BBQ Bacon Meat Sushi

My wife posted a video on her Facebook wall. What transpired in the video was pure genius, a mince mix wrapped in bacon and glazed in BBQ sauce. So I decided that this needed to be experimented upon.

(Warning! this dish has no sushi based ingredients or components)

This is a pure meatfeast but is so moreish that we found that the whole thing to be just too little for us (however I'm certain that the nutritional contents disagree). On the plus side, it is super easy to make.

You will need to have:-

8 slices of streaky bacon
350g beef mince
3tbsp grill seasoning (or similar)
1tbsp salt
1 egg
100g Emmental cheese, sliced
50g crushed nachos
40ml BBQ

Start off by preheating your oven to 180C then put your beef mince, grill seasoning, salt and egg into a bowl and mix all together. Place a piece of baking paper flat on your kitchen side and layer with the bacon, overlapping slightly to from a mat. Press your mince mix onto the bacon and spread out thinly, about half a cm. Place your cheese about a quarter of a way in and then roll up the paper. Try and make it as tight as possible, then place onto a wire racked baking tray. Place into oven.

After 15 minutes open the oven and with a pastry brush, brush some BBQ sauce all over your mince log and close door. After another 15 minutes repeat. Then after ten minutes repeat and leave for 5 more minutes before taking out of the oven. Place your crushed nachos on a tray and then roll your mince log all over until you get a nice coating of nachos. Slice into 1cm thick slices and serve with a side of BBQ and chopsticks for that authentic Sushi feel.

It is great as a snack for movie nights or as a buffet item for house parties. You can make them up beforehand and freeze if you like.

Curried Cashew Nut Chicken

So finally after moving and getting the flu, the Robinson clan are back on track.

So one of our first meals when I moved in was Roasted Chicken thighs in a curried cashew nut sauce. It went down a treat and really filled the holes left from moving and unpacking. It was a super easy meal in that you can make it all up and just forget about it.

To feed four hungry mouth, you need:-

4 chicken thighs
1 small onion, diced
2 tbsp ground ginger
2 tbsp ground cumin
2 tbsp ground coriander
1 tbsp turmeric
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tin (400ml) coconut milk
200ml chicken stock
75g cashew nuts
salt and pepper
little bit of oil

Preheat your oven to 175C and line a baking tray with baking paper. Place your chicken thighs on the tray and season with salt and pepper, give it a good rub in.

While waiting for the oven to heat up put some oil in a sauce pan and sweat your onions for about 5 minutes. Now add all the spices and stir in and cook for around a minute. Pour your coconut milk and stock and bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer and allow to reduce by a third.

Place your chicken in the oven and cook for an hour until the juices run clear.

To serve, heat the sauce and add the cashew nuts and pour over the chicken. It goes great with rice and naan bread.

It really is that simple, it doesn't take a lot to make good wholesome food for your family and friends.

Enjoy

Apple Bread and Butter Pudding

So it is March, we have all moved into our nice bungalow in the suburbs of Oulu and now we have to sort through the chaos that is our boxes.

However, March also means time to get back to blogging tasty recipes for you all. So this is my Apple Bread and Butter pudding. This is a traditional British dessert and really is the epiphany of British culinary style, it has a wholesome base taste rather than a palette of delicate flavours, is comforting for those dull, wet British summers winters. It has been a stable in British cuisine for centuries with the oldest recorded dish being from 1729, you can find it in many restaurants and pubs throughout the British Isles.

This one is my take upon the classic dish. I used grated apple to replace the more commonly used raisin and also added apple jam and cinnamon. 

To make enough for 4 people you will want:-

12 slices of bread, crusts cut off (you can use your older, stale bread)

50g butter, softened

50g apple jam

2 apples, grated (sprinkle some lemon juice on them to stop them going brown)

400ml full fat milk

4 eggs

2tbsp honey

2tsp cinnamon

1tsp nutmeg

Start by greasing up a 1 litre size square oven dish. Cut the crusts off your bread and spread the butter and jam on one side. Place the slices butter/jam side up in the bottom of the dish and then sprinkle some grated apple and cinnamon and repeat until you have used all you bread up. Make sure your top layer doesn't have any apple. In a bowl, mix together the eggs, milk, honey and nutmeg and the pour over the bread. Leave to stand for 30 minutes. While standing, preheat your oven to 175C. Cook for 30 minutes (or until the top is golden and the milk mixture has set).

It really is that simple.

Serve warm with some ice cream or vanilla sauce.