It's been about 2 years since I cooked anything myself and 6 years since I actually spent any decent amount of time in a kitchen. Transitioning from the lifestyle of a cash-strapped student to time-poor employee meant that cooking was one of those activities that dropped right down to the bottom of the priority list. It moved even further down the priority list when I moved to Hong Kong in 2015. Being in a city known for the tastiness of its yum cha and amazing diversity of it's food options made it far too easy eat out and abandon cooking entirely!
If you want evidence of the impact lifestyle and walkability of a city has on a person's health, just look at the impact of my move from Hong Kong back to Sydney*. In the space of about 6 months I shed 10kg just purely by switching back to a home cooked diet (thanks mum and dad for letting me crash at yours for 'a while' 😉) and from using my feet to get around everywhere. (OK, there was also the regular morning runs, cycling, and barre classes...but life back in Sydney did make it easier to do all that :) )
I'm not implying that I am entirely bereft of cooking skills - just a little out of practice. Give me a recipe, and I think I could do a fairly decent job of making something edible and tasty.
The problem I face now is 'inspiration'. Having not cooked for so long I have a little trouble figuring out what I could cook for myself. I'm one of those people with a confused face in the middle of the grocery store pacing between the vegetable and pasta aisles. Cooking for one doesn't make it much easier either. I no longer benefit from the back-and-forth banter one has when you're living with a partner. *sigh*
This is a happy story though. In the interest of rediscovering my cooking mojo, I made a conscious decision Wednesday last week to buy a packet of pre-packed stir fry vegetables and cooked asian-style chicken thighs from the hot food section of Tesco. Yes, feel free to cue laughter. All I did was essentially stir fry some vegetables and plate that with an already cooked piece of chicken - but I was so proud of myself...I had actually progressed to firing up the gas stove! Last night I took it a step further and bought a packet of pre-packed stir fry vegetables and pre-packed raw sweet-chilli marinated chicken thighs. Yes...I feel awful about all the packaging involved in these purchases, but I promise I'll work on that over the next few weeks!
To celebrate this milestone, I'd like to document my first solo recipe for one.
Recipe Number One: Stir fry vegetables and sweet chilli chicken
Serves one person for 2 meals...or 2 people.
Ingredients:
- One packet of Ready to Cook Vegetable Stir Fry
- One packet of Chef's Select Easy Cook Sweet Chilli Chicken breasts (Lidl exclusive)
- Optional: One rye bread roll
Method:
- Fire up stove top and put a little oil into a fry pan. Wait for it to heat up a bit.
- Take the pre-marinated chicken out of the packet and place both into the heated fry pan*. Wait for them to cook a bit on one side before flipping over to the other side.
- Shift the halfway-cooked chicken to the side of the fry pan and tip in a half packet of the stir-fry vegetables. Toss them in the frypan and cook them for about 5 min alongside the chicken.
- Find the additional sweet chilli sauce packet that came with the Easy Cook chicken. Squeeze half of it over the stir-fried vegetables and toss vegetables to coat.
- Plate vegetables and finish cooking chicken. Chicken will be cooked when the meat changes from being squishable to firm to touch.
- Plate one chicken with cooked vegetables - this is dinner! Cling wrap the other piece of chicken and put it in the fridge with the remaining half of the stir fry vegetables - this is tomorrow's dinner. :)
- If you're extra hungry, eat dinner with a rye bread roll. Remember to check and remove bits with white mould spots before eating.
* Side notes:
- As much as people rave about Hong Kong's metro system, I am definitely not a fan of the city's version of Transit Oriented Development. It was exhausting moving around in the city - navigating the city's endless tunnels, multiple exits, and non-direct bridges across multi-lane roads. Not pedestrian friendly at all.
- The Chef's Select Easy Cook Sweet Chilli Chicken packet will tell you to cook it in the oven. Ignore that, it will take forever. Just fry it.