Starving Artist’s
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By: William Booth
Starving Artist’s
COOKBOOK Written & Illustrated by: William Booth
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Dedicated to:
My friends and family who have been encouraging and helping me stay motivated to pursue what I love.
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Table of Contents About This Book........................................................ pg 7 Breakfast Open-faced Egg Sandwiches................................... pg 11 Biscuits and Sausage Gravy.................................. pg 14 One Pan Mashup........................................................ pg 15 Cream Chipped Beef................................................. pg 18
Lunch/Dinner Ham BBQ Sandwiches............................................. pg 21 Spicy Chicken Pasta................................................. pg 24 BLT Sandwiches........................................................ pg 25 Poor Fried Rice......................................................... pg 28 Dogs in a Towel......................................................... pg 29 Tater Tot Casserole................................................. pg 32 Crunchy PB&J........................................................... pg 33 Poached Ramen......................................................... pg 36
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Desserts Christmas Crack...................................................... pg 39 Sheety Chocolate Chips......................................... pg 42 Cast-iron Brownies.................................................. pg 43
Drinks Root Beer Floats..................................................... pg 48 Low Budget Long Island.......................................... pg 49
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About this book...
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From living on your own and trying to learn how to cook and buy food for yourself to managing your money to budget as best as you can for the next week or month until your next paycheck or commission, it can be really tough. Thankfully, that’s where this book comes in. From recipes that are well known, to some unique ones tried and made from personal experience, these meals are both delicious and affordable, helping you save without having to crawl your way back to that McDonald’s Dollar Menu. I hope that this cookbook helps some people out with finding useful recipes that can help them cut back on ordering out or inspire them to think of new ideas to try out in the kitchen while keeping things affordable, but not sacrificing flavor and taste.
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Breakfast
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Open-Faced Egg Sandwiches
Serves: 2-4 people
Ever wake up craving a breakfast sandwich, but you either don’t want to use up all the bread you have, or don’t feel like driving out to a fast food restaurant in hopes that you made it in time for their narrow window of a breakfast selection? This dish helps to keep it simple and give you a quick meal to cook up in a matter of minutes.
INGREDIENTS: Eggs: 1-2 (depending on sunnyside down or scrambled) Butter/olive oil Bread: 1-2 slices Bacon: 3 strips *small sauce pan or skillet
1. Place pan on stove, and turn to medium/high heat. Put a few slices of butter or a few splashes of olive oil into the pan. 2. Place bacon into pan and let cook until crispy. 3. Once cooked, remove bacon from pan and set to dry on paper towel. 4. Keeping the grease from the bacon in the pan, crack eggs into pan and cook the way you prefer your eggs to be served. 5. While eggs are cooking, place bread into toaster. 6. Once toast is done and buttered, and eggs are ready, assemble with the toast on bottom, followed by bacon and then the egg on top. 7. Enjoy your open-faced egg sandwich!
*Cook’s notes: To save time on this dish, buy pre-cooked breaded chicken cutlets.
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Difficulty: Easy
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Biscuits and Sausage Gravy
Serves: 2-4 people
Nothing smells better than fresh from the oven biscuits, and what could make it better than having them doused in a creamy white gravy with bits of sausage? Absolutely nothing! This is a personal favorite breakfast dish that’ll .
INGREDIENTS:
Ground Sausage: 1 lb Flour: 2 tablespoons Milk: 2 cups Additional seasonings and spices to your preference Biscuits: 1-2 canned tubes Butter: 1 stick *skillet, oven, bowl
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F and place biscuits on ungreased cooking sheet and keep spaced apart. Bake for 11 to 15 minutes or until golden brown. 2. While biscuits bake, turn stove to medium heat and add 2 slices of butter to pan, followed by ground sausage. Cook until sausage has browned. 3. Remove from pan and place into bowl. Add flour and milk into pan, and stir together. 4. Once mixed, let heat for a moment before adding the meat back into the pan. Add additional seasonings to your own preference. 5. Turn off heat, and serve with biscuits first and gravy poured on top. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: Be careful with cooking milk on heat.Recommended that heat be lowered during this step.
