The following is most relevant to a skinny guy who is trying to add some mass and muscle to his frame. The older you are, the more different the weight gain guidelines would be (i.e. a little more clean), but most of you are young anyway. Here’s what I would do.
1. I’d designate alternate weeks as chicken fried steak (CFS) and chili week. Luckily there are good recipes for both (see respective links). If you make plenty on Saturday or Sunday, then you’ll have it throughout the week. This is the best plan, because you don’t have to worry about making food throughout the week. Whether you are a student, working, or just lazy, making the majority of your week’s food all at once is going to work best.
2. I would ALWAYS make fried biscuits with the CFS and corn bread with the chili. The first time I had fried biscuits was the first time Gant invited me over for CFS, and it’s a perfect combo. Just get the easy-make biscuits and put the biscuits in some grease and pull them out after they are browned. Dip or cover them with gravy. Aside from having a delicious addition to your meal, the biscuits/bread will ensure you get extra calories and the carbohydrates for mass gaining. I shouldn’t have to repeat this, but if you’re older or already a bigger or fatter guy, then you won’t need as much. Skinny guys should eat until they are uncomfortable. If you regurgitate your meal, you ate a tad too much.
3. I would make corn bread as a staple too. When you have breakfast, I’m already assuming you’re having plenty of eggs and bacon (and cooking the eggs in the bacon grease). After this, take your already made corn bread, put a bit of butter in the pan, and then re-cook each side of your corn bread in the butter. This will make a slightly crisp and buttery exterior to the piece of corn bread that complements the bacon extremely well.
4. I would cook some other kind of meat throughout the week as well. A pot roast can break up the monotony and even add a third addition to your meal rotation. Ground beef, sirloin tips, and chicken cutlets can all be made in large quantities and stored. I name meats like this because if you’re young, busy, and possibly single, you won’t want to take a lot of time building your food. Prepare lots of another type of meat so that you aren’t eating CFS or chili three times a day.
5. I would make mashed potatoes a staple to the diet. Adding mashed potatoes to your meat mill will ensure you get yet another complete meal. Sure, you can have vegetables with this, but when aiming for mass you’re gonna try and get big hearty meals. When I was going through a linear progression and trying to gain weight I didn’t always get complete meals nor did I build easy meals such as these. I recommend you do because the quality of food will make you enjoy the process much more.
6. This is another thing I shouldn’t have to say, but I have a feeling it needs to be said. If you’re eating “clean” for the sake of aesthetics or health, treat yourself once in a while to an awesome meal. Being kinda weird about what you eat is all right, but being really fucking weird is really fucking weird. If you think you think you catch a cold from a hunny bun, you’re taking it a little far. Gant once said something along the lines of, “If you’re getting knocked out by a happy meal, you’re just not that elite.” Not only is drinking beer while watching football okay, but it’s going to be necessary to make sure you aren’t insane.
Those are just a few things I came up with as I was frying some corn bread this morning. For those of you who have already gone through this process (or those of you who still are), feel free to share any interesting/helpful tidbits. My aim here was to focus on ease and cost effectiveness. Some of you would argue that getting dollar fastfood hamburgers is a solid idea, but I never really cared for that approach (that isn’t to say I didn’t opt for fast food, but only in a pinch).
Note: It’s kind of difficult to link to another post on WordPress because if you publish the post you want to link, it will show up as the recent post on the home page. If anyone knows a way around this, let me know. Since I A) don’t have much time to write a post, B) talking about building quality food is important, and C) this didn’t get posted yesterday, I’m going to use it as the Wednesday post.
Note 2: The TSC is this month’s challenge, and it isn’t all that hard to do. This is how you do it, and this is where you post the results.
The following is the text from an e-mail Harrison sent me.
This is a very simple, base version of the recipe. Feel free to experiment and add your own flavors. A few ideas I’ve tried: more spices like cumin, cayenne pepper, carraway, etc. Different cuts of meat. Different varieties of potatoes.
Ingredients:
* Two huge pieces of beef (round eye, chuck, it doesn’t really matter. Get whatever is cheap.)
* Rosemary and Thyme (fresh is better, dried is OK)
* 10 cloves of garlic, minced
* 1 large white onion, minced
* salt
* pepper
* Beef broth or stock. You’ll need enough to cover the meat in the pot. Somewhere around 32 oz. Make your own with spare bones and trimmings from other meals if you can.
