Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Adventure Cuisine: Hash-Patty

Welcome, adventurer, to Adventure Cuisine! I'm going to teach you (by trial and error (mostly error)) how to cook some things that I made up because I was hungry and they sounded good. The adventurer never settles for the basic meal: The hamburger, the pancake, the duck's bill (probably a delicacy somewhere, I'm sure). No! The adventurer sees a recipe as a challenge to his or her ingenuity. A recipe says, "Why have an adventure when you could have something that has already been tested?" An adventurer says, "I'll take my beef adventurous, if you don't mind!" and dips it in an egg yolk batter then fries it and serves it on top of a cinnamon roll (AMERICA!).


With that preface to what the goal of Adventure Cuisine is, let's get to it.


First, let me note that "Hash-Patty" sounds like it's filled with drugs and that if anyone has a better name for this recipe, feel free to tell me so I can copyright it and make a ton of cash while you wallow in poverty.


The Workstation: An American Fire Hazard


The first step to making a Hash-Patty is deciding that what you really want is some hashbrowns. You buy a 10 lb. bag of potatoes (fully intending to use all ten pounds, though, as a bachelor you can only stomach so much of your own cooking) and grab the cheese grater from your roommate’s drawer, telling yourself you’ll wash it after using it.


You take one potato, wash some of the dirt from it and call it good, then grate it against the largest holes on the grater, nicking the tips of your fingers because you have some incessant need to use every piece of the potato (Note: if skin and blood mix in with the potato, no biggie. You're an adventurer, after all!). 


Once this is done, you do the next thing that pops into your mind, which is of course to coat the lump of potato shavings in flour, chili powder, and any other spices that look like they could taste good, maybe. This will make a sticky mass that you find you can mold into any shape.


Does it look like a lump of pig offal? You're doing it right!


Though you know this isn’t how hashbrowns should look, you forge ahead. In a skillet, dump some vegetable oil then turn the heat to somewhere around 350 degrees Fahrenheit--this is America and we don't use Celsius--(Remember: when you are finished with the skillet, don’t put it directly under water from the heat because it will make a loud noise and hot oil will explode onto your hand, leaving a good amount of blistering, and all your friends will think that you have leprosy or some other skin-eating condition that, by mere touch, will be transferred to them) and toss in the roughly patty-shaped mass. 


Does it look like sizzling pig offal? You're a champ!


Fry it until it is brown on both sides (five minutes and expect the inside to be crispy (though it won’t be, but the chewy center is perhaps the best surprise). Take the patty out of the oil and place it on a stack of paper towels in the hopes that doing so will somehow leech all the unhealthiness from the patty (Fun Fact: This is a good way to lose weight (if you lose weight by lying to yourself)!). 


Burned pig offal? Perfect!


Put a slice of pepper jack cheese on top and bite into the patty while it’s still far too hot. Deal with the consequences. Realize one year later that you never learned how to make hashbrowns.

And that was just the first try! Upon further experimentation, I concluded that cheese is always better when it's inside something instead of on top of it. So separate your patty into two halves and place a slice of pepperjack (or cheddar if you are a low-level adventurer) in between the halves.

Now that there's dairy, that's a nutritious meal!

This accomplishes two things: First, the cheese will melt as the patty cooks and create a gooey center (which is the goal with all foods except hard-boiled eggs and most meats (probably all meats)); and second, if you serve it to someone, the cheese acts as a hilarious molten sneak-attack that will spill all over their chin, burn their skin, and adhere itself firmly so that it will continue to burn until the victim scrapes it off. Again, hilarious!

Also, bacon. cook some bacon, chop it up, put it in the middle. Have I tried it?

Now I have!

When you fill the patty with cheese and bacon, it tends to get a little difficult to seal up, so you have to spend a good amount of time pressing the potato lump around the filling to create a protective shield, because you know that if the cheese touches the oil it will explode, start a fire, and leave you homeless, again.

Fire hazard avoided!

Next you think, "How could this possibly be more delicious/deadly?" Fry sauce is the correct answer. To make fry sauce, add equal parts ketchup, mayonnaise, and repressed regret. Stir the mixture until it is salmon-colored, delicious, or both (some people like more mayo, these people are going to die young).

Fun fact: Fry sauce doubles as a delicious pudding if you are disgusting!

The last step in creating this meal of meals is to put everything on your computer desk and eat it while you stare at the screen, realizing that you'll have to tell your readers about what you just ate. Guilt should set in at about the point that the patty reforms itself around your heart.

It sets in...Now

There you go, fellow adventurer! The perfect meal for the college-bound adventurer with nothing to lose.

Nutrition Facts:
-If you're looking for health facts, stop calling yourself an adventurer and go find some nice little health food blog and DIE.
-Did you know that you can buy a bag of edible, pre-cooked, pregnant crickets for under six bucks? What a steal! Find this and other edible (but not necessarily palatable) insects here.

Lastly, this was my soundtrack while I cooked:


Enjoy the Adventure (even if it kills you)!

2 comments:

  1. All of your posts are amusing, but this one was downright hilarious. How's your cholesterol?

    ReplyDelete