Rocking Seafood Dipping Sauce - Easy to Cook

Add some life to those prawns and other shellfish with the seafood dipping sauce. This sauce isn't hot but has a nice kick and a very distinct flavour. Prepared in less than 5 minutes and best of all no cooking involved.

Ingredients:
2 Tablespoons sweet chilli sauce
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 teaspoon high quality extra virgin olive oil
1 lime
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 ginger root
1 bunch of corriander

Method:
Combine sweet chilli sauce, fish sauce, olive oil, and garlic. Mix well with a fork.
Half the lime and squeeze in the juice.
Grate a small piece of ginger into the mix, note the ginger is what gives this dipping sauce its kick, more ginger more kick, but don't add too much to overpower it.
Wash the corriander leaves, bunch up and chop into fine pieces, stalks and leaves. Add into the sauce mixture a give a quick stir.
Allow the sauce to sit in the fridge for 30 minutes to allow the flavours to combine before using.

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.

Poached Chicken & Asparagus

Yet another easy meal for you guys. This Poached Chicken and Asparagus is a classic easy cooking for men meal, and  is a dinner designed to impress that special someone. Best served with a light and dry white white.

Ingredients:

3 Italian parsley stems

1 tablespoon black peppercorns

2 spring onions or ½ an onion finely chopped

1 tablespoon salt

4 skinless chicken breast fillets (200g ea)

8 kipfler potatoes

12 fresh asparagus spears

1 head of witlof (Belgian endive)

Dressing:

1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh chives

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons lemon juice

Pinch sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Method:

Put the parsley, pettercorns, spring onion and salt into a large saucepan filled with cold water and bring to the boil. Add the chicken breasts, turn off the heat, put the lid on and leave the chicken to poach for 2 hours.

Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil and cook the popaties for 15 minutes, or until tender. Drain and peel. Cut in slives and toss two-thirds the dressing through. Keep warm. Blanch the asparagus in boiling water for 3 minutes, then refresh in cold water.

To make the dressing, stir the chives, oil, lemon juice and salt & pepper in a bowl.

Slice the chicken breasts on the diagonal. Divide the witlof leaves, potato & asparagus equally on serving plates, top with slices of chicken & drizzle some dressing over the top.

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.

Easy Cooking Thai Fish Cakes Recipe

Another favourite of easy cooking for men this Thai Fish Cakes Recipe is simple to cook and quick and easy to prepare.

Ingredients:

• A few of your favourite fillets of white fish
• 1 free range egg
• 3 tablespoons of cornflour
• 1 tablespoon of fish sauce
• 3 teaspoons of red curry paste
• handful of fresh corriander leaves
• 2 thai chillis
• handful of green beans
• handful of spring onions
• Peanut oil
• Sweet chilli sauce

Method:

• Place the fish into a food processor and mix into a mash
• Beat the egg and add into the food processor with the cornflour, fish sauce, curry paste, chilli, and corriander. Mix in the food processor until well combined.
•  Remove the mixture from the food processor and place into a bowl. Slice the beans and spring onions and add into the fish cake mixture, mix well.
• Scoop a dollop of fish cake mixture into an egg ring. Tip, wet a spoon or eg slice to press the fish cake mixture well into the egg slice. Oil the inside of the egg slice.
• Heat the peanut oil in a large heavy base frying pan. Pour in only enough oil to cover the base of the fry pan. This is a shallow fry recipe.
• Fry the Thai Fish Cakes and flip when golden brown. Once both sides are cooked to a golden brown, remove from the pan and drain the Thai Fish Cakes on paper towels. Place on a tray in a low heat oven while cooking the other fish cakes.
• Serve on a bed of rice and a dollop of sweet chilli sauce on top and some asian greens on the side.

Variation:
Substitute the rice and mix up your Thai Fish Cakes Recipe by serving on a bed of mashed potato mixed with mixed herbs, cream, and butter.