Raid Food: Three quick easy and cheap recipes for gamers.

Naturally, when in the middle of a gaming session none of us have time to cook, but why order pizza, when it's expensive, unhealthy and most of all it takes half an hour to forty five minutes to arrive anyway. So instead get these simple ingredients:


flour / eggs / salt / baking powder / cooking oil / bulk cooking yellow cheese / meat: any meat will do / veggies if you sway the vegetarian way - onions, leek, potatoes etc. / any kind of spices - pepper, chili, barbecue spice etc.


You'll also need tin foil an oven a bowl to mix stuff, one plate, one fork and one knife and a frying pan, preferably a cheap-a$$ non-stick wok and a pot and probably a wooden spatula.

Some quick common sense tips before you start: If cooking for the first time you can waste ingredients and money

at the least and kill yourself at worst. Burning protein like meat chars and eventually catches flames. Overheated

oil smokes up and bursts into flames, totalling your kitchen in seconds, if that happens don't throw water onto it,

unless you want a fire-ball in your kitchen - use a wet towel to smother the flames, since fire hates a lack of oxygen

more than it hates water. Burning carbohydrates such as veggies boiling in a pot (with the water boiled out) 
smoke up and release Carbon Monoxide, which will kill you in minutes, it's a smokeless, odourless, 
colourless gas that can fill up your kitchen in mere minutes.

1: Trinidad Aloo Pies

Start by peeling 3-4 large potatoes throw them in salted water and boil until you can cut them in half with the fork without any effort - that's the easiest way to know they're ready. Meanwhile in a bowl mix half a bowl of flour, 1 table spoon of baking powder, a pinch of salt and water. Add like 3/4 tea-cup of WARM water and with a stirring motion make a soft dough that shouldn't be sticky. If your dough is softer you can always add flour while you knead it, if it's harder add some more water and stir well.

Your potatoes will not be ready by a long-shot, so dump that dough onto a large plate and sprinkle it with flour. Spread the flour on top of the dough and on the sides so when it inevitable sticks to the plate you can use your fingers and the flour to lift it up. Then KNEAD, like you're grinding fishing in WoW, don't burn yourself out just punch it up, until it's flat then fold into a ball again, flour if sticky, and punch up again - do that for 10 minutes.

By now those annoying potatoes should have started to bubble every now and again, but ignore the weak-sauce pre-boil and move on, being rightfully disgusted by the insane amounts of energy that salty water is able to buffer, before it starts to give a f&*(.

Take your dough and make a cylinder out of it, then cut it into 6-9 equal pieces, then roll those in balls, and leave them on the side, but make sure they're not touching each other, since they'll try to merge together, like the Terminator and annoy the living hell out of you, having to do the whole cutting and shaping all over again.

Now your water is probably boiling so go have a smoke, have some coffee, chill out, think about the meaning of life, and come back in about 20 minutes. Try if you can drive your fork into a potato. Do you have to push? No? It goes all the way through and that poor thing ends up in halves? Score! Take off of the stove, dump the water, and using your fork mash the potatoes into pulp, then add spices like pepper, chili, whatever you like, and mash some more. Flatten the thing on the bottom of the pot, and with your fork cut it into the same number of divisions as the balls of dough you have.

Finally heat up your wok with half an inch of cooking oil and be careful here, cuz that thing will smoke up and eventually catch flame if you forget about it. Take a ball of dough flatten it into a pancake the size of your palm, then dump the potato mix, press and fold in two until you have a dumpling shaped thing. Squeeze the edges together and twist to close it. Now flatten it between your hands as thin as possible without breaking it, then fry until golden brown on both sides. Keep in mind it takes 1-2 minutes on high heat per side, and 3-4 on medium heat. Easy way to find out when its done is it's going to sizzle like a motherf*^$#r at first, then it's gonna go quiet. When it goes quiet it's done. Flip it using your wooden spatula, then drain on a sheet of tin foil.

If you've closed the dough well, and your pies didn't have any holes in them, they'll puff up to 2-3 times their thickness, when you fry them. So don't worry about flattening them too much, as long as there's no holes in the dough. The flatter they are the better they'll taste.

You can leave some for later, they're spicy and taste great both hot and cold and in combination with anything else you can think of, they'll also last in your fridge.


2: Home-made pan pizza

Make the dough as you would for the Aloo Pies, but add a tablespoon of cooking oil and a pinch of sugar. Spread it on a piece of tin foil, large enough to cover the baking tray of your stove, the flatter it is, the better. Set your oven on the highest heat (300 Celsius for mine), and throw the dough in it for 3-4 minutes. It may start to form bubbles of air, poke and flatten those with your fork. Don't brown the dough, or you'll end up with a lame excuse for Turkish bread, take it out after 3-4 minutes. We do this so your pizza isn't doughy, cuz it takes more heat for the dough to cook, than your regular ingredients.

So take that out and add some ketchup or tomato sauce on it, cheese, meat, spices, whatever you like. Any leftovers you have will do. Go crazy experimenting. Throw it back in, until the sides are nicely brown and crispy, which on high heat would be around 10-15 minutes. You can add spices after its done, or an egg.

The trick to adding an egg to pizza is it takes 2-3 minutes to cook, after which it turns into rubber. So only add it when your pizza is done, throw a pinch of salt on it, back in the oven, and watch it as it cooks in front of your monitor strained eyes.

3: One-piece hot dogs


Make the dough same as for the Aloo pies, although add an egg, that's gonna make your dough more puffy. Spread it really thin, you can roll it using a rolling pin if you have one, or a thick glass bottle. Make sure to dust it with flour as you roll it, and flip it every now and again or else it'll stick to the tin foil and you'll have to clean that off piece by little piece, which sucks.

Then cut the dough using your knife, into pieces the size of your palm, take some hot dog wieners, or any other meat or veggies or cheese you like, throw them on top and close the dough in the shape of an envelope. Pinch the edges, so it doesn't open up when it bakes, but leave it open on the top, so you can later on add some ketchup to it or whatever you like.

Make sure the oven is heated on max, and throw those things in, making sure they're spread apart on the tray, since they'll expand and you probably don't want to have to cut them off from each other.  As soon as the top is nicely brown and before any of it starts to burn, take them out, add fresh vegetables, sauces or anything else you like and enjoy.