* 4 cups white mushrooms
* 8-12 Yukon Gold potatoes
* 2 sticks of butter
* 1 cup of whole milk
* 4-6 handfuls of broccoli
* 2 tomatoes
* Olive oil
* Red wine
* Blue Crushed Velvet Suit
* Silver Medallion with Male Symbol
* Italian Leather Shoes
* Burt Backarat Plays His Hits Vinyl Record
Start by heating a large pot (cast iron if you have it) on high. While it’s heating, rinse and pat dry the beef, then liberally season it with salt and pepper. Sear each side of the beef in the pan. Be patient. After like 45 seconds you’re going to want to turn it. Don’t do that. Give it a good 2-4 minutes/side. Set the oven to 350 F.
Add the broth, half of of the garlic and half of the herbs. No need to chop the herbs, just give them a good smash with something to get their juices flowing. I recommend using some kitchen twine to tie them all together for easy retrieval later. Cover and put in the oven for 3 and 1/2 hours.
Have your wife/roommate ensure that the house doesn’t burn down while you go to the gym.
Return from the gym and drink 1/2 gallon of milk and a sandwich. Then move on to beers, either Natty Boh, or a solid Brown Ale if it’s been a good year.
Chop the potatoes into equal sized cubes. At the 3.5 hours mark, put the potatoes on the stove and cover them with water. Add about 2 tsp salt to the water. Turn on the burner and boil for 20 minutes.
Remove the lid from the pot and give everything a stir. Add the mushrooms, remaining garlic and half of the onions. Optional: add carrots, celery, cabbage, and/or whatever you want. If you add these extra vegetables, don’t add the mushrooms; instead, sautee them with some of the broth for about 15 minutes, until they’re shrunk and soft.
After 20 minutes drain the potatoes and get rid of as much water as you can. While they’re draining, heat two sticks of butter in a small pan. Add some olive oil too, to prevent burning. Once it’s melted and hot, add the rest of the onions and garlic. De-stem and chop up the remainder of the herbs and add them in too. Put the potatoes back in the pot and put it on a medium burner. Add about a cup of milk and then pour this mixture into your potatoes. Mash it all together. Add more salt and pepper, as desired.
Also while the potatoes are draining, chop up your broccoli and tomatoes and coat them with olive oil, herbs, salt and pepper. Put them into a steamer but don’t turn it on yet.
Once the uncovered pot has been in the oven for 30 minutes, remove it and turn off the oven. Carefully remove the beefs and put them into a bowl and cover. You’ll want to let them rest for 10-15 minutes.
While the meat is resting, turn on the steamer. As soon as the broccoli turns a deeper green and the tomatoes are soft, remove them from the heat.
While the vegetables are steaming, get your mushrooms out of the broth using a strainer and put them into a pan. Add some red wine and broth to the pan and heat for about 5 minutes, until the sauce is reduced.
Put this mixture into a blender and blend until smooth. This is the gravy.
Slice the meat from one corner to another, against the grain. Get a huge plate and build up a nice bed of mashed potatoes. Put some of the vegetables on one side and the meat on the other. Smother with gravy. EAT IT ALL. I like to have a few fruits after the meal.
Suggestions welcome.
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Get strong so you don’t have to be the recipient in the last panel of this comic.
70’s Big reader Harrison shows you how to make pot roast. Finally, some more recipe submissions. I’ll ask him for a cliff notes in case you don’t watch the 9 minute vid. Edit: I forgot to note that the quote that I was credited with in the video was said by Gant. Edit 2:You can find the recipe explanation here (let me know if this link doesn’t work).
This past weekend I decided to make Gant’s chicken fried steak and Jacob’s chili. Both of these are top Texas meals, and I’ve never made either one of them. I’m just guessing here, but I’m assuming Jacob has had chili his whole life and has made it hundreds of times. He said he had never measured anything, so that means he’s used to eye balling all the portions (almost as much as he eyeballs pictures on this site).
Gant is an experienced cook who makes meals that a man would want; smoked meats, potatoes and the like. Gant has been doing it so long it’s just natural, and he has a lot of wisdom stored up on the matter. I say all this because either one of these guys can make a video showing how to make their chili or chicken fried steak, but there are still some problems you can run into when you’re a noob. I cooked both of these meals and they were incredible. I learned some things along the way that I would have rather not learned the hard way. I am a noob cook/chef/whatever. That means that while you older guys may say, “Well, yeah, duh” to my observations, this is all new to me. And if you younger guys say the same thing, then I’m sorry I don’t waste my time watching Rachel Ray, and I don’t care how much you want to diddle her. Pay attention. I’ll try and make it entertaining along the way.
