How To Cook Like A University Student

Yes ... the end is near. The end of your sheltered life is at hand and with it comes a new beginning which involves, among other things, labouring over a hot stove and cleaning up after yourselves.

With CAPE season now upon you, the end of your secondary school life is drawing ever closer. No doubt, many of you are already busily preparing for your departure to universities in the region and elsewhere. Hence, now is the perfect time to introduce all of you sheltered birds - soon to fly the coop - to the realities of university life by teaching you the most essential of lessons: how to cook like a university student.

For, along with your books, money and other necessities, you will need to throw in some tried and true menus on how to prepare a great (well...edible) meal when all you have in your cupboard is a handful of rice and a soon-to-be-expired tin of sausage.

Do you want to learn how you can survive when you only have ten dollars left to last until the end of the month? Do you need some tips on how best to sponge on thy neighbours? In other words, how to cook and eat like a UWI student?

Here's how:

MACARONI AND CORNED BEEF-

We will start our series of recipes with this UWI classic. This meal is central to any university student's diet. It is the perfect un-nutritious, unbalanced, high-caloric, but most importantly cheap, quick and filling meal.

You need:

*One medium sized pot and one small pan- well, naturally your own lovely pot and pan that you bought at the beginning of the semester have vanished into the mysterious abyss of pots, clothes, books and other Things That Disappear On-Hall. So you have two options-- you can either cuss about de tiefing people as you hunt the block, the hall, the campus for your pot or you can cuss and borrow someone else's pot and pan. We recommend option two. However, please note, you may have to feed the people from whom you borrowed the pot and pan.

*Two boxes of Instant Macaroni and Cheese No doubt, the last in your cupboard -- time to go shopping again, because if you don't have macaroni, you don't have food!

*One large tin of corned beef

*Milk -- your own tin of milk has no doubt been used by someone else or has gone sour and lumpy, so you will have to borrow this from your housemate/blockmate. Take special note:you will probably have to be fed this person too.

*Butter/margarine- Ok, really, you will be using margarine, because butter kind of counts as an unnecessary expense when there are essential things like books to buy and fetes to attend and fees to pay and clothes to buy (cause, you know how we Bajans flex when we hit anywhere a little bit foreign and the low clothing prices start to sweet we) and margarine does the same job. But if you want to be fancy, you can buy 'I Can't Believe It's Not Butter' for that buttery flavour. Half of your tub of margarine that you bought last week will be used (only half if you lucky) and not by you -- but you ain't bitter! Moving on...

*Onion

*Tomato

*Salt

*Black pepper

Preparation

Fill the pot with an adequate amount of water. (If you don't know what is an adequate amount of water to boil macaroni, you should not be at university yet.) Set it on the stove to boil. Add a touch of salt. Cut up the onion and the tomato to go with the corned beef. When the water comes to a boil, add the macaroni. Leave the room, go to bathe, study (no, really!), lime, buy a pre-meal snack. Return hurriedly when your house/block-mate hollers to you that the macaroni is about to burn.

Rescue pot from the stove and rain whatever water is left in it before adding the packages of powdered cheese, a tinge of milk and a little margarine. Stir vigorously.

Cover pot of macaroni and place on counter. Place pan on burner just vacated by pot-- no, you will not get two whole burners to yourself to use, especially at Prime Cooking/Eating Hour. Hence, there must be a quick turnover with your pots and pans to keep your burner.

Toss in corned beef, and vegetables, stir quickly to keep it from burning. Add a touch of black pepper. This does not take long to cook. The entire estimated preparation time for this classic meal is forty-five minutes.

This meal can serve four, or at a stretch, six. We recommend it with tinned veg on the side and red kool-aid as the beverage of choice.