It's BBQ SEASON!

That's right dudes and dudettes! It's Spring, the snow's gone, and it's time to get your BBQ on!

I'm not going to throw down a dozen recipes and brag about how much of grill pimp I am (I am) because this is a blog for the rookies out there. The great thing about BBQ is that no matter how much of a kitchenphobe you might be, everyone feels awesome when they're over a grill.

OK, so what are some the things you want to do on the grill? Steaks are easy enough, anyone can throw a couple of hot dogs or frozen patties on heat and it's summery awesomeness. But, I think it would be fun to let you fledgling grillmeisters in on some of my favourite BBQ recipes and tricks.

But first things first. You need to actually BUY a BBQ if you don't have one! Now, what kind you should get is up to you. Propane is good for quick start and convenience. Problem is, if you live in an apartment, chances are it's actually ILLEGAL for you to have. My landlords mentioned that yo me when I moved in to my current place, stating that the propane tanks can't be inside or something to that effect. Which means you have to go with charcoal. And frankly, charcoal grilling tastes better and is more fun.

Also, charcoal BBQs are much cheaper. You can get a hibachi or round grill for about 50 bucks new.

There are a million different recommendations about BBQs. I'll simply tell you to type in "What is the best kind of barbecue" in Google and see what comes up.

I will say this: I bought this BBQ (well, the 2007 version of it) for about $150 Canadian at Canadian Tire and it has served my VERY well. Last summer I smoked ribs for the first time using it and... yeah... drooooooll.... So, take from that what you will.

Alright. Some other things you'll need: spatula, tongs, oven mitts (for those wimps amongst you), basting brush, skewers. Often, these sort of things come with a BBQ, or can be bought on the cheap. Again, I turn it over to Canadian Tire.

Something else I swear by is the portable grill basket. This allows you to grill up veggies with minimal annoyance. Basically take cut up tomato, zucchini, peppers, onion, etc., soak 'em in your favourite marinade and toss them in the basket over the heat. Here's my easy and delicious marinade for grilled veg (also good with shrimp): equal parts balsamic vinegar and olive oil, dash of salt, pepper, basil & oregano, a squeeze or two of lemon juice, whip together with a fork, toss over cut veg and seal in a freezer bag or container, let sit for a couple of hours, done! Do the same with shrimp, just DON'T peel the shrimp until after you cook it.

Now, something else to bless your meat is my whiskey marinade for steak. This allows you to take a fairly cheap cut, like a flank steak, and turn it into the gourmet sh**.

Here ya go:

Irish Whiskey Marinade

¼ cup Irish whiskey (Bushmill’s)
¼ cup BBQ sauce
1 tbsp maple syrup
1 tsp minced garlic (fresh)
1 tsp minced ginger (fresh)
1 tsp Montreal steak spice
1 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
5-6 drops hot sauce (optional)

- whisk ingredients together with fork
- pour into Ziploc-type bag with steak and shake well
- marinate for 24 hours



I'll be back in a bit with more BBQ goodness.

Enjoy!

A dinner to impress

Good day fledgling cooks!



Today, I'm going to throw you in the deep end. It's time to get gourmet on this mofo! You've been seeing boy/girl x for a few weeks (months?) now, you've made the pasta, the stir-fry, and maybe even gotten brave enough to try out something out of a cookbook. Well done! I betcha it served you well (wink, wink, nudge, nudge, saynomore). But now it's time for the big leagues, Slick! On the plus side, you pull this off, you're golden FOREVER!



Dudes and dudettes, I give you Maple-Cognac Glazed Pork Tenderloin.



I invented this one a few years ago in a fit of recent singledom, and while I've had mixed success with the consistency, the flavour is un-flipping-believable! It's also really easy to make.



To make life easier, I'll also say that you're serving this deliciousness with a side of green beans.



So, I'll give you the step-by-step.



Spice Rub

- coat meat (best to use pork tenderloin) lightly in olive oil and mixture of crushed black pepper, garlic powder, salt & crushed rosemary - I usually coat the meat with my hands, sprinkle the spices with a spoon and then massage them lightly into the meat with my figners. If reading any of this is making you tingly, get help.