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One-Pan Mashup
Serves: 2-4 people
Now let’s say you wanna have an omlette, but you’re not confident in your skills to flip it without breaking the eggs. Maybe you want to have hashbrowns and sausages, but all your pans are in the sink and washing them is a chore that no one wants to do. That’s where the One-Pan Mashup comes in, allowing you to cook 3 separate parts of a breakfast in one pan. INGREDIENTS: Eggs: 6 Butter/olive oil Cubed potatoes: 1 bag Sausage bits: 1 bag Shredded cheese: 1 bag *large skillet, bowl
1. Place skillet on stove and turn heat to medium to high. Add butter or olive oil. 2. Add sausage to pan, cooking until sausage bits are browned. 3. Add in potatoes, seasoning with salt and pepper and allowing to turn a golden brown. 4. In a bowl, mix 6 eggs and pour into pan. Let cook until solidified. Turn off the heat at this point. 5. Sprinkle cheese on top and cut into slices. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: The bottom of the dish may come out looking burnt, so don’t worry if this happens.
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Difficulty: Hard
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Difficulty: Easy
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Cream Chipped Beef
Serves: 2-4 people
When you hear the nickname for this dish, you’re certainly going to do a double take if you aren’t familiar with it. Cream Chipped Beef, also known as “Shit-On-A-Shingle,” is a white gravy with chipped pieces of beef, served on top of toast. It’s actually quite delicioius when you try it, and tends to be a reliable way to tell if a diner does a good job with their cooking as well.
INGREDIENTS: Bread: 2-3 slices Cream Chipped Beef: 1 box Butter *small pot, toaster
1. Fill a pot with water and place on stove. Bring water to a boil. 2. Place bread in toaster and let toast. 3. Take out cream chipped beef packet out from box, and place into water. Do not cover pan. 4. Let the pouch simmer in water for 18 minutes. 5. Remove pouch from the water, and retrieve toast from toaster. 6. Butter pieces of toast, and cut into squares, but leave it in the shape of the toast. 7. Pour cream chipped beef onto toast, and enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: This dish goes great with some hashbrowns. You can probably get a pack of those at the store while shopping.
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Lunch/Dinner
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Ham BBQ Sandwich
Serves: 2-4 people
While this recipe sounds rather basic and simple, the result is anything but. This sandwich is one of my favorites to cook, as it doesn’t require much time to cook, and you won’t have that much to clean in the way of dishes. Nothing is better than pairing this with a cold drink and a bag of jalapeno kettle chips.
INGREDIENTS: Olive oil/butter Deli ham (1 lb, sliced thin) Choice of bbq sauce Club rolls *skillet
1. Heat up pan on medium to high heat; add small amount of oil. 2. Tuck slices of ham and place on edge of pan, covering the edge first. Continue to place as you move towards the center of the pan. 3. After 5 minutes, add BBQ sauce to pan, pouring over top of meat. Turn and mix around meat to allow the sauce to coat ham. 4. Turn off the heat and let sit for a minute. Place ham between the rolls, and serve. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: As an added bonus, cooking with small, chopped bell peppers add some extra flavor to the mix.
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Difficulty: Easy
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Spicy Chicken Pasta
Serves: 5 people
This recipe came to be in as a happy coincidence. It was late one night, and my family didn’t have much food in the house. Scrambling to find something for us to eat, we had some chicken cutlets and noodles. We cookded it up, and added some pepper flakes for a spicy kick, and it turned into a staple recipe that we cook every so often now. INGREDIENTS:
1. Fill pot with water and heat to boil.
Olive oil
2. Pat the chicken dry, before dredging it in flour in a bowl or ziplock bag.
Red Pepper Flakes Pasta *(any kind) Chicken Cutlets (1-2 lbs) Bread crumbs Milk Flour Minced Garlic *small sauce pan, large pot, bowl, skillet
3. Dip the floured cutlet in milk, followed by dipping in bread crumbs. 4. In the meantime, have a skillet heating up with a few tablespoons of olive oil. 5. Cook breaded chicken 4-5 minutes on each side. Once cooked, cube it and set aside. 6. Once water is boiling, throw in a pound of linguini, or preferred choice of pasta, to the pot. 7. Once pasta is cooked, drain and combine with chicken in a large bowl.
*Cook’s notes: To save time on this dish, buy pre-cooked breaded chicken cutlets.
