Weekend Cooking: The Magazine Edition

In the dark ages of the pre-Internet world I subscribed to just about every single food and cooking magazine that was available in the States. I also bought cookbooks like a maniac.

After I joined (and in fact helped moderate) a UseNet group (!!!), I started relying more and more on the web for finding new recipes. As we entered the modern era of blogs, websites, and Pinterest, I stepped back from magazines.

Then, early in my blogging career, I won a subscription to a digital magazine service. I forget what it was originally called, but it became Texture. For a small monthly fee, I had access to hundreds of magazines, though I primarily read the food and cooking titles. Tons of my more recent favorite recipes came from this service.

Well, all things have their end, I guess, and Texture sold out to Apple News+. For a slightly lower fee, I could continue my magazine subscriptions. I was willing and signed up for a trial month. I don't have too many gripes about Apple, but the interface for reading magazines in Apple News+ is the worst. Food magazines are missing the recipe indexes, there is no quick navigation or slider get to where you want to be, and finding recipes became totally frustrating. I canceled my subscription.

I didn't think I'd miss my magazines, but I really, really do. Enter RBG Digital, Flipster, and my libraries. Thank you, thank you. I can now read most of the magazines I'm used to: Cooks Illustrated, Eating Well, Bon Appetit, Food & Wine, the Food Network, and many more. Only one of my favorites is missing from the several libraries I belong to.

That magazine is Rachael Ray Every Day. Frankly, I'm not at all a fan of her show (is it still on???), but I always find at least one great recipe in her magazine every month. Why isn't she hooked up with the library? Fortunately, I found another workaround. For only $5 a year I bought a digital access only subscription. Even if I find only a single recipe in each issue, it's well worth the price, but my experience with Ray's magazine tells me I'll get my money's worth and more.

This week's hit recipe is a funny one: it's the overhauled sloppy Joe recipe from the May/June issue of Cook's Illustrated, which I checked out of the library. This recipe is so darn easy and quick and was truly delicious. Sometimes you just want to have comfort food, and this week called for it. I served our sloppy Joes in brioche buns from Wegman's (I was too lazy to bake my own), but it'd be fine on regular hamburger buns or even over rice, pasta, or a gluten-free alternative.

Add some fresh veggies from the farmer's market, pickles, and a summer salad and you're good to go. We drank wine, but I think beer would have been a better choice.  The photo shows my meal prep and I forgot to record the finished product. Ooops!

I was unable to find an online source for the original recipe, but I did find a version in which the ingredients have been cut in half to make a meal for two. If you want to make the same recipe I did, simply double the ingredients for 1 pound of meat, which makes enough filling for four sandwiches.

I checked the linked recipe against the one in the magazine, and it's exactly the same. Note too that this is one of those rare occasions when I actually followed the directions step by step. Shocking, right? That proves how much I trust America's Test Kitchen.

Go forth and be sloppy . . . you won't be sorry you gave these Classic Sloppy Joes a try.

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Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page.

NOTE: Mr. Linky sometimes is mean and will give you an error message. He's usually wrong and your link went through just fine the first time. Grrrr.
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