Meat

Essentially, grill or bake the tenderloin until it's a uniformly cooked consistency in the middle. Tenderloin always stays a bit pink in the middle, so don't worry about that. In other cuts of pork, ensure it's white in the middle. Once cooked, slice into medallions about 3/4 inch thick.

Glaze/Sauce

In saucepan, sauté/fry/caramelize 1 tbsp very finely minced garlic and 1 tbsp very finely minced onion in butter. Basically, you want it to turn golden, but not burn.

Reduce heat to medium-low (about 4)

Add 1 oz. Maple syrup & reduce (cook until it starts to thicken)

Add ½ oz. Cognac & reduce

Add extra rosemary if desired

Allow mixture to simmer until reduced to glaze consistency (this is always the part I find hard, sometimes it just takes to long to thicken).

Baste or spoon onto cooked meat

As for the beans, boil them in a very shallow pool of boiling water, drain once tender, coat with butter and serve.

And there you go! Send me comments if you need more detail!

I'm not entirely sure what to put in my next post. I might go off on another diatribe...

Back from obscurity with a little diatribe on salt and processed food

Happy New Year!

Alright, it's been 4 months since I've posted and I feel bad (that's if anyone actually reads this).

I just wanted to talk about an issue that I've been taking to heart lately. What motivates me to write this blog is the fact that most single folks rely way too much on "convenience" food; take-out, microwaveable, prepackaged, tinned, etc... And hey, most of it tastes good! The craving for a McChicken comes up far more often than I care to admit.

The problem with most pre-made food is that it is full of two nasty elements: fat and salt. Easy way to get rid of the first is to eat the low-cal diet food. Fine, sure, it's not going to pack on the pounds. But it's by no means healthy. Think about a real simple example: pasta sauce in a jar.

Prego's "Chunky Garden Combo" sauce sounds kindy healthy to me - it's got chunks of garden in it! And at only 140 calories per cup, pretty diet-friendly too. Yeah, and then check the sodium content: 940 mg per cup. The daily recommended intake for adults is 1500 mg of sodium per day, so the sauce itself covers nearly a third of that. Add to that the salt you may have used to cook the pasta with, the numbers add up pretty fast. And that's in ONE MEAL! (Well, if you eat a cup's worth of sauce per meal...)

So, what does this have to do with making awesome meals that gets the ladies' knees a-quivering? Well, next time you're fixing up a bowl of pasta or a stir-fry or whatever I figure to show how to make next time (stew and/or soup, methinks), keep in mind to leave the salt shaker out of reach. A pinch to a teaspoon of salt is usually enough for any recipe, or even less, depending on ingredients and amounts.

Let's say you're cooking something and are adding olives. Each olive has somewhere between 30-60 mg of sodium (depends on size, preparation, etc.). The salt will permeate whatever dish you're making and flavour it just fine without adding any more.

Most meat and seafood is salted before it ever gets to your table, so you really don't need extra. And don't get me started about all that ketchup you're eating with your fries...

So, from now on, less salt. You want flavour? Raid that spice rack dude!

Bon appetit!

Making a Stir-Fry - Step 3 - Cooking and Eating the Stir-Fry

Alright, everything's cut up, your stir-fry sauce is made (or purchased for you lazy bastiches out there), you’ve decided which starch you’re using (or, like me for the years I didn’t know about rice noodles, decided that starch is for sissies). It’s time to cook this sonuvagun.

OK, first thing, heat your pan on the stovetop at medium-high heat (about 6 if the dial on your range features numbers) and toss in the sauce, ginger and garlic (or, if you decide to make the sauce well ahead of time, add the ginger and garlic to the sauce, it’ll spread the flavours out in the sauce). Wait till it’s bubbling, then add other ingredients. Now, when you add the other ingredients is a bit tricky. So, I’ll break it down this way:

- chicken/pork/beef (the latter two if cubed), carrots: add first, cook for 5 minutes then add rest of veggies
- pork/beef (if sliced thin): add first, cook for 3 minutes, and then add rest of veggies
- veggies: toss in based on instructions above, stir-fry (as in stir with a spatula while it fries) for about 10 minutes or until veggies reach desired tenderness and meat is fully cooked
- shrimp/scallops: these actually take less time than veggies, so add them after about 2 minutes of cooking the veggies.