8. In a small sauce pan, add a quarter-cup to a half-cup of olive oil, a 1/2 tablespoon of hot pepper flakes, and a half tablespoon of minced garlic. 9. Heat until the pepper flakes begin to crackle. Once done, pour over the chicken and pasta, and stir until mixed. Enjoy!
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BLT Sandwich
Serves: 2-4 people
Now say you want to keep eating bacon, but it’s important to eat veggies every once in a while. With that fact aside, a BLT is a great way to enjoy your love for bacon while keeping to a somewhat healthy diet! This is definitely a great recipe to whip up during a warm Spring day. INGREDIENTS: Bacon: 2-3 strips per sandwich Lettuce Head: 2 leaves per sandwich Tomatoes: 1-2 tomatoes Bread: Any kind works Butter/Olive oil Mayonnaise: *optional *skillet
1. Heat pan to medium heat. Add a slice of butter/a splash of olive oil to pan. 2. Place bread into toaster and let toast. 3. Once bacon is cooked and crispy, place onto plate with paper towel to allow excess grease to drip off. 4. Once toast is done, cut tomato into slices and rip large leaves of lettuce from lettuce head. Rinse leaves under water to clean off. 5. Spread a small amount of mayonnaise on both pieces of toast. 6. Assemble sandwich with bacon on bottom, followed by lettuce and then tomato slices on top. 7. Cut sandwich into triangles, and enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: Definitely pair with a cold glass of iced tea for the Spring or Summer vibes.
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Difficulty: Easy
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Poor Fried Rice
Serves: 2-4 people
You’re probably asking yourself “Did they mean to write pork roll and not pork?” Yes, you read that right. This is something that I have worked on and am proud of how well it turns out. It’s definitely a great meal to have by yourself or share with friends.
INGREDIENTS: White rice: 1 cup (leftover or cooked the night prior) Pork roll: 4 slices Olive oil Eggs: 2 Soy sauce *skillet or large pan
1. Cook 1 cup of rice in 2 cups water the night prior to cooking, to allow for the rice to be full of moisture. 2. Heat pan to medium heat. Add a small splash of olive oil to pan. 3. Cut each slice of pork roll into eight pieces each, and at into pan. 4. While meat is cooking, pour a small amount of soy sauce into pan to let it cook into the meat. 5. Add rice to pan, stir and fluff rice with meat. 5. Beat and add eggs onto rice, and stir to let mix. 6. Let sit to cook for 1-2 minutes, before stirring and letting sit again. 7. Drizzle with soy sauce, and serve into bowls. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: This is a more simplified version of this dish, so feel free to change it up however you want!
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Dogs in a Towel
Serves: 2-5 people
You’ve heard of Pigs in a Blanket, now get ready for Dogs in a Towel. A delicious recipe that my mother found and perfected in her own way. What it comes down to is a hot dog wrapped with cheese in biscuits. Specifically, some premade biscuits because we’re trying to save on money, not open a bakery right now.
INGREDIENTS: Pillsbury biscuits: 2 tubes Your choice of cheese: 2 slices per hot dog Hot dogs: 1 case *baking sheet
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cover baking sheet with non-stick spray to make sure dough does not stick. 2. Open up tubes of biscuits and seperate each biscuit before spreading and stretching out to length of hot dogs. 3. Place 1 biscuit down, followed by 2 slices of cheese, and then the hog dog. 4. Tuck cheese in and wrap around hot dog, before placing another stretched biscuit on top. 5. Wrap and press biscuits together, so that hot dog is encase inside. 5. Once biscuit dogs are ready, place into oven and bake for 20 minutes or until golden brown. 6. Take out of oven and let cool for 1-2 minutes before serving. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: You can serve this with fries, and also dip your dogs in towels into your choice of sauce!
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Tater Tot Casserole
Serves: 4-6 people
Do you love tater tots? Wanna include a yummy side dish as part of the main course? Then this is the recipe for you! Tater tot casserole is a delicous dish comprised of ground beef with cheese and gravy, topped with tater tots. There is nothing better than smelling the mouth-watering aroma of this fresh out of the oven.
