Black Bean Salad

This absolutely delicious recipe comes from a good friend of ours and continues the Latin Amercan theme. Our friend lived in Chile for a number of years and this receipe comes to you, dear gentle readers, from her via there.

This is a great side dish to serve at a BBQ.

You will need:

½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon of orange zest
1 teaspoon of lime zest
60ml fresh orange juice
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons white-wine vinegar
½ teaspoon ground cumin
1/8 teaspoon dried hot red pepper flakes
A splash or two of tabasco sauce
350g black beans, soak overnight, rinse, cook and drained, you can also use chickpeas or any type of bean
1 red bell pepper, finely diced
Big handful of fresh coriander sprigs, washed well, spun dry, and finely chopped
Big handful of parsley, finely chopped
300g of corn, ideally roasted on the bbq and kernals removed from cob

And then the hard part

Put all of the ingredients together in a bowl, toss well and leave in the fridge to rest and cool before serving.

Khalonji Chicken

In general, almost any yoghurt-based marinade works brilliantly with chicken: tarragon and mustard, chili and spices or mint: there's a whole lot of experimenting to do and it's pretty hard to go wrong. Alternatively, there are true classics like shish taouk, which can be made with an oil-based marinade or a yoghurt-based one (the recipe linked is oil-based, just replace the oil wiht a couple of tablespoons of yoghurt).

This version is a mildly spiced, subtle marinade that'll give a tender result time after time, ideal for the grill and a rice/salad accompaniment but also fantastic when barbecued. The more time you can leave everything to marinade and combine, the better!


Ingredients

• 4 chicken breasts, halved lengthways
• 4 tbsp yoghurt
• 2 tsp ground coriander
• 2 tsp onion seed (kalonji)
• 1 tsp garam masala
  
• ½ red onion, finely diced
• 2” fresh ginger, grated
• 4 cloves garlic, grated
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper

Mix everything together and then add the chicken. Marinate for as long as you can, then lay the chicken pieces out on a foil-lined baking rack and grill for 5-10 minutes (depending on the ferocity of your grill!), until the surface of the chicken shows brown flecks and the meat has started to firm up, before turning to brown the other side. Serve!

Warm Aubergine and Pomegranate Salad

This is a great BBQ side-dish, or delicious served alongside a few slices of this season’s Spring lamb.

You will need:

6 local long thin aubergines, cut in half lengthways
1 red onion, cut into wedges
100ml EV olive oil
2 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice
Lemon zest/rind from 1 lemon
1 clove garlic chopped fine
2 teaspoons sumac
Good sized handful of flat leaf parsley, chopped fine
200g feta cheese, cut into small cubes
1 pomegranate
1 tsp balsamic vinegar

And then you need to:

Pre-heat an oven to 200C/400F.

In a small bowl combine half the olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, lemon zest and the sumac. Season.

Place the aubergine and onions on a roasting tray and pour over the olive oil mixture. Give it a good toss. Go on, get stuck in and get your hands dirty.

Roast for about 30 minutes, remove from oven and set to one side.

Cut the pomegranate in half across its equator. With one half squeeze as much juice out as you can over a large bowl. Pick out any bits of the white pith that might have fallen in. With the other half holding the cut side down over the same bowl start hitting the skin side with a wooden spoon. Soon all the little seeds will start falling out.

Pour into the pomegranate juice/seeds the remaining olive oil, the balsamic and any juices from the roasting tray.

Arrange the aubergine and onions on a large shallow dish, pour over the pomegranate mixture, sprinkle the feta and the chopped parsley all over and serve.

Grilled Vegetables with Saffron Aioli

This makes a great side dish for a BBQ, especially as all the vegetables can be cooked on the griddle.


You will need (serves 4 as a side dish):

200g fresh asparagus
1 red pepper
4 plum tomatoes
1 courgette

For the aioli:

3 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp honey
Large pinch saffron threads
3 cloves garlic.
5 tbsp decent mayonnaise


First off make the aioli.

Blanch the garlic cloves with their skin on in boiling water for about 2 or 3 mins then pop them out of their skins and mash with a fork.

