Sometimes you look in the fridge and think “Whats for dinner?” – this dish was knocked up freestyle with a bit of this and a bit of that, whatever was to hand, More an improvisation than a recipe, but as tasty as any recipe ive followed.
Method: Chop all the root veg into small cubes and set to boil in salted water, meanwhile fry the onions corgette and minced lamb in a little olive oil with half of the mixed spices, once the mince is browned off add some tomato passata and leave to simmer.
Once the root veg is boiled soft, drain and add to the pan with the remaining spice mix sprinkled over and the remaining passata, add a little water if it seems a bit dry, simmer for a further 10 minutes and serve with pitta bread.
If you have a few mouths to feed make a side of cous cous or basmati rice . MMmmmmmm – lets munch
I asked Josh how he wants his chicken cooked tonight
- he said Just the breast in lemon with roast potatoes,
so here goes – it turned out a tasty dish and cooked to order.
Ingredients:
4 Chicken Breasts
1 Lemon
Half a bulb of garlic
Bunch of fresh sage
Butter
olive oil
Method: Peel, par-boil and put your potatoes in to roast….
Chop up the garlic and some of the sage heat a pan with a mixture of olive oil and butter and add the chicken breasts, turning occasionaly until browned and sealed with sage and garlic coating the breasts.
Transfer the whole lot into an oven dish and place alongside your potatoes,
Once all cooked through take the juices from the dish and thicken with some cornflour to make a delicious lemony herby gravy and serve.
Its quick, easy and simple and goes with many things eg. jacket potatoes , rice, pasta, tortilla chips and wraps.
I had mine with action man bow-tie pasta with cheese on top.
Ingredients:
500gms mince beef
1tin of peeled tomatoes
1tin of kidney beans in chilli sauce
1 large red chilli
paprika
cayenne pepper
chilli powder
1 large red onion
2 clove of garlic
marmite
Method: First dice the onion and finely chop the chilli and garlic keep the seeds if you like it hot.
Then add them to a large pot on a low heat with a little oil sweating the onions untill soft.
Season the meat with salt and pepper add a tea spoon of chilli powder , tea spoon of paprika and a dash of cayenne pepper . Mix together then add the meat to the pot mixing all of the ingredients together then add a table spoon of marmite . keep turning the mince until browned now add the tin of kidney beans and tomatoes, add another tea spoon of chilli powder, 1 1/2 of paprika and a little cayenne pepper.
Simmer with the lid off on a low heat stirring occasionally , the longer you you do this for the better but i would say a minimum of 45 mins.
Ingredients: 1 Whole fresh chicken ethically reared
Four whole onions
White potatoes with hardly any skin (m&s do great potatoes)
Broccoli
Spring greens
Garlic
Butter, seasoning & gravy granules
Cook: Start your oven, on 180• wash your chicken and trim it’s backside. While washing it, push your palms down on it’s back to break it’s bones and flatten it slightly,this aids an even cooking process and allows more flavour. Slather some vegetable oil all over the tin and heat on hob for a few moments. Put your chicken in the centre of your roasting tin face down and sear on the hob for a few seconds to seal the skin then turn it over and place in oven,setting your timer for 1.15hrs cooking time. This is about average for a good sized chicken and for it to be moist. Lovingly peel your potatoes and as opposed to cutting in half cut them in half longways. It’s more attractive on the plate to have generous sized pots. Par boil the potatoes for about 8mins, drain the spud water into a vessel for later. Drench the pots in vegetable oil, add butter and a generous squeeze of garlic purée and season. Swirl around with a metal spoon until all potatoes are covered. Open the oven and place your glistening, delicious-smelling potatoes all around your chicken. Take your onions peel them and place around the tin.
Trim your broccoli end and then break into sprigs. I always chop the stalk and include this too believing that there’s nutrients in that bit. Place a quarter of water in the pan, cover and put aside. Take your spring greens, wash thoroughly, chop into slices and throw into your saucepan. DO NOT FILL WITH WATER! Biggest mistake people make is to drench their veg with water. Nooo!
Take about 3-4 cloves from a bulb of garlic, crush and throw into your greens. Slip a knob of butter beneath it all then season with coarse black pepper and rock salt. Cover and leave aside. Disappear for a bit, in my case sort out the rows over the gaming in the front room, seek out my 3yr old diva daughter and remove the expensive makeup from her hands and retrieve items shoved down the amenities. Put a stack of washing away then return downstairs to crack on with the Chardonnay. Oh! it’s only 5pm? What the hey! Chin chin!
