11 Nov 2021
Preparing meals is a time-consuming process that includes shopping, cooking, and cleaning. Let our Genies take care of all of that, so you can have more time to spend with your family. As an added bonus, your family will love the food, too!
25 Mar 2021
I believe Cleveland’s own Michael Symon says it best: “Cooking and feeding people always makes me feel better and, I think, it will also make everyone else feel a little more normal and better, too.” 2020 has, to nobody’s surprise, devastated the culinary industry around the world. It has left many cooks, chefs, dishwashers, and servers without a reliable source of income and taken away a major part of their daily drive. But as times change and industries evolve, people find new outlets for work, creativity, and passion to satisfy their craving for fresh food.
Right as the pandemic took hold and many places were forced to close their doors, I found myself without a kitchen to run and a lot of time on my hands. It allowed me time to pursue other culinary outlets and has given me the chance to explore the world of cuisine from outside the confines of a hot bustling commercial kitchen. With CookinGenie, I am able to keep pursuing that daily drive and practicing my art, even in times of turmoil. At first, as with any new industry, I had my doubts about reversing the typical restaurant status quo and traveling with my expertise. But as I would go on to learn, culinary passion is the same whether it was in a busy kitchen or in someone’s home.
One of the best feelings of working in a restaurant is going out to the dining room at the end of a busy night and seeing a packed house of customers all having the night of their lives. From couples having a romantic night out, to families celebrating a birthday, it brought a sense of accomplishment and pride to see plates of food that took so much time and effort to make come back practically licked clean. With CookinGenie, I am able to work directly with the client and give them that same sense of satisfaction, while being able to give them and their food one hundred percent more focus and attention. My first client was a family celebrating getting their vaccine and being able to see extended family from out of state for the first time. I was able to connect and bring these people a stress-free, decadent first meal in a long time. It allowed them a chance to reconnect, drink and share all while not having to worry about shopping for fresh ingredients, clean-up, sanitization, or any other worry that could come with traditional restaurants.
CookinGenie brings a sense of appreciation that is sometimes hard to feel in the back of the house (BoH is anyone that works unseen in the back. Cooks, food runners, dishwashers, etc). Instead of the train of tickets on the line, with orders from 15 different families, CookinGenie allows for a much more personal, romantic experience. When preparing food for a client in their own kitchen, it allows the individuals cooking the meal the chance to really let their culinary talents shine. Most cooks have to follow a menu set by either their chef or the restaurant owner and never have a chance to let their personal talent and skillset succeed. With CookinGenie, the menu, the schedule, the sourcing is all mine. It also allows for menus to be changed seasonally so that you can always guarantee fresh delicious home cooked food.
06 Jul 2021
The Challenge of Eating Gluten Free
For many Americans, trying to find good gluten free meals is a never-ending struggle. It’s estimated that about 30% of Americans follow a gluten free diet. A small number of these people have celiac disease, a rare disorder that causes violent illness after consuming products with gluten, but many others avoid gluten due to more minor sensitivities or to improve overall health.
Whatever your reason for seeking out gluten free meals, there’s no doubt it can be challenging. Today, as the popularity of gluten free diets have risen, it is easier to find gluten free foods, but there can still be many obstacles.
Many restaurants still don’t offer very many gluten free options on their menus, or menus don’t have specific dietary labels, which can make it hard for diners to distinguish which items are safe to order. Even in the grocery store, unless an item is clearly marked as gluten free, it can be hard to read labels and determine what is actually gluten free or not.
CookinGeine Has Plenty of Delicious Gluten Free Menu Items
This dynamic can make trying to cook gluten free meals at home difficult. Luckily, CookinGenie can service all your gluten free meal needs and then some! Scroll through the menus of our many talented genies, and you’ll find plenty of healthy, delicious gluten free meals available.
