Stew and stir fry are my two favorite techniques. Both are great ways to prepare vegetables and you can usually make them with whatever you have and it will usually taste good. Accordingly they both make good ways to explore how certain flavors go together. You can add extra firm tofu or tempeh or meat to a stir fry or medium tofu, meat, bones, or beans to a soup to get a nutritious meal. Stir frying is especially good in a heat wave because you can run the heat for a short time and not heat the house up, especially with induction. I use pretty short metal serving spoons for my stir fry, you probably won’t be able to get away with that if you use a gas burner though. I use coconut oil or olive oil for my stir fry most of the time as those are pretty healthy options and not too expensive.
Important to have spices for this. I recommend salt, cumin seeds, powdered or fresh garlic, fresh ginger for relatively cheap options. For stewing bay leaves and cinnamon sticks are also good choices. For the next tier up, whole cloves, Shaoxing wine, thyme, dark soy sauce, and Old Bay. Whole frozen red peppers if you’re so inclined.
Spaghetti aglio e olio is a good occasional meal too. Garofalo is the best bang for your buck pasta that I can get but it’s ok to make it with shitty store brand pasta too.
For equipment, victorinox fibrox knives are cost effective. Get the 6 inch chef’s knife and a 400/1000 grit whetstone. Any plastic cutting board is fine especially if you have a dishwasher you can put it in. I have three $2 cutting boards from Ikea. A cheap slow cooker is the next most important buy. After that, an induction plate costs about $60 and can give you quite good control over the cooking temperature. Pair it with a flat bottom heavy gauge carbon steel wok or skillet and an induction compatible saucepan and you’ve got a fully equipped kitchen that you can move easily for a total of about $200, or a half equipped kitchen with just the slow cooker, knife, whetstone and boards for about $70. Get Kenji’s book on wok cooking off libgen and go to town.
Note that you need to pressure cook or soak and boil beans separately before slow cooking.
Edit: I use a salad spinner every day to wash vegetables. First you fill the bowl with water, fill the inner bowl with vegetables, and let it soak while you check Twitter. Then you remove the inner bowl, empty the outer one, rinse the inner bowl and vegetables under the sink quickly to get rid of any remaining pesticide residue, and spin out the water. It speeds up prep for a stir fry significantly, so I recommend it as well.
Edit edit: inspired by this thread I decided to try something new with my oatmeal. I mixed in a tiny bit of powdered cinnamon and some Lao gan ma chili crisp. It’s good as hell, don’t sleep on the savory oatmeal comrades.
Stew and stir fry are my two favorite techniques. Both are great ways to prepare vegetables and you can usually make them with whatever you have and it will usually taste good. Accordingly they both make good ways to explore how certain flavors go together. You can add extra firm tofu or tempeh or meat to a stir fry or medium tofu, meat, bones, or beans to a soup to get a nutritious meal. Stir frying is especially good in a heat wave because you can run the heat for a short time and not heat the house up, especially with induction. I use pretty short metal serving spoons for my stir fry, you probably won’t be able to get away with that if you use a gas burner though. I use coconut oil or olive oil for my stir fry most of the time as those are pretty healthy options and not too expensive.
Important to have spices for this. I recommend salt, cumin seeds, powdered or fresh garlic, fresh ginger for relatively cheap options. For stewing bay leaves and cinnamon sticks are also good choices. For the next tier up, whole cloves, Shaoxing wine, thyme, dark soy sauce, and Old Bay. Whole frozen red peppers if you’re so inclined.
Spaghetti aglio e olio is a good occasional meal too. Garofalo is the best bang for your buck pasta that I can get but it’s ok to make it with shitty store brand pasta too.
For equipment, victorinox fibrox knives are cost effective. Get the 6 inch chef’s knife and a 400/1000 grit whetstone. Any plastic cutting board is fine especially if you have a dishwasher you can put it in. I have three $2 cutting boards from Ikea. A cheap slow cooker is the next most important buy. After that, an induction plate costs about $60 and can give you quite good control over the cooking temperature. Pair it with a flat bottom heavy gauge carbon steel wok or skillet and an induction compatible saucepan and you’ve got a fully equipped kitchen that you can move easily for a total of about $200, or a half equipped kitchen with just the slow cooker, knife, whetstone and boards for about $70. Get Kenji’s book on wok cooking off libgen and go to town.
Note that you need to pressure cook or soak and boil beans separately before slow cooking.
Edit: I use a salad spinner every day to wash vegetables. First you fill the bowl with water, fill the inner bowl with vegetables, and let it soak while you check Twitter. Then you remove the inner bowl, empty the outer one, rinse the inner bowl and vegetables under the sink quickly to get rid of any remaining pesticide residue, and spin out the water. It speeds up prep for a stir fry significantly, so I recommend it as well.
Edit edit: inspired by this thread I decided to try something new with my oatmeal. I mixed in a tiny bit of powdered cinnamon and some Lao gan ma chili crisp. It’s good as hell, don’t sleep on the savory oatmeal comrades.