Back to cooking…
With about 15 minutes till end of cooking time. Boil up your broccoli, bearing in mind there’s hardly any water in there it may sound like it’s dry boiling. Just keep an eye on it. When the water boils away, turn off the gas and let it cook in it’s own steam – steam = flavour. Turn on your greens, let them sizzle and get hot with the help of the butter. If they catch a bit, don’t worry it all adds to the flavour but turn the gas off after 3-4mins and cover. Your letting the garlic, butter and seasoning infuse the delicious al dente veg. When the cooking time is up, take your chick out, transfer onto a large plate and let her rest. Set out plates. When serving up, cut your chicken generously and in simple moves. My family is made up of three fussy herberts but luckily each likes breast or leg. Cut the leg first and literally cut the whole leg including some of it’s undercarriage as that’s where the tastiest dark meat is. When cutting the breast, again cut in one svelte move, you are serving up a whole side. Go close to its spine and cut in one move. Give the wings to whomever wants them. While doing this a lot of juices will have escaped onto the plate, pour these into a fresh saucepan, add your potatoe water from earlier and boil it up, and add your gravy granules to make a tasty gravy. Add as many or as little as you like depending on how thick you like it. Now, serve up your glorious green broccoli next to your chick, lay next to that your beautifully crisp and golden pots, then spoon up your garlic infused greens. Finish your dish by pouring over the steaming hot gravy with all those natural juices. Breathe in all those simple luscious flavours, perfectly cooked veggies and moist succulent meat. You’ll find this to be a hearty and reasonably healthy roast dinner, not just for Sundays I say!
There will probably be loads of Jamaicans and West Indians kissing their teeth while reading this and saying things like “Dat kyan right” or “dis na bloodclaat Jerk”, because Jerk is not a recipe its a state of mind, a feeling from deep within the soul, it is the epitomy of soul food and even by sticking to a recipe you are not giving the Jerk the respek’ due.
So heres some guidlines for the Jerk beginner, feel free to add or subtract depending on your mood and feelings and by all means this is not limited to Chicken or Pork, you can use fish, prawns, goat, beef, sausage or even if you are a real saddo tofu….
Ingredients:
1 scotch bonnet chilli
3 cloves of garlic
1 thumb size piece of ginger
1/2 tsp salt flakes
2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp ground all spice
1 tsp ground cloves
1/4 nutmeg, grated
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 tbsp malt vinegar
2 tbsp molasses or dark unrefined sugar
1 chicken or 1 kilo pork belly (or whatever you decide to “jerk”)
2 tbsp groundnut oil
Jerk Ingredients
Method:
In a pestle and mortar (or if your lazy like me use a spice blender) put the garlic, chilli, ginger, salt, thyme, spices and grind to a paste, then add the vinegar, oil and sugar and a few tbsp water until all combined and a smooth creamy paste.
Score the chicken (or whatever your using so as the paste penetrates deep into the meat) then put into a tupperware container or ziplock bag or a dish covered in cling film and allow to marinate – turning occasionaly for at least 4 hours – preferably overnight.
Jerk Chicken
Cook on a barbeque preferably one with a lid, and for added flavour put some all spice leaves or bay leaves or thyme or all of the above on to the charcoal to create an aromatic smoke (there are pre made smoking chips you can get)
Some people may think making your own pate is a right palava, but actually its not that hard (as long as you have a blender) and you can make so many variations to the normal chicken liver pate, this recipe makes a lovely lunch time pate, serve with fresh baked crusty bread for a real lunchtime treat.
JD pate
Ingredients: 500g Chicken livers
Small Onion
Few Mushrooms
2 cloves garlic
few sprigs of thyme
2 tbsp Jack Daniels
2 tsp Worcester Sauce
Ground pepper
Sea Salt
Olive Oil
Clarified Butter (or Ghee)
Few Bay Leaves
Method: Heat a little olive oil in a pan with the thyme and garlic,chop the livers and fry till cooked medium rare and put into the blender.
Then in the same pan soften the onions and mushrooms in some more oil just before they are cooked through add the Jack Daniels and Worcester Sauce and increase the heat.
Add all this to the chicken livers in the blender and pulse. – The more you blend the smother the pate.
Spoon the mixture into a few ramekins or pate dishes and place a few bay leaves and pepper corns on the top.
JD Pate
Then put a few knobs of clarified butter into the pan and melt, pour the melted butter over the top of the pate to seal it.