Once all ingredients are cooked, either toss in noodles if using, or spoon over hot cooked rice (or over nothing). I usually eat my stir-fries in a bowl to keep the sauce from spilling.

Now, here comes the last of choices: how to eat a stir-fry? Do you use a fork or dare to use chopsticks. Well, it depends on a few things: 1 – How clumsy are you? 2 – How hungry are you? 3 – Will it impress your date? I think once you figure that out, you’ll be up for the challenge.

So, that’s it for the stir-fry. My next entry will focus less on meal making and more on important ingredients.

Until then, Excelsior!

Making a Stir-Fry - Step 2 – Dealing with Starch

OK, the several billion people who consume rice as their main food staple probably know something I don’t. Like how to cook it properly. But, I am not one of them. For me, cooking rice has always been hit-and-miss, with miss commanding a strong lead. That being said, I feel it necessary to discuss the intricacies of a) making rice and b) finding easier alternatives to using rice to accompany our stir-fry.

So, making rice. Well, in my experience, I’ve had the best luck with Jasmine rice, which is the staple rice in Thailand. I haven’t successfully attempted cooking any other kind in recent memory. There is a plethora of different types of rice used throughout the world (it’s a bit intimidating: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rice_varieties). The basic rule with cooking rice is to follow the instructions on the package TO THE LETTER! Rice isn’t one of those things you can experiment with, it just doesn’t work. So, that’s about it for my grand wisdom on cooking rice.

But, that being said, I highly recommend going with plan B: using rice noodles or vermicelli. If you’ve ever eaten at a Vietnamese pho restaurant, you’ve probably noticed that they use a variety of rice-based noodles, some thicker like fettuccine, others super thin like Angel hair pasta. Well, any of these is a much easier alternative to grain rice. You can find these kinds of noodles in the Asian food section of your super market. Basically, cook similarly to pasta (as per the instructions on the package). There’s a bit of a difference in that you will cook the noodles, then cool them off, mix them with some sort of oil to loosen them up, then toss them in with the stir-fry. I really like going with this kind of dish instead of rice because it somehow feels more satisfying as a meal, and it’s easier to eat noodles with chopsticks.

So, that’s about it. We’ll get back to the actual stir-fry next time.

Making a Stir-Fry - Part 1

Intro and Step 1

Stir-fries are a quick and easy way to make a delicious meal. Really, there’s not much that’s easier to make than a stir-fry. The only drawback is preparing that ubiquitous and expected accompaniment, rice. Oh rice, you frustrating grain, you. I have been cooking for a long time, have usually had things turn out anywhere from decent to magnificent, but rice continues to confound me. I just can’t seem to get it right on any sort of consistent basis. So, we’re going to break down the art of the stir-fry into three steps: the first will deal with getting the elements of the actual stir-fry together, the second with making rice and finding alternatives to rice in oriental-style cooking in general, the third will deal with cooking the stir-fry, as well as the elements of presenting the meal.

Step 1 – Getting your Stir-Fry Together

Cookware

Alright, let’s hope you’ve put something of a kitchen together since the first post. For this recipe you’ll need pretty much the exact same cookware as with our pasta recipe. The elements are almost identical. You’ll need a knife and cutting board for prep, a large frying pan (or a wok if you want to be all authentic and stuff) and spatula for the stir-fry itself, a medium sized saucepan/pot with a handle and a lid for the rice, a bowl or plate for serving the food, a fork to eat it with (although using chopsticks is much more rewarding and a damn sight sexier – at least it is according to one of my exes, more on that later).

