You are to be stranded on a desert island. Nothing grows on this island*, but, strangely, it's covered with every imaginable kind of cooking equipment. You can only bring 5 ingredients with you, but a never-ending supply of each. What do you bring?

My list:


A cow - a source not only of many delicious cuts of meat, but of milk, butter and cheese as well. Not sure if that's cheating.

A potato - a no-brainer. Now I can have them fried, mashed, baked, au gratin, or as hash browns. Also, I can make vodka.

Garlic - since it's just me on the island, I can eat as much as I want.

A cacao plant - that's dessert taken care of. I'd probably try to get creative after a few years and put it into savoury dishes as well,

Asparagus - mainly for health reasons.

As a bonus crop, you can also plant one type of grape. I'd have to go with cabernet sauvignon, because of my cow.


*except herbs and spices

Fun question. I was actually thinking a few weeks ago of edible/consuming living things I really couldn't live without. I was slicing tomatoes, looking how perfect they were and i was like "wow - what if there were no tomatoes?". What could substitute for it and how it would turn my diet of 30 years upside down. Glad it was just a hypothetical!

I came down to 3 really tough ones. Wine (no kidding), Garlic and Tomatoes. When I think about the uniqueness of those 2 foods, the flavors they give off and how often I cook with them and integrate them - It would realy be a struggle for me to enjoy cooking and food in general without them. No other vegetable can replace those 2 for me. What could replace garlic? It's just the best thing ever created for a foodie. I could go vegeterian easier than give up garlic and tomato...

You have a few of my answers here. A cow is a good choice for the different cuts of meat, the dairy it produces etc. (and we could just keep getting a cow whenever we wanted?). Can we pay the "desert island authorities" extra to slaughter the cow and make some T-Bones ahead of time? or are we getting actual butcher equipment?

Garlic of course. Maybe an olive tree Cab for the wine too. I have to think more about this and we'd get sick of the food eventually. "Asparagus"? I think we can do better than that.

I like lots of things more than asparagus.. but I don't like many vegetables more than asparagus, and I thought I should have at least one green vegetable in there.

It's a shame pigs don't produce viable milk, because I think they're actually a bit more versatile, meat-wise, than cows. Plus then I could have bacon for breakfast. Maybe some sort of pig-cow hybrid is the best answer... one that lays eggs.

I think I'd miss bread most of all.

Bacon.

Barbera

I would also need coconut

Crimini and Porcini mushrooms

Cauliflower

Broccoli

I would keep the cow.

Broccoli and cauliflower are the same species (Brassica Oleracea), so with time and selective breeding you should be able to have both from one. Also in the same species you have kale, cabbage and brussel sprouts.

quote:

Originally posted by VT2IT:
Broccoli and cauliflower are the same species (Brassica Oleracea), so with time and selective breeding you should be able to have both from one. Also in the same species you have kale, cabbage and brussel sprouts.

In that case, I will start with cauliflower, I think it taste better.

You might need a few thousand years though... are you immortal on the island?

For that matter, I suppose since all life on earth shares a common ancestor we could just start with that and evolve anything we want. Wouldn't be terribly good eating in the meantime, but it would give me a chance to make my cowpig.

I'm not sure how long it would take, but I know it would be a lot less then 1000 years. More then a human life span? Maybe. Good luck with the cowpig though. If you manage to produce one I'll be your first client.

1. I will also take the cow-for milk, meat, and leather...perhaps a use for transportation also?
2. A chicken-for meat, eggs, and feathers for making pillows
3. Flour-I can make bread, pasta, pizza dough, tortillas...almost any carb product
4. Oranges-can eat it, drink it, use it as a weapon against enemy invaders...Vitamin C prevents scurvy
5. Spinach will be my green vegetable-lots of vitamins and provides calcium too

What exactly would you do with the cacao? Make bitter chocolate potatoes, bitter chocolate asparagus, or bitter boeuf a la cocoa? Isn't it kind of unless without the means to refine it and sugar to sweeten it?

I'd distill some sugar from grape juice.

This begs to ask, if there's nothing on the island, is there a supply of firewood/matches and pots? How are we going to cook all of this cowpig and distill the cacao?

quote:

Originally posted by Winetech:
This begs to ask, if there's nothing on the island, is there a supply of firewood/matches and pots? How are we going to cook all of this cowpig and distill the cacao?

woops..re-read the original post..missed the everykind of cooking equipment part