Put the vinegar, honey and saffron in a small pan and over a medium heat bring to a boil, stir and then remove. Leave to stand and cool.

Put the mayonnaise into a large bowl and mix in the mashed garlic. Add 1 tbsp at a time of the honey/saffron liquid. Give it a good mix and taste each time. You probably will not have to use all the liquid but add until you’ve reached a taste that you like; slightly sweet, a little bit sharp, garlicky, a bit runny and a wonderful golden colour.

Cut the courgette into three or four strips lengthways. Chop the red pepper into quarters, discarding the seeds and the pith. Chop the tomatoes in half.

Put all the vegetables, including the asparagus into a large bowl, toss with a little olive oil and with a big glass of wine in one hand take the bowl outside to the pre-heated BBQ.

Gently grill all the vegetables and then arrange on a flat platter. Drizzle them with about half of the aioli and put the rest in a bowl beside the dish. Serve.

Coriander Lamb Kebabs

This is so straightforward, so lacking in anything fancy and just so, well, damn easy. And yet it’s a great way to serve good lamb, a subtle touch of orientalism that is even more delicate if you make it with ruinously expensive loin instead of sensible leg.

Ingredients

• 500g lean lamb
• 1 lemon, juice and grated zest
• ½ cup coriander, chopped
• 1 red chilli, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tbsp runny honey
• 1 tsp salt
• Soaked bamboo skewers

Mix it all up, marinate for at least an hour and ideally overnight and then grill or barbecue on a lively heat, turning, for 10 minutes or so until browned, caramelised and generally done to perfection all over but pink and tender inside.

Barbecue Bliss-out

Here’s a barbecue in a box: from the drinks course to dessert. A few notes. Firstly on sausages and steak: do cook sausages slowly over a moderate part of the barbecue and DON'T PRICK THEM! Poking holes in your sausages lets the juices escape, which then drop onto the charcoal and burn, leaving your sausages black and sooty.

Steaks, on the other hand, should be rubbed with oil, seasoned, and then cooked fast and hot. Allow your cooked steaks to rest for a few minutes before serving.

Quantities are very flexible - my original event was catered to 12 people, hence a whole leg of lamb and a whole side of salmon plus chicken, sausages, steaks and so on. Marinades should be sufficient to completely cover the thing being marinated. Spices are to personal taste, but generally should be a balance rather than any one dominating. Salad ingredients again are a judgement call - use sufficient feta to balance the sweetness of the mango, and enough rocket to create an attractive visual effect on the plate. With the salmon marinade - the more ‘Scottish malt extract’ the better, in my humble opinion. Something smoky from the Western Isles, or rich and sweet from Speyside, perhaps. As always, buy and use what's freshest and best on the day, don't hesitate to substitute any flavour or ingredient you prefer, and taste, taste, taste...

Enjoy!

Marinated Butterflied Leg of Lamb

Tikka Marinated Grilled Chicken

Cous-Cous with Cucumber and grapes

Fruit and Marshmallow Kebabs


Stuffed Chocolate Bananas

Hawaiian Sunset

These recipes come to us from Fat Expat Guest Barbecue Guru: EyeOnDubai

Marinated Butterflied Leg of Lamb

This recipe can be made with springbok or even, if you can get it, venison. Whether you use these or lamb, you’re looking at a cut around 3-4 kilos.

Ingredients

• 1 leg or forequarter of lamb

Marinade

• 200m date honey
• 100ml balsamic vinegar
• 100ml olive oil
• 5 cloves garlic, crushed

Bone out the leg or forequarter (or get your butcher to do it for you) so you have a large, flat 'butterfly' shape, not too thick as this will help it cook evenly.

Blend all the marinade ingredients, place in a bag or non-reactive dish with the lamb, and leave for as long as you can - 2 -to 4 hours is ok, overnight is great. Season generously with salt and pepper.

Roast, covered on a VERY SLOW Cobb barbecue for up to 4 hours until cooked through and very tender.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Maple Hot-Smoked Darne of Scottish Salmon

I have discovered that you get an even better result if you make a foil 'saucer' for the fish, instead of placing it directly on the grill - prevents the skin side from burning and lets the smoke cook the fish more evenly.