Ingredients

The most important ingredient for making a stir-fry, I find, is sesame oil. It’s what gives Chinese food it’s Chinese-iness? Um, yeah… I’ve found you don’t want to get massive quantities of sesame oil as it gets bitter after a while. President’s Choice sells a 185 ml bottle which I’ve found is the perfect size.

With sesame oil and only 3 more ingredients, you can make a no-fail stir-fry sauce. So, here it is:

Nick’s Super-Easy Stir-Fry Sauce
(as with anything I cook, none of this is an exact science, fiddle with amounts as you see fit)

- 2 tbsp sesame oil
- 2 tbsp soya sauce (or, preferably, 1 tbsp each of soya sauce and oyster sauce – oyster sauce is thicker and isn’t quite as purely salty as soya, with a subtle fishy undertone)
- ½ tsp Chinese five-spice powder (a spice mix usually consisting of fennel, cinnamon, star anise, Szechuan peppercorns and cloves; available at most grocery stores in major cities – delicious stuff!)
- 3-4 tbsp your favourite beer

Whisk all that together with a fork and that’s it! Put in a glass or ceramic container and set aside.

Stir-fry ingredients:

1 tbsp minced garlic
1 tbsp minced ginger (fresh)
½ tsp. cayenne pepper (optional)

As for the meat and veggies, it’s all to taste. Just dice veggies (about 1 ½ cm thick). If using carrots, slice thinner as they take longer to cook. Just think of the last time you got Chinese food and cut your veggies roughly the way the restaurant did.

For meat, I like to use beef and cut it into thin slices (almost like ribbons). With chicken, I usually cube it (you can buy chicken already prepped into stir-fry strips or cubed). You can also use shrimp or scallops (see previous post for notes on prepping seafood). Even fish filets will work, but the cooking time is a little different.

Next post: Dealing with Starch

Last time we got the ingredients, now it's time to put them together..

Step 3 - Give 'er!
 
Prep
 
1) Meat: If you're doing shrimp or scallops, thaw them quickly using the strainer and lukewarm water. They don't need to be completely thawed, but if you have to peel the shrimp, they should be. Set aside. 
 
2) Garlic: mincing garlic is one of my favourite activities, I find it therapeutic. You might find it annoying. If so, invest in a garlic press. Or buy those pre-chopped garlic dealies,  check the grocery store.
 
3) Veggies: chop your veg into whatever size you like best. Just remember that the smaller you chop, the faster they cook. I like my veggies firm, so I usually go no smaller than approx 1 cm width. When chopping tomatoes, make sure you keep as much juice as possible. Put them in a separate bowl. Onions can be chopped as fine as possible because they're going to flavour the sauce rather than stand on their own. 
 
Cooking 
 
First, you need to get a pot of water on the stovetop. Add a splash of oil to the water to keep the pasta from sticking. Get it boiling. 
 
While the water heats up, put the frying pan on medium-high heat, add a splash of oil (about 2 tbsp) and heat it (this takes about 2 minutes) 
 
Add chopped garlic and sauté (get it a little brown, but no more or it'll be bitter) 
 
Your water should be boiling, so add your pasta; about 1/6 to 1/4 of a 900 g package. I usually break it in half when using linguine, it cooks faster, easier and is easier to get on the fork. 
 
Reduce heat in the frying pan to medium. Add the rest of your ingredients (including wine if using) and mix it all up. Sauté for about 5-6 minutes, until everything is cooked through. 
 
Strain your pasta (check it to see if it's tender. I like it a little mushier than 'al dente', which means firm, but al dente is the way most of the high falutin' cooks like it. 
 
If you're feeling skillful, add the pasta to the sauce in the pan and toss it all together by using a flipping motion with the pan. Or, use a spatula or wooden spoon and mix everything together that way. 
 
Serve the lot on a plate or bowl and top with all that neat stuff I mentioned earlier. 
 
There ya go, crack a beer or fetch some vino, or a glass of water, or whatever. Park yer arse in front of the tube and snarf away! Then, do this all over again for your lady friend or gentleman caller (but do not snarf in their presence. Not good.)
 
Dude, you just cooked! 
 
Cheers! 

Next time: stir-fry made dead easy