Archive for the ‘Good Easy Recipes’ Category
Announcement: Good Easy Recipes – Not a Chef? Don’t Worry!
I didn’t worry much about preparing food. As any married man I only had to BBQ sometimes. Not much of a chore. No need for Good Easy Recipes.
Then, a few years ago my wife had some problems with her hip and leg and started walking with crutches. As she couldn’t stand in the kitchen I had to do more and more every day.
I started out as being the brawn and she the brains. Lots of times the recipes were too difficult for me to do and she had to help. She didn’t mind, but not being able to do anything much on my own was very frustrating. She pushed my button more and more to help with ideas for meals, because it was difficult for her to think of recipes I would be able to handle. Enter the search for good easy recipes.
We went through our recipes and started jotting down the good easy ones. A kind of good easy recipes for dummies effort.
It’s very difficult to do any meals if you don’t even understand the terms. The first thing then was for me to learn the terms. A Hollandaise sauce, for example, sounded Greek to me, but is only an emulsion of egg yolk and butter, usually seasoned with lemon juice, salt, and a little white pepper or cayenne pepper. Lots of other terms posted problems too. Too many ingredients further clouded the issue. What I was looking for should be easy, with a few ingredients and not too much possibility to stuff things up. Because of be ing pressed
for time most of the time, I wanted recipes that it would also not take too long to prepare and make.
Well there are, believe it or not, recipes like that and this blog is going to bring everything together.
Here is a recipe for my ‘Greek’ Hollandaise sauce.
Ingredients:
· 2 egg yolks.
· 250g butter.
· 1 lemon.
· Seasoning – Salt and pepper.
Utensils:
· 1 hand blender and 2 tallish containers. One must be microwave proof.
Step 1.
· Separate the eggs yolks and whites, and place the yolks into a measuring jug (or tall container).
· Add the juice of 1 lemon. (You can use more or less according to your taste).
Step 2.
Slice the butter and place in another measuring jug (or cup).
Microwave to boiling hot! – Make sure it doesn’t boil over the sides.
You need it to be this hot as it is going to cook the egg. Raw egg tastes yukky !
Step 3.
Blend the eggs and add the hot butter in a THIN stream to the egg mixture whilst hand blending. The more butter you add the thicker it will be.
Wonderful with chicken, fish, eggs etc.
Easy Beef Stew Recipe for the Stove
First off, thanks to Noakes and Co for this recipe, which I’ve adapted from their Raising Superheroes cookbook. The recipe in the book is actually a stew for toddlers which I came across when searching for some new recipes for my baby boy. And you know when you make stuff for your little people you have to do quality control, right? Well, I did serious quality control with this recipe – one spoon for you, one spoon for me, one spoon…until I just decided it would be better to just make a family-sized version of the stew with a few tweaks. Like, a non-pureed version.Secondly, you do not need a pressure cooker for this stew, you just need 90-120 minutes for cooking time. Hoooooray for you if you don’t have a pressure cooker this recipe is for you! (But I mean, you still need to get yourself one, at some point, you are not completely off the hook, see!)The actual preparation time is quick so you can quite easily prepare it early in the afternoon and still have it ready for an early dinner if need be. The great thing about stews is that they are difficult to mess up. You’ll usually score an A+ with whateverrrrr you add. They are often my go-to meals for weekends because I can finish up any lonely looking veggies in my fridge before I re-stock with fresh goods.Having said that, you need to adhere to a few basics! Here are my top tips for an AMAZING stew: Always brown the meat. Add in garlic or spices or herbs when browning the meat as it releases and imparts all sorts of rich flavours to your stew. If you don’t have beef or chicken stock, use wine. Red wine for beef stews and white for chicken stews. Tomato paste or tomato puree can also add an incredible flavour to stews. Long slow cooking times equal tender and tasty stews. There you go!!
Spaghetti with Mince and Bacon
4 SERVINGS
Salt
500-gram spaghetti
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
3 slices smoked bacon, chopped
500-gram mince
1 medium onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves (crushed)
3 tablespoons sweet chili sauce
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 can (410 gram) chopped, peeled tomatoes
205-gram tomato puree
2 cups Cheddar cheese (grated)
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Salt the water and add the spaghetti. Cook the pasta until al dente. Drain the spaghetti. Heat a deep pan over medium-high heat. Add the olive oil and bacon. Brown and crisp the bacon for 5 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon to a paper-towel-lined plate. Drain off a little excess fat from the pan if necessary, leaving just enough to coat the bottom.