Chili
Jacob making his chili, part 1 and part 2. Here is the post with the ingredients.
I didn’t really mess anything up when I made Jacob’s chili. My only regret is that something prevented me from starting the crock pot mid-morning and it wasn’t ready in the middle of all the college football games on Saturday. I went ahead and included all of the ingredients that he listed. Before I made the chili, I remembered when Gant made it earlier this year, and he said it was a little spicy. Well, if Gant thinks it is spicy, then it’s gonna be real fucking spicy for me. Gant told me that the heart of chili is a good beer, chili powder, and cumen — everything else is just icing on the cake.
Pre-cooked chili
Jacob listed a few different types of chili powder, but I just used one type of chili powder. I used about 3 tablespoons of it, then a little over a tablespoon of cumen. Then I halved all the other peppers, because I didn’t want to get effed up (and neither did the lady friend). In the video Jacob uses Shiner Bock, which has become my stock everyday beer since I lived in Texas (I like others, as well, but when I’m eating smoked or spicy meats, I like Shiner). And I didn’t realize that it was used as the primary liquid in the chili. You see, my parents are both from Pennsylvania so stuff like smoked meats, chicken fried steak, and chili weren’t staples in my childhood. My mom is a great cook, but she doesn’t have the southern or Texas influence. Anyway, I used two Shiner Bocks for my broth (along with the ingredients Jacob listed) for about…oh, probably 3 pounds of meat, maybe more. It was sirloin tips and ground beef. I wouldn’t suggest using any kind of light beer (certainly not light commercial shit) because it won’t have any significant flavor. Gant told me he has used Negra Modelo for a nice mexican chili.
I chopped about a half cup of cilantro up, and this was the high end of what Jacob recommended. This turned out being pretty strong. When the chili was cooking for about an hour and a half, I was worried I had too much cilantro. at this point I only had 2 tablespoons of chili powder and 1 of cumen, so I added about another of each. That seemed to bring down the strength of the cilantro, and I’m glad I did it.
Before I forget; fuck garlic. Don’t waste time with this. I had never dealt with raw unpeeled garlic before, and it’s not worth it. You have to peel the crusty stuff off the top, then you have to peel the individual cloves like it’s a pistachio that hasn’t been cracked. It was a giant pain in the ass, and I was in the middle of trying to watch football and drink beer, so I was pissed. Most stores have freshly peeled/chopped garlic in the vegetable section. Fucking Winn Dixie didn’t.
I used flour to thicken my chili up after it had been cooking five or six hours. It worked pretty well. Ere on the side of less flour than not. We’ll come back to this lesson later. All in all, this chili was badass. Again, I’ve never made these Texas foods, and I will always default to Gant’s advice on food, because he A) likes eating good food and B) is good at making good food. Texas seems to this on lock down.
Chicken Fried Steak
I’ve eaten Gant’s chicken fried steak before, so I already knew it was delicious. The problem would be in replicating that feat. Luckily Gant has some pretty comprehensive videos on how to make it.
Here is the post with ingredients, and here is video 1, video 2, and video 3.
The good thing about making CFS is that you don’t need a whole lot of stuff. The odd item is the tenderized cube steaks. My mom tells me that some grocery stores don’t sell them. Well, Winn Dixie did, but my steaks weren’t nice little squares like Gant’s in the video. They looked like the butcher and his buddies were throwing them against the wall from across the room, and then let them slide down into the package. No big deal, though, because they don’t fall apart.
Depending on where you live, this may sound shocking, but I’ve never cooked anything in grease before. I poured some oil in the pan, turned it up to a little over medium, and thought, “Let’s see how this goes.” In the video, Gant said, “And if you’re gonna test your grease with water, for God’s sakes don’t put your face over the pan.” I didn’t, of course, because I listen to what Gant tells me, but I tossed a drop or two of water, and that shit popped 12 inches off the pan. Lesson here: If you’re new to grease cooking, keep the heat low. You can get fancy later.
I breaded my steaks (rub them all in flour, then add some corn meal to your leftover flour, dip them in an egg/milk mixture, then cover them in the corn meal mixture), and I decided I was NOT gonna put them in with my fingers like Dr. Badass Gant Grimes. I decided to use a fork. As I was putting the first steak in, the second half of it slipped off my fork, slapped the grease, and shot it in the air, burning the underside of my forearm in the process. Lesson here: Be very fucking careful when putting the steaks in grease. That shit hurts. I started using metal tongs and gripped them like Michael Jackson dangling his baby over the balcony. Side lesson: Apparently chapstick is good at healing grease burns.