INGREDIENTS:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
Ground beef: 1 lb
1. Place skillet on to stove and put on medium to high heat. Add butter or olive oil.
Shredded cheese (your choice): 1 bag Tater tots: 1 bag Beef flavored gravy: 1 jar *skillet or cast iron pan, baking dish
2. Add ground beef to pan and let meat cook until browned. Add salt, pepper and additional seasonings. 3. Once meat is cooked, add in gravy and stir. Turn off the heat. 4. In baking dish, pour gravy and meat into dish, and cover with shredded cheese. Place tater tots on top. 5. Place into oven for 25-30 minutes. 6. Take out and let cool for 2-3 minutes. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: Don’t worry about defrosting the tater tots. They’ll cook in the oven.
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Crunchy PB&J
Serves: 1-2 people
This is a rather easy dish to make, but that doesn’t make it taste any less great. The salty taste of potato chips combined with peanut butter and the sweet taste of jelly work well together, with a satisfying crunch in each bite. INGREDIENTS:
1. Place your bread down on a plate.
Peanut butter: 1 jar
2. On one slice of bread, spread your peanut butter down to
Jelly (your choice): 1 jar
cover the surface, all the way to the edges.
Potato chips: 1 bag Bread: 2 slices
3. Repeat Step 2 with jelly on the other slice of bread.
*just a butter knife is needed for this dish
4. On the peanut butter side, lay down potato chips down. 5. Place both slices together, and cut in half if desired. Enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: You can toast your bread as well for even more crunch.
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Difficulty: Easy
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Difficulty: Easy
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Poached Ramen
Serves: 1-2 people
Let’s be honest here. When yousaw this was a cookbook for starving artists, you knew there was going to be a recipe involving instant ramen. This mainly focuses on how you can improve upon a simple dish by adding more ingredients.
INGREDIENTS:
1. Fill pot halfway with water and place on stove to boil.
Instant ramen: 1 pack
2. Once boiling, lower heat and add seasoning pack from ramen pack to water, stirring to make your broth.
Eggs: 1-2 Soy sauce Additional seasonings of your choosing *medium-sized pot
3. Turn heat back up to a medium and add noodles, seperating carefully as to not break noodles. 4. Once noodles are soft, crack and add eggs in, and cover pot with a lid for an additional 1-2 minutes on low heat to allow eggs to poach. 5. Add soy sauce and additional seasonings to adjust flavor to your liking. 6. Pour into bowl and enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: Depending on which flavor you use, adding leftover meat to ramen during Step 4 works well with the dish.
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Desserts
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Christmas Crack
Serves: 6-8 people
Who says that you have to wait until the holidays to bake something that’s holiday related? Known as Christmas crack, this dessert is chocolate, caramel, and saltine crackers combined together to make something so good, you’ll understand exactly how this got its name!
INGREDIENTS: Saltine crackers: 1-2 sleeves Packed dark brown sugar: 1 cup Unsalted butter: 1 cup Kosher salt: 1/4 teaspoon Vanilla extract: 1 teaspoon Chocolate chips: 2 cups *rectangular baking pan or sheet (make sure it’s oven safe!), mixing bowls, medium saucepan, microwave-safe bowl
*Cook’s notes: As a bonus, you can add chopped nuts on top after adding the chocolate.
1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F. Line pan or sheet with aluminum foil, making sure it covers edges. Line saltine crackers in a single layer on bottom. 2. Add your brown sugar, butter, and salt into saucepan and place on stove. Turn heat to medium and stir until butter melts while stirring. 3. Continue stirring for 3-5 minutes until it starts to boil and darken. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla extract. 4. Pour the hot brown sugar mix over the saltine crackers, spreading evenly to coat entire surface. 5. Move pan/sheet to the oven, and bake for 5 minutes. 6. Melt chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl at 30 second intervals, stirring between cook times until chocolate is melted. 7. Pour chocolate over crackers, spreading so it coats the whole surface evenly. Chill overnight. 8. Take out from the fridge, and remove from pan/sheet. Peel foil off, and cut with knife or break apart with hands. Enjoy, and remember to share!
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Sheety Chocolate Chips
Serves: 6 people
Do you love chocolate chip cookies? Do you hate having to touch the dough with your hands and find the texture extremely discomforting to the touch? Well this is a great recipe for you to enjoy, without having to get your hands dirty! You’ll be able to indulge in some freshly baked cookies, but this time they’ll be squares!