Add the mince and crumble it as it browns (3 to 4 minutes).
Add the onions and garlic and stir into the meat. Season the meat with salt and pepper, sweet chili sauce, and Worcestershire sauce. Cook for 5 to 6 minutes more, then stir in the tomatoes and tomato puree.
Add the hot spaghetti to the meat and sauce and combine. Serve up the pasta in bowls and grate some cheese over the top of each serving.
Fast Macaroni and Cheese
Ingredients:
250 g (500 ml) Macaroni
15 ml cooking oil
600 ml milk
1 Packet (62g) thick white onion soup powder
Pinch of pepper
500 ml grated Cheddar cheese.
Method:
Boil Macaroni in salt water till soft. Mix with cooking oil and keep on hand.
Whisk milk, soup powder and pepper together and add half of the cheese. Mix.
Pour into a fireproof dish of about 20x10x5 cm. Sprinkle the rest of the cheese
on top and bake for 30 minutes in a pre-heated oven at 180°C. Serve warm.
Good Easy Recipes – Terms and Patties
Here I go again about some good easy recipes. Last time I spoke about some terms. Some of the most common ones are:
Bake – To cook using dry heat, either covered or uncovered, in an oven;
Fry – To cook in hot fat; to pan fry in a small amount of fat or deep fry in a large amount of fat that covers the food
Grill – To cook on a rack over hot coals or other direct heat source that simulates coals.
Separate egg yolks/whites – separate the white and yolk of an egg;
Fold in – to combine ingredients with a spoon. Go down through the mixture on the far side of the bowl with a spoon or spatula. Bring the spoon across the bottom of the bowl and up the near side. Turn the bowl slightly and repeat. Keep doing this until the mixture is well blended.
Caramelize – to melt sugar, or foods containing or mixed with sugar, slowly over low heat without burning, until the sugars melt and become brown in color. Also used for browning onions etc.
Fillet – A piece of meat, poultry or fish with all bones removed. To fillet is to remove the bones.
Lean – Generally with a fat percentage of less than 10%.
Chop – To cut food into small pieces with a knife. OK, enough terms for today. Now for a good easy recipe. Some of the easiest recipes are for burgers. I have yet to meet someone that doesn’t like burgers. You can even make it in the microwave oven. And it tastes not bad at all. Here is a recipe for microwave burger patties. (Obviously you’re going to buy the Buns.)
Patties Recipe:
Ingredients:
- 500 grams (1 pound) of beef mince. (Use a moderately lean mince, it won’t shrink so much.)
- Two thick slices of bread.
- 100 ml of milk.
- One egg.
- One chopped onion.
- Salt (half a teaspoon).
Method:
- Soak the bread in a bit of the milk. Add some milk until the bread is thoroughly soaked.
- Place the mince in a mixing bowl, add the bread, that has been pulped, into the meat and mix well with a fork.
- Add the egg and mix well. The egg is to bind the meat so it doesn’t fall apart when grilling.
- Now add the chopped onion and salt. I also add about a teaspoon of dried thyme. You can also add some other spices to your liking. Mix everything well with a fork.
- Now make little round balls with your hands and flatten. The size of the balls will depend on how big you want the patties to be.
- Place patties in a baking dish. To get it to look nice and brown you can brush it with a little bit of Worcestershire sauce or Ketchup (tomato sauce).
- Cover loosely and microwave on high (100%) 5 minutes.
- Turn patties over and brush again.
- Microwave until done, 2 to 3 minutes.
The patties can also be done on the stove –
- put some cooking oil (olive if you want) into a frying pan.
- Heat the pan to a medium high heat and place the patties in the pan.
- Grill for 7-8 minutes and then flip them over.
- Grill for another 7-8 minutes or until done.
NB Never undercook hamburger patties! Unfortunately E. Coli can taint half raw ground beef. This is another of my good easy recipes. Enjoy! Next time some more terms and another recipe.
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