff at once.