INGREDIENTS: All purpose flour: 2 1/4 cups Baking soda: 1 teaspoon Salt: 1 teaspoon Butter: 2 sticks, softened in 1 cup Granulated sugar: 3/4 cups Packed brown sugar: 3/4 cups Vanilla extract: 1 teaspoon Large eggs: 2 Chocolate chips: 2 cups *rectangular baking dish or sheet (make sure it’s oven safe!), mixing bowls
*Cook’s notes: A good way to keep your cookies fresh for later is to keep them refridgerated.
1. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F. Grease your baking dish/sheet to make sure that your dough doesn’t stick to it. 2. Combine your dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, and salt) in a bowl, mixing them together until they are blended into one. 3. In your other mixing bowl, add your softened butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar, and vanilla extract together. Add one egg at a time, beating it well to make sure it’s mixed in. 4. Start to add your flour mixture, pouring it in gradually to allow for it to mix with your wet ingredients evenly. 5. Pour in your chocolate chips, and keep stirring for another 1-2 minutes. 6. Pour and spread the cookie dough into your baking dish/sheet. 7. Place in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until dough is golden brown. 8. Remove from the oven and let cool for 2-3 minutes. Cut into squares and serve with milk.
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Cast-iron Brownies
Serves: 2-4 people
There isn’t any difference from making brownies in a cast-iron pan when comparing to a baking dish. However, you get the option of cutting the brownies into pizza-like slices, and I see that as an absolute win.
INGREDIENTS: Brownie mix: 1 box Water: 3 tablespoons Vegetable/Canola oil: 1/2 cup Eggs: 2 (large) Chocolate chips: 1 cup *cast-iron skillet, measuring cup and measuring spoons, mixing bowl, spatula
1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Grease your cast-iron skillet. 2. Pour your brownie mix into a mixing bowl, and add water, oil, and eggs. Mix thoroughly until there are no clumps or dry powder left. Add chocolate chips and mix again. 3. Pour and spread brownie batter into pan, and put into oven for 36-38 minutes. 4. Check with toothpick or knife to see if it comes out almost clean. Once ready, take out of oven and let cool for 1-2 minutes. 5. Cut into slices and enjoy!
*Cook’s notes: You can add chopped candy bars instead of chocolate chips. Additionally, you can add a scoop of ice cream on top when it comes out of the oven.
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Difficulty: Intermediate
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Drinks
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Difficulty: Easy
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Low Budget Long Island
Serves: 2-4 people
For anyone that doesn’t wanna go out to clubs or bars, and hates the taste of beers and IPAs, look no further than this. With actual Long Island Iced Teas not even having iced tea in them, you can change that with some actual iced tea and a little bit of vodka.
INGREDIENTS:
1. Select your glass and place ice cubes inside.
Vodka: (any kind)
2. Pour 1 to 1 1/2 shots of vodka to glass.
Iced Tea: 1 gallon
3. Pour iced tea into glass, and mix.
Lemons: 1 wedge or slice Ice: 2-4 cubes
4. Cut a lemon and make a slice or wedge, and place into drink. Enjoy!
*spoon to stir with
*Cook’s notes: Please be sure to drink responsibly and have fun.
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Root Beer Float
Serves: 1-2 people
Nothing beats a classic treat like a root beer float. Being perhaps one of the best soft drink desserts out there, this is fairly easy to make and enjoy with your friends or a cozy summer night on the couch with your favorite shows.
INGREDIENTS:
1. Select your choice of a glass to use for your float.
Vanilla ice cream: 1 scoop
2. Using a spoon or ice cream scoop, take your ice cream and get a big scoop, placing it into your glass.
Root beer: 1 can *tall drinking glass
3. Crack open your can of soda, and carefully pour it in, making sure that foam doesn’t overflow from the glass. 4. Stir for 10-15 seconds, and enjoy your drink!
*Cook’s notes: There are a lot of ways to add to this recipe! You can cook up some chicken fingers and fries to have a little snack to go with it, or put the glass in the freezer for an hour prior to make sure your drink stays cold longer!
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Difficulty: Easy
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The Starving Artist’s Cookbook is designed to help and assist artists, college students, or anyone trying to live on a budget by providing easy to follow recipes with ingredients that won’t break the bank with their costs. Inside this cookbook contains a number of recipes that are affordable and don’t sacrifice flavor over cost.
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