Ingredients

• 1 side of fresh Scottish salmon, skin on
• Salt, for brining (sufficient to completely cover salmon)
• Maple wood chips, soaked in water

Marinade

• Maple syrup
• Scottish (single) malt whisky

First, remove the 'pin bones', that row that runs along the lateral line of the fish. This is easily done with your best needle-nose pliers, or if your partner is the sort to use your good razor to shave her legs, her nice new eyebrow tweezers would work equally well.

Once de-boned, place the fish in a glass dish, and cover with salt. After 1 hour, remove from salt, wash off any excess, pat dry with paper towels and place in marinade for up to 4 hours. The salt will have drawn off some of the moisture, and this will be replaced by your marinade, intensifying the finished flavour.

To hot-smoke, use a Cobb or kettle-type barbecue. Light a small quantity of charcoal and wait until it goes white, then cover with well soaked maple chips to produce smoke. Place fish on grill and cook covered for around 30 minutes or until cooked through – the fish will be firm and take on a rich colour.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Tikka Marinated Grilled Chicken

This is a traditional Indian recipe for grilling chicken - the richness of the marinade gives chicken a lovely depth of flavour, and the yoghurt helps to keep it moist and tender. There are two ways of cooking the chicken, depending on which part you're using. Grill cubes of breast meat on skewers hot and fast and you'll have tender, juicy kebabs. If you're doing joints or legs on the bone, grill them much more slowly to ensure that the chicken is fully cooked without being burnt on the outside.

Ingredients

• 4 breasts/legs good quality organic or free-range chicken
• 500ml yoghurt
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 2 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 tsp cayenne or chili pepper
• Pinch ground ginger
• 1 tsp salt

Prepare your chicken - cut breasts into equal size cubes, score larger pieces. Season.

Mix everything together - yogurt, lemon juice, garlic, cumin, coriander, turmeric, cayenne or chilli (if using) and ginger - you should have a fairly thick paste, stiff enough to stick to your chicken.

Add chicken and stir to ensure everything is well coated, then cover and let it marinate in the fridge for about 3 hours.

Light your barbecue, and let the charcoal burn down to white in colour.

Grill larger pieces of chicken slowly on a moderate part of your barbecue. When nearly cooked, grill the kebabs over a higher heat to ensure everything is ready at the same time.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Cous Cous with Cucumber and Grapes

Ingredients

• 1 packet organic cous cous
• Local cucumber
• Small, seedless grapes
• Fresh mint, coriander & parsley
• Olive oil

Place cous cous in a large bowl and cover with boiling water as instructions on packet. Add a glug of olive oil, stir with a fork and leave to cool slightly.

Dice cucumber to same size as grapes (some of the smallest and sweetest come from Iran in September and October), then stir through prepared cous cous. Finely chop and add a good handful of mint, coriander and parsley. Adjust seasoning and serve.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Fruit and Marshmallow Kebabs

Ingredients

• Firm, chunky fruit - pineapple, mango, strawberries etc
• Marshmallows
• Garam massala powder
• Date honey
• Freshly squeezed orange juice

Cut fruit into bite-sized chunks, combine marinade ingredients, mix everything together and leave covered in a cool place for an hour or two to let the flavours marry. Thread fruit and marshmallows onto soaked bamboo skewers

Grill over a medium to hot barbecue, and serve with copious amounts of spray-on cream.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Stuffed Chocolate Bananas

Ingredients

• Firm (barely ripe) bananas

• Good quality dark chocolate

Cut a small slit in the top surface of each banana, insert two or three squares of good quality dark chocolate, then wrap each banana in tinfoil. Bake on a medium grill for 20 minutes until the banana is hot and the chocolate melted.

Adults may add a teaspoon of Caribbean island liqueur (if liked), best eaten with fingers and too much spray-can cream!

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

Hawaiian Sunset

Ingredients
Good quality Hawaiian rum
Blue curacao
Grenadine
Coconut milk

Combine rum, curacao and coconut milk in a shaker with ice, then strain into a tall glass. Slowly add grenadine and wait till it sinks to the bottom of the glass. Garnish with pineapple slice and an ironic umbrella.

