Morphy Richards Slow Cooker Curry Beef Stew

To celebrate the newest addition to my kitchen accessories, the Morphy Richards Slow Cooker i will embark on a series of crockpot recipes from the easy cooking for men slow cooker cookbook. AS with all slow cookers the best meals are those that have plenty of flavours so my first in this series will be a curry beef stew.

Curry Beef Crockpot - Slow Cooker Cookbook.

Ingredients:
500 grams diced beef
2 tablespoons of minced garlic
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 can diced tomatoes
1 cup beef stock
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
1 teaspoon chopped fresh ginger
1 finely diced jalapeno chili pepper
1 roughly chopped onion
1 cup rice

Directions:
Turn on the crock pot to its lowest temperature setting, you will need it in about 5 minutes.

The first part of this Curry Beef is cooked in a large pan over medium heat. Pour a table spoon of olive oil in the pan, add beef and stir until browned on all sides.

Remove beef from pan, it is important to keep all juices as this will help to cook the meat in the slow cooker.

Morphy Richards Slow Cooker

Add the garlic, ginger, and jalapeno in the pan and cook for a few minutes. Continually stir  until tender, do not allow the ingredients to stay still in the pan and burn. Add curry powder. Mix in the diced tomatoes and juice from the beef. Remove the pan from the heat.

Add the onion and browned beef in to your Morphy Richards Slow Cooker, if your lucky enough to have one.  Pour the pan mixture on top of the onions and beef into the slowcooker. Add the beef stock.
Cover the slowcooker with the lid and leave it to cook for between 6 to 8 hours stirring occasionally.
Serve in bowls on a bed of rice.

Variation:
Serve with a side of naan bread and or papadums.

If you don't have a slow cooker, thats OK. You can use a large pot with a lid cooked on a very low heat for a few hours. Remember to stir every few minutes as the heat from the stove will burn the meat. Thats why i bought my Morphy Richards Slow Cooker, so i don't burn my meals when i want to infuse the flavours by cooking for many hours.

Hamburger Patty Recipe - Easy Cooking

Another easy cooking recipe for the barbecue is this hamburger patty recipe. Like most guys i love to grab a beer and cook outside on the barbecue, and just start frying. There is no more easy method of cooking for guys than to crank up the barbecue, and who doesn't love that smoky flavour in your hamburger patties. This recipe uses half lamb with half beef, but you can just as easy use all beef.

Ingredients:

• 250 grams beef mince - For best results make sure the lamb and beef are as fat free as possible, too fatty and you will lose flavour and burn the outside of the patties. You also risk a flare up on the barbecue.
• 250 grams lamb mince
• 1 medium sized carrot
• 2 brown onions
• 2 beef stock cubes
• 2 tablespoons barbecue sauce
• 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tea spoon mince garlic
• 2 eggs
• mixed herbs
• 2 tablespoons butter

Method:

• Finely dice one of the onions and grate the carrot.
• Beat the eggs, and crumble the stock cubes.
• Mix all the ingredients (except the second onion and butter) together thoroughly.
• Halve the second onion and slice, this will be used as a topping in the bun later.
• You can either roll handfulls of the mixture into patties and use and egg ring  or a hamburger patty maker if you are really fussy about presentation.
• Note, if the hamburger patty mixture is too sloppy you can always add a little plain flour to help.
• Get the barbecue plate hot. Drizzle a little oil and fry until cooked through, check regularly so that they don't get burnt on one side. Many barbecues have hot spots so make sure you move the patties around a little so they all cook evenly.
• Place the sliced onion rings on the barbecue and drop the 2 tablespoons of butter on the top. Flip regularly to avoid burning the onions. Allow the butter to coat through the onions, this will create a caramelised effect and stop the onions from drying out.

Serving:
Note I didn't include the serving ingredients in the above as this is strictly a hamburger patty recipe, but i guess hamburger patties by themselves aren't much fun.

Bun selection is important and varies from person to person. I like a large soft bun with seseame seeds, OK stop laughing now.

Spread a relish (i like tomato) over the bottom half of the bun, and mayonaise over the top half.
Place the hamburger patty on the bottom bun, and top with a few of the caramelised onion rings. If you like sauce add it now, mustard, berbecue or ketchup are all good. Add sliced tomato, salt and pepper, jalapenos, avacado, maybe some cheese, and finally lettuce.

Close the hamburger with the top half of the bun, serve with a side of chips. You guys can grab another beer for a job well done, and chow down on the tastiest hamburger patty recipe you likely to eat today.

Variations:
Fry a few eggs and rashers of bacon for a hamburger with the lot.