The butter acts as a seal and the pate will keep for up to 2 weeks in a fridge, however once the butter seal is broken you have about 2 days to eat it.
pork shoulder 1-2kgs serves 4-6
3 red chillies (finely chopped)
1 onion
finger of ginger 2-4cm
fish sauce 1 table spoon
3 cloves of garlic
light soy sauce 2 table spoons
for the stock:
Cinnamon sticks
red onion
1 Chilli
chicken stock 500ml
Method:
first you start with making a paste for the pork, grate the onion, garlic and ginger into a bowl then add the chillies , fish sauce and soy and.
mix this together until a paste ( potato masher is handy or a food processor makes easy work of this).
once the texture is like a sloppy peanut butter.pat down the pork with kitchen towl to remove excess moisure.Rub the paste into the pork putting the majority of it on the fat on top. then place ino a baking tray.
preheat oven at 180 o
second prepare the stock, you can use a homemade chicken stock if you have it or one of the good stock cube/liquids are fine. add 500ml of the stock to the baking tray then add two cinnimon sticks , the chilli whole and an onion chopped in half.
cut the grease proof paper to the size of the topside of the pork place on the pork against the paste like a grease proof roof, this is to help the fat crisp.then wrap the foil over the whole thing finishing it wrapped around the tray.put in the oven for 2hours after 2 hour turn the temperature to 120, remove foil and baste the sides of the pork place back into oven for 30mins or until pork is crisp ( if you have trouble crisping the fat remove crease paper and pop under the grill). take it out of the oven and leave to rest for 15-20mins then serve.drizzle the stock over the pork.
we served ours with roast potato’s and a pineapple salad.
Tasty oven cooked chicken dish, can be used with any cut of chicken here we use thighs, but this recipe is all about the marinade / sauce.
Satay marinade/sauce
Ingredients;
Chicken (here we used 16 thighs)
Garlic
Ginger
Lemon Grass
Zest and juice of lime
3 tbsp Peanut butter
Coconut milk
Method:
Put all the ingredients (apart from the chicken) into the blender and blend into a smooth liquid about the consistency of single cream.
Score the chicken skin right to the bone place in an ovenproof dish and completely cover the chicken pieces with the sauce, place in the fridge for at least 2 hours, preferably overnight turning occasionally.
Roast in the oven until chicken is cooked through, again turning occasionally. – serve with a rice dish.
home made beef burgers are so much more tasty and comforting than buying 99p rubbish from your local supermarkets frozen food department, plus you know whats in them and it takes minutes.
Ingredients:
500g minced beef
1 egg
handful of breadcrumbs
1 tsp salt
1 tsp mixed pepper
1 tsp chilli powder
few drops of tabasco
2 tsp mixed herbs
Method
chuck it all in a bowl and mix it up with your hands – a blender will ruin the texture….
Roll into balls and flatten into patties, grill on the George Foreman.
- if you dont have a George Foreman chuck them under the grill turning often.
Extremely tasty melt in your mouth dish from a cheap cut of meat, slow roasted so the meat just falls apart and full of flavour. – not suitable for those on a diet, especially the crispy crackling that goes with it.
Slow Roasted Pork Shoulder
Ingredients:
Shoulder of Pork (deboned preferably)
Bottle of Cider (Sweet or Medium)
Apple
Cornflour or gravy thickener
Salt + Pepper
Garlic Salt
Onion Granules
Method:
Core and skin an Apple and chop into segments place on the bottom of an ovenproof dish, place the Pork Shoulder on it skin side up,
Score the skin and rub in a mixture of salt, pepper, garlic salt & onion granules into the skin making sure to get the mixture deep into the cuts you have made, this makes for a very flavoursome crackling.
Preheat the oven to 130 and roast the joint with the lid on for half the time.
(for each kilo of meat you should roast in totsl for at least 6 hours – so in this case we have a 1 kilo joint pre-roast for 3 hours)
Remove the fat that has cooked out of the pork and replace with the cider, it is important to try and cover as much of the joint as possible with the cider but allowing the skin to remain above the water level. – this keeps the meat moist but allows the skin to start to crispen.
After the next 3 hours remove the joint from the dish and peel off the layer of skin / fat from the top – place this under the grill for around 5 minutes before serving to make it crispy (it will pop and crack while crisping)
Put the oven dish on the hob and bring to the boil then simmer adding your thickening agent to make the cider gray.
- serve with roast potatos, mash, veg, & Yorkshire Puddings