Guest barbecue guru: EyeOnDubai

It's BBQ Time!

Well it is that time of year here in Dubai where the weather is just about as good as you could hope for, lovely warm days and staying warm in the evening. Last night the BBQ got dusted down and fired up for the first time in a while. I've missed it.

I cooked chicken breasts marinated in my Thai-style sauce (which you can find here ), rib-eye steaks in teriyaki sauce and minty lamb kebabs (shop bought from Spinneys – they are pretty good though).

My wife has been pleading with me to change the dishes I serve alongside the carnivore platter as I do seem to have stuck to the same three or four rather a lot recently. As I ALWAYS do as my Lovely Wife instructs (just in case she is reading this) I prepared some new recipes for her delectation. And they were:

Grilled Aubergines with Tahini Sauce

Chickpea and Chorizo Salad

Two Potato Salad with Mustard Dressing


and because we are just such smashing guys we are sharing the recipes with you free, gratis and for nothing.

Grilled Aubergine with Tahini Sauce

Tahini paste is made from ground roasted sesame seeds and is easily available all over Dubai.

Ingredients:

2 medium sized local aubergines.
2 tbsp tahini (sesame) paste
Juice from half a lemon
1 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tbsp crème fraiche (or natural yoghurt)
50 ml double cream
Pine nuts
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley


In the oven or in a dry frying pan toast a small handful of pine nuts. Set to one side.

Slice the aubergine lengthwise into four slices, they should be at least 1cm thick, any less they will fall apart. Brush both sides with olive oil which has had a clove of garlic crushed into it.

Place the slices of the aubergine onto the hot grill and cook for about two minutes each side. Remove and place on a long shallow dish.

In a bowl combine the tahini paste and the lemon juice. It will turn all stiff and sticky, don’t worry! Add the mayonnaise and the crème fraiche and give it a really good stir. Then add the double cream, keep stirring and adding cream until you have quite a runny consistency for the sauce.

Pour the sauce over the grilled aubergine, sprinkle the pine nuts on the top and then garnish with the chopped parsley.

Chickpea & Chorizo Salad

This was a bit of an invention and I think it worked quite well.

Ingredients:

400g tin of chickpeas, washed and drained
1 red pepper
100g chorizo
1 spring onion chopped fine
5 or 6 little cherry tomatoes chopped into little pieces
Chopped fresh flat leaf parsley
3 tbsp EV olive oil
1 tbsp sherry vinegar
½ tsp caster sugar

Chop the chorizo into little pieces and in a little bit of olive oil gently fry it until it is crispy. You can add a drop of sherry to the pan if you like which does add a wonderful flavour.

Under a hot grill or over a flame roast the red pepper until the skin is slightly blackened. Wrap in foil and leave to cool. Remove the skin and the seeds inside, give it a very quick wash and slice into thin ribbons.

In a bowl put the drained chickpeas, the chopped tomatoes, the chorizo, the roasted pepper and the spring onions. Add seasoning.

You could also add some chopped black olives should you so be inclined.

Combine the oil, the vinegar and the sugar, stir to mix well and pour into the bowl. Give it all a good stir to cook and tip out onto a shallow platter. Sprinkle the parsley over the salad and serve.

Two Potato Salad

This salad makes a really nice change from the usual mayonnaise covered potatoes that you can find everywhere.

Ingredients:

1 large potato
1 large sweet potato
Small handful of chopped fresh mint
3 tbsp EV olive oil
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp grainy mustard


Peel both potatoes and cut them into bite sized pieces. Place the potatoes into two different saucepans because the sweet potato cooks much, much faster than the normal potato.

Make the dressing by mixing the oil, vinegar and the mustard.

Boil the white potato in salted water for about 10 minutes or so until the pieces are a little soft. Boil the sweet potato in salted water for only about 5 mins. Test the ‘doneness’ with the tip of a small sharp knife.

Drain the potatoes and put into a large bowl. Whist still warm pour on the dressing, sprinkle the mint and add some salt & pepper.

