NoxiousOdor

If you are having a meat or potato based meal you can cook up some white or yellow onion on the stove chopped up. one onion makes enough for about 3-4 people. Keep it at a low or medium temp for maybe 10 or 15 minutes. You aren't looking to fry them, just cook them until they are soft and shiny. If you like mushrooms you can slice up some brown or white crimini mushrooms and throw them in with the onion.

In a separate dish mix a little bit (about 2-3 tablespoons) of white cooking wine with about a teaspoon of beef bullion. You can get jars of the bullion at costco and they will last you darn near forever. After the bullion and the wine are mixed you poor it on top of the onion and the mushrooms and let it simmer until the mushrooms are cooked to your liking. for the best timing I recommend adding the mushrooms and the wine/bullion at about the same time.

After that is done you can serve the solid stuff with whatever other food you made but leave the juice in the pan. Add a tiny but of corn starch (just a pinch or two to start) and it will thicken into a nice sauce you can poor over everything.

This sauce is great if you like spicy noodles/veggies/chicken chow mien what have you.

You will need:

- 1/3 cup soy sauce. If you want to limit the salt then get reduced salt soy sauce. I would recommend it if you make a lot of asian food like I do.

- 3 minced cloves of garlic

- 2 tablespoons of brown sugar

- 1 table spoon of chile paste or sriracha

- 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce (sounds gross imo but it is good when it is in this sauce)

- 1 tablespoon of grated ginger or if you have dried ginger powder use a little less

- 1 teaspoon of sesame oil (also gross on its own but it is a nice touch to the sauce. I don't recommend smelling the bottle though)

Mix it all together and set it aside, scoop two tablespoons of the sauce and add it to whatever meat or veggies you are cooking. Just before everything is done poor the rest into the pan as well and give it a good mix. I strongly recommenced using this with noodles or if you have a sizeable amount of food cooking unless you want your mouth to burn off. The more food used means it will be diluted more. If you don't want to make very much food then you can also reduce the chile past amount as well as the garlic.

If you don't mind I can share things that have helped me. It won't fit with everyone but these things have certainly helped me.

I used to eat tuna, little caesar's pizza, and ramen noodles exclusively. This wasn't because I didn't like other food but because I never had the energy to cook other food and I didn't know much about cooking good foods in a way that wasn't time consuming and frustrating. My biggest recommendation to anyone who wants to eat healthier but isn't the worlds best chef is to buy a wok or some other large pan.

It has be unbelievably easy to make meals now, all I do it chop up any combination of veggies and or meat and then you just toss it in the pan with a tiny bit of oil. It doesn't take more than just a couple of minutes to cook and it is easy peasy. Having the big pan makes you feel like a pro too so that is fun. Some of my favorite things to toss in the wok in no particular order are: broccoli, carrots, mushrooms, onion, celery, chopped chicken, chopped beef, bamboo shoots or really anything else. Stir fry meals are really easy and super filling. You can also boil some noodles in another pan and then after they are done and strained you can toss the noodles into the wok with whatever else you happen to be making and it will make a really tasty noodley meal, rice is great too and works just as well. I have done this will dozens of combinations of foods and I have yet to see it turn out badly.

Sauces can be a lot of fun to make too. They are surprisingly simple and can spice up the flavor a bit too. I would be happy to share some of my favorites if anyone is interested.

I guess what I'm getting at is that it is really nice to have one kitchen utensil that you can go to to make a huge variety of food. You really can toss anything you want in it and make it taste good and have fun while making it.

Another thing that has helped me a lot is that I go on more walks now. It kinda sucks sometimes during the winter time but on warmer days or during the summer it can be really fun to go walking. Me and my wife often walk from our apartment down a hill a mile or so to the nearby village and while the walk itself isn't terribly exciting it is nice to have some time to get fresh air and talk. We also play Pokemon Go a lot and even though the game is pretty simple it is a nice way to keep my mind off of the fact that I don't want to half to walk back up the hill to get home. It gives you a hint of an extra reason to walk to the places you are walking too.

Like any exercise walking can kind of suck at first but it is one of those things that sucks less the more you do it. I quickly found myself going on walks because I wanted to and I enjoyed them, a nice transition from going on them because I was out of shape and felt like I had to.

Like I said, this isn't going to be the solution for everyone but I thought I'd share some of my experiences.