Treat yourself to a heart-healthy, gluten free meal of Pan-Seared Salmon over Creamed Spinach, courtesy of genie Lashondre’a Lenor. Or if you’re looking for an elegant gluten free chicken dinner, look no further than the delightful Lemon-Rosemary Cornish Hens found on genie Dylan Tompkin’s menu.
And if you also follow a vegan diet, (we have plenty of vegan food too) there are still plenty of delicious gluten free meals to be found on CookinGenie, such as genie Vanessa Cahoun’s amazing Jamaican Vegetable Curry or genie Ozelm Saritoprak’s authentic Turkish Stuffed Grape Leaves.
Our Genies go the Extra Mile to Create Gluten Free Dishes
Our genies take care to carefully select their ingredients to be accommodating to many different dietary restrictions. Take, for example, genie Jared Kent’s vibrant Pad Thai, which uses gluten free soy sauce, opening up dishes to gluten free eaters that might not normally be available.
Amazingly, that even goes for dessert! It’s notoriously hard to find good gluten free desserts, but CookinGenie has you covered. You can get your fix for a gluten free chocolate craving with genie Lamont Denny’s addicting Chocolate Caramel Turtles or genie Christian Farah’s decadent Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge Bars.
Each dish is marked with tags that explicitly note if that item is gluten free, so there’s no guesswork involved. But even if you see a dish that’s not marked as gluten free, there’s a good chance if you give us a call, we can work with your genie to adjust it to your preferences. Often times all it takes is swapping out flour or pasta for a gluten free alternative. Our genies are skilled adapters and are happy to go above and beyond to satisfy their customers.
Eating gluten free can be tough; let CookinGenie make it a little easier, and a little more delicious.
02 Sep 2021
In America, we love our fried foods. From chicken wings and French fries all the way to corndogs and mozzarella sticks, we’ll eat just about anything that came from a deep fryer. But as much as we love these foods, it doesn’t take an advanced nutrition degree to tell that something submerged in a vat of hot fat probably isn’t good for you.
Deep frying foods cause the calorie count to go way up, it adds more saturated fat, and tacks on cholesterol. It’s been well-documented that regularly eating fried foods can promote weight gain, increase your chance of heart disease and diabetes, and just generally degrade your overall health.
Given all the adverse health effects of deep-fried food, it seems fairly obvious that giving them up would be a great lifestyle choice. But still, we love our fried foods, with 1 in 3 Americans eating fast food every day. The trouble is the hot, crispy food that comes out of the deep fryer can be very tasty, and rather addicting. Plus, many of us grew up with fried foods like chicken tenders and onion rings, and as adults, it can be very hard to put them down.
With more people becoming increasingly health-conscious about their diet, a new phenomenon has come into the fold over the past few years, air frying. An air fryer is a countertop machine with a perforated basket to “fry” foods without submerging them in oil. You simply toss the food with just a little bit of oil, put it in the basket, and the air fryer cooks it by blasting hot air in a rapid convective motion around the food. So technically, the air fryer doesn’t “fry” the food, it’s more of a quick convection bake, but the result of ultra-crispy food is still the same.
Without all that oil, air-fried foods have fewer calories than deep-fried foods and have much lower fat and cholesterol content. Of course, things like chicken wings and fries are still not exactly healthy foods even when air-fried, but this new age device can certainly help curb some of the worst consequences, so you can feel much better indulging.
At CookinGenie, one genie has mastered the art of air-frying and is ready to share his air fryer with the world. Genie Dylan Tompkins offers several air-fried dishes, such as his extra crispy air-fried wings with a delicious choice of sauces such as barbecue, buffalo, Cajun, and garlic-parmesan. He also has crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside air-fried sides such as the delicious marble potatoes served with bacon smash burger, or the golden-brown French fries that come with the chicken gyro. These delicious foods have all the same crispy fried goodness you love but without all the bad health baggage. With the magic of the air fryer and the magic of CookinGenie, you can have your fried foods, and eat them too.
Written by: Jared Kent