This smarted.
(I realize that doesn’t look like much, but A) I needed some visual aids for this post, and B) when it hit me it hurt like a mofo. Go splash hot grease on you and see how it feels. Asshole.)
When I had the first two steaks in the pan, they didn’t seem to be getting that “crispy golden” look like Gant’s. That’s when I called him and learned that olive oil is the worst oil you can use for CFS. I didn’t even think about it. It was sitting next to the stove and I was drinking beer while watching Monday Night Football after training. Luckily I was able to drain the pan and use vegetable oil. The steaks turned out much better after this. And I was much more careful when I put them in the pan.
After cooking the steaks, it’s time to make gravy. I’ve made gravy before, but I made with sausages for breakfast. Basically you add flour to the grease, let it thicken up, and then add milk to that mixture. I’m pretty sure Gant poured some grease off. I was not entirely sober and just left it all in the pan. Then I added flour. Too much flour. It’s not like I turned my grease into Elmer’s glue, but when you add milk and the heat starts cooking your mixture, it thickens up. Then, as Gant told me, it will always thicken up when you take it off the pan. So in other words, you don’t need that much flour. But my befuddled brain thought I needed a good bit because I had so much grease. This doesn’t ruin the gravy, it just means you have to thin it out more and delays the whole eating process. Gant and my mom say that water is best to thin out gravy. I just added more whole milk. Lesson here: Use less flour than you think you need to. You can always add more later. Be patient with the thickening process, because it may take a few minutes on some heat. Make sure to get enough salt and pepper in there, but again, go easy at first.
Other than that, the CFS meal kicked ass. I forgot to make fried biscuits, but I did on Tuesday night. You just take the biscuit dough and place it in some hot vegetable oil in a small pot. Turn the biscuit over and you’ve got an awesome side to your chicken fried steak. If you’re trying to grow or recover from hard training, chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, and fried biscuits are filled with plenty of calories to get you bigger and stronger. I highly recommend it.
Gant's finished CFS
Hopefully this post does a few things. I hope it inspires you to try out either one of these recipes as the weather cools off (chili is perfect football/beer food). They are amazing. Texans really have their shit together when it comes to making awesome food. CFS doesn’t cost a lot of money because the majority of the ingredients should be sitting around your kitchen anyway. If the chili is expensive, have a few friends throw down to get the ingredients. I also hope that if you’re new to cooking awesome stuff like this, you’ll learn from my mistakes (mainly getting owned by the hot grease). So try it out and report back to us.
Lastly, if you have another awesome meal you think we will enjoy, e-mail it on in. It will be even better if you create a cooking video like Gant and Jacob have done (by the way, Jacob’s second video is worth viewing again — watch it until the end to see his bloopers). And you people from the north: you’re gonna have to do a lot to impress Gant.
Before this site was active, I would repeat a quote to my friends in creepily deep voice; “You gotta make sacrifices if you wanna be…70’s Big…”
It’s true. Everyone isn’t a genetic freak so you have to work hard for your strength and muscle gains. You have to put in the time, do the work, and eat right. Sometimes “eating right” means “eating lots”. Can you dig it?
Here is the shopping list that Harrison (5’9″, 185, up from 160) and his roommate used when they shopped at Costco recently. He said it’ll last them about a week.
32 chicken breasts
5 ribeye steaks
4 pounds of ground beef
4 packs of bacon
Pork spare ribs
126 eggs
Wheat Bread
Huge bag of frozen vegetables
Almond Butter
Fish Oil
Glucosamine
Alieve
Whey
Fresh Spinach
Huge bag of carrots
Huge bag of walnuts
Fresh asparagus
Many gallons of whole milk
Many fruits (apples, oranges, bannanas, strawberries, peaches, pineapple)
Teeth Whitening Strips (gotta stay pretty)
Case of beer because we ran out of home brew ale (gotta stay happy)
Here is the accompanying picture:
In related news, Michael e-mailed me about someone throwing down a challenge at work. Since he was the only “Man” in the department (only guy above 200 lbs.), he kindly obliged to attack The Whopper Challenge.
The Whopper Challenge consists of a Triple Whopper, Double Whopper, Single Whopper, and Whopper Jr. in one sitting. There is an hour time limit, but Michael shrugged that off (Brent told him to) and finished in a smug 17 minutes. The meal netted Michael around 3100 calories. Anybody want to challenge his time?
It’s time to get serious. What sacrifices have you made?
