Since summer is just around the corner, it’s time to fire up the barbecue and cook some delicious food. Here’s a variation on a recipe on found online for a delicious rub to put on your meat before you cook it.

• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/8 cup paprika
• 2 tablespoons Smoke & Spice salt
• 1 tablespoon pepper
• 1 teaspoon onion powder

Mix all together into a fine power, making sure to get all the lumps out of the brown sugar. Put the rub on the meat an hour before you cook it to maximise flavour. Be sure to cook the meat over a medium heat, less than you would normally use as the sugar in this rub has a tendency to catch fire! (Trust me on this)

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I’ve mentioned this to a few people and all are intrigued by the sound of this sauce so I thought I’d publish the recipe.

BBQ marinade sauce

• 350mL of ketchup (choose your brand)
• 1/3 cup of vodka (use the quality stuff)
• 1/3 cup of apple cider vinegar
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1/2 tbsp salt

Add it all together in a pot and simmer on a low heat for 30-40 minutes. This sauce makes an awesome basting sauce for any meat on the barbecue, or as a dipping sauce for chicken nuggets. Enjoy!

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Here’s a little recipe I’ve adapted over the years into a delicious and nutritious meal.

Meatballs

• 400g lamb mince
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp rubbed mint
• handful of raisins
• sesame seeds

Mix the lamb, egg, rasins and mint together and form into meatballs, then roll in sesame seeds. Bake at 180C for about 20 minutes.

Sauce

• 1 can tomatoes
• 1 capsicum
• 1 onion
• 1 tsp garlic puree
• 1 tsp mint
• 1 tsp basil

Slice capsicum, dice onion and cook in olive oil with the garlic until soft, then add the rest of the ingredients and simmer for 15 minutes.

Serve on a base of couscous seasoned with a little sumac or turmeric. Place meatballs on couscous and pour sauce over the top. Enjoy!

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With all the rubbish food on sale out there, I’m looking at you “Fruit” Roll Ups, finding a healthy snack option can be rather difficult. I’ve come up with, or found, some good recipes that you can share with friends and you know are good for you.

Roti chips

• 6 pack of roti/chapati bread
• 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of garlic puree

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I’ve always enjoyed spare ribs ever since I first ordered them at the Lone Star Cafe over 20 years ago. In fact, they were the first meat dish I ate after two years of vegetarianism.

Tonight I decided to make some ribs myself, having bought and cooked pre-glazed ribs before, but this time I intended to make them from almost scratch. First, the marinade.

BBQ marinade sauce

• 300mL of ketchup (choose your brand)
• 1/3 cup of vodka
• 1/3 cup of apple cider vinegar
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp chili powder
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1 sliced chipotle pepper
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1/2 tbsp salt

No related posts.

So I like fooling around in the kitchen, creating new and interesting dishes. Some work, like tonight’s effort, others don’t like my Thai yellow curry with herring.

Tonight’s dish was turkey nuggets with a lime and vodka salsa with a side of chips.

Salsa

• 1 can of chopped tomatoes
• 1 finely diced onion
• 1 sliced chipotle pepper
• 3 teaspoons of minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon of cumin
• 3 teaspoons of coriander
• 1/2 a cup of lime juice
• 1/2 a cup of vodka

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Here’s a recipe that I’ve been working on for a few weeks and think I finally have it perfected.

• 300g of chicken cut into small slices
• 1 can of light coconut milk
• 1.5 desert spoons of peanut butter
• 1 desert spoon of soy sauce
• 1.5 cups of frozen vegetables

Brown the chicken in a non stick pan with no oil. Once chicken is cooked, add coconut milk, soy sauce and peanut butter, bring to the boil, then add the frozen veggies and simmer for 20 minutes. I like to use an organic whole nut peanut butter and reduced salt soy sauce.

While it’s simmering, cook up some brown rice or brown quinoa to serve with the satay chicken. When the rice or quinoa is five minutes away from cooked, I also like to cover the satay mixture with baby spinach, stir and leave it until the rice or quinoa is ready. This makes the baby spinach wilt just a little and adds a nice flavour to it.

As a vegetarian or vegan option, swap the chicken for tofu which also makes a delicious satay.

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By popular demand, here is the recipe for vegetarian sausages. I’d like to point out, I do not claim this recipe as my own, it’s a variation of a recipe from Alison & Simon Holst’s cookbook, Meals Without Meat.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup of grated cheese
• medium sized onion
• 220g bag of breadcrumbs
• 2 eggs

Add cheese and onion to bowl. Add breadcrumbs and eggs. With wet hands, knead mixture until dough in consistent. Roll into approx 6 sausage shapes. Add to hot frying pan or barbecue until all four sides are golden brown.

The frying pan does do a better job of cooking these, they go a bit hard on the barbecue. If you like, a teaspoon of garlic puree is a lovely addition.

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A vegetarian favourite in our house, this is a meal that’s low on meat and high on taste. Full of anti-oxidants and vitamins, it’s not just a taste sensation, it’s good for you too.

Ingredients

• 1 medium to large kumara
• 1 can of chopped tomatoes (Watties Mexican tomatoes are very good)
• 1 can of Mexican style beans
• 1 teaspoon of garlic purée
• 4 tortillas
• 1 cup of grated cheese
• sour cream
• guacamole

Chop the kumara into small cubes and boil for around 20 minutes until kumara is soft.

Mash and add tomatoes, beans, garlic and seasoning if desired. I quite like MasterFoods chili & lime. Simmer on a low to medium heat.

In a pan, heat a small amount of oil and add one of the tortillas. Turn every 10 seconds until the tortilla is crispy. Tortillas cook quite unevenly and can burn quickly so it is important they are turned often.

Once all the tortillas are cooked, place one on a plate and cover in kumara mixture. Place a second tortilla on top. Cover evenly with guacamole, then add cheese and top with sour cream.

This kumara mixture can also be used to make burritos or some yummy vegetarian nachos.

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When you think about pizza, you probably think about a company who will bring a tasty meal right to your door but also the fat that seeps from the crust and meat which cannot be good for you.

Pizza is a traditional Italian dish which was made with a thin crust, topped with tomatoes, cheese and olive oil. However, over the years the American take on the pizza with double meat, shortening laden bases and cheese stuffed crusts.

As I mentioned earlier, tomatoes have a number of anti-cancer chemicals in them including lycopene, and a traditional margherita pizza contains a double dose of them. Plenty in the sauce and tomatoes as a topping as well.

An interesting study conducted in Milan, Italy between 1995 and 1999 found that men were 40% less likely to suffer a heart attack if they ate pizza once a week, but once again this is the Italian style pizza.

Having read all this I decided to try my hand at making my own pizza. I’ve done this before and it has ended in disaster. Today’s effort was much better, firstly buying a pizza stone made a huge difference, giving the crust an extra crispiness. Making the dough in my breadmaker, an appliance which has been out of action for about four years, was also a great success giving me a light fluffy dough, the foundation of a good pizza.

Pizza sauce is something which you’ll find on many supermarket shelves, but that’s just not the way I like to do things. Instead I got a couple of cans of tomato products, after checking the ingredients, and mixed them with some garlic and herbs, leaving them to simmer for 30 minutes.

The end result? My margherita pizza was fantastic, and while there are a few tweaks I need to make to my technique, I think this is one meal which will be promoted to the regular rotation.

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