Kitchen Casualties: Corned Beef Sopas (without the sopas)

And she's back! In the kitchen! Which is a rather strange place to be. But fret not, nothing has happened so far that is cause for concern.

Today on my comeback post, I present to you my first attempt at Corned Beef Sopas. Why am I posting about this and what prompted me to tell you what I did for this recipe instead of the creamy scrambled egg with marble potatoes I did last week? I have no idea. But it's safe to say that this is one of the more successful experiments I've done in the past couple of months.

So here we go.

For the original recipe, the one I attempted to follow, please check the Yummy Corned Beef Sopas from the Nestle site. It's really pretty simple. But I had to make it complicated because reasons.

Okay, so what I did and what I learned and things that went through my head while cooking this.

1. Always check your available ingredients. I learned that elbow macaroni is different from salad macaroni. As you can see in the picture, I had salad macaroni. So I reasoned out that salad macaroni is basically elbow macaroni torn apart from its joint. Which I guess is debatable or totally wrong but pasta is pasta. (I'm sorry.)
2. Always check the quantity of your ingredients. For example, what is 1 tbsp of garlic? Is it 2 cloves of garlic? Three cloves of garlic? Three cloves of garlic after it is minced? What is sliced onion? How much onion should be sliced to fill a third of a cup? Do I squish it to fit? How sliced should it be considering the garlic (minced) and the onion (sliced) should be sautéd together? That means the garlic cooks a lot faster than the onion. What does a limp onion look like? If it requires a cup of corned beef, what if I have 260g of it? Why is it asking for just a half cup of cream from a 240mL pack? What do I do with the rest? I don't have a refrigerator. Can't I just pour the whole pack into the mix? These are the questions you need to ask yourself before you start the fire. Questions that I did ask myself but did not answer.
3. If you increase or decrease the quantity of an ingredient, you're going to have to do something about the other ingredients. For example, when I added the macaroni, it looked like it wasn't enough. So I added another cup. But I didn't add more water. Because pasta drinks a lot of water, hence this sopas is without soup. 



With Soup



Without Soup







































Do not be impatient. You want the water to boil so you intensify the heat. Now you add the macaroni and the water just disappears. Let it burn slowly. Feel the moment as the fire cooks the macaroni. Or just add water if you're in a hurry.
Last but not the least, if it's edible, eat it. It doesn't matter right now if it's not cooked exactly as written in the recipe or if it turns out unlike your expectation. The fact that you tried to cook and did not burn anything is a great achievement. Knowing that the food is cooked thoroughly and safely is a great achievement. Cooking your own dinner with the ingredients you currently have is a great achievement. You will improve in time. It takes practice after all. And one day, your sopas will look exactly like the one in the pictures or even better. 

My actual recipe:

1 tbsp cooking oil
1 tbsp minced garlic
¼ cup sliced onion
260g cup corned beef
1 sachet 8g MAGGI MAGIC SARAP®
4 cups water
2 cups salad macaroni
1/3 cup diced carrots
3/4 cup Nestle All-Purpose Cream

So I just realized that I actually needed 1/4 cup sliced onion haha not 1/3. Oh well. Still edible to me.

See you next time on Kitchen Casualties.

PS
What do I do with the rest of the cream? Will it spoil overnight? Do I have to finish eating all of this tonight? Does it really need to be refrigerated? Why do I have so many questions?