Optional extras include finely chopped gherkins and / or some chopped spring onions.

Give it a gentle stir and tip out onto a dish. Serve whilst still warm if possible.

Vietnamese Salad with Chicken / “Goi Ga”

We are very good friends with an English/Vietnamese couple and I have been pestering her for ages to teach me some Vietnamese dishes. Well finally I was obviously becoming too annoying and so invited me around last week and showed me two delicious recipes. She has also promised me a demonstration on Vietnamese spring rolls (both the cooked and uncooked types) and I can’t wait.

We were very regular visitors to a cheap and cheerful Vietnamese restaurant in Hong Kong called Perfume River and I was always surprised, and in fact I still am, about how both Thai and Vietnamese food share a lot of the same basic ingredients but how different their foods are.

Anyway, dear readers, I am going to share with you one of the recipes today and the others will follow.

I cannot help myself and I have already played around a little bit with her recipe and so this is my plagiarised version which may or may not be as good as the original.

Ingredients (for four)

300g chicken breast
5 carrots, peeled
5 small local cucumbers, washed, halved lengthways and seeds scraped out. Don’t peel.
2 red (Spanish) onions
A good sized handful of fresh coriander
A good sized handful of fresh mint
50g raw peanuts, roasted for five minutes then roughly crushed in mortar and pestle
2 cloves garlic
50g shallots, peeled and roughly chopped
2 tsp oyster sauce
2 tsp light soy sauce
Also salt, pepper, sugar, oil


For the pickling mixture:

200ml white (or rice) vinegar
200ml water
2 tbsp sugar
4 tsp fish sauce


For the dressing:

200ml boiled water from the kettle
2 tbsp granulated sugar
2 cloves garlic, chopped fine
2 Thai chillis, chopped fine (or more if you are brave)
2 tbsp fish sauce (nam pla)
2 tsp fresh lime juice


As with a lot of Asian salads, actually Asian food in general, the hard work and the time is in the preparation, the assembling of the salad is a work of minutes.

Place the chicken fillets on a wooden board, cover with cling film and using a rolling pin gently bash it to flatten and thin it slightly. Don’t go mad!

Place chicken into a shallow dish and sprinkle with salt, pepper, 1 tsp brown sugar, 2 tsp oyster sauce and 2 tsp light soy sauce, chopped garlic. Leave to marinade for 45 minutes.

In a saucepan put the pickling mixture ingredients, bring to a gentle boil, stir to make sure all the sugar has dissolved, remove from heat and set to one side to cool down.

Using a potato peeler or a mandolin on the thinnest setting cut into very thin strips the carrots, cucumber and the onions.

Put them into a glass bowl and pour the cooled pickling liquid on. Give it a very good stir and set to one side for at least 45 minutes. Give it another good stir every ten minutes or so to make sure all the vegetables get a good soaking.

Make the dressing by combining boiled water with the sugar and stirring until dissolved, then add the rest of the ingredients. Set to one side to cool.

Take a clean tea towel and place about a quarter of the chopped vegetables (carrot, cucumber and onions) in the middle. Fold the towel and giving it a number of very tight twists squeeze out as much liquid as you can. Tip the squeezed vegetables onto a large flat platter, and repeat until all the vegetables are done.

In a small frying pan with about 1 tbsp groundnut oil (no one said Vietnamese salads were healthy) fry the chopped shallots until nicely browned and a little bit crispy. Do be careful here, there is an incredibly fine line between brown and crispy and burnt!

Wash and chop very fine the mint and coriander (it will look like a lot but don’t worry) and spread on top of the vegetables.

Get a grill or a griddle pan nice and hot and quickly cook the chicken. It won’t take long as they are quite thin. Once cooked chop into small pieces and spread on top of the rest of the salad ingredients.

Spoon the cooked shallots on top, no need to drain.

Pour the dressing all over the salad and serve.

Now here are a couple of other thoughts that I have:

Chinese cabbage would be great in this, after all being pickled is the best way to treat this vegetable as any Korean will tell you!

I also think some Chinese vermicelli noodles would be good. I would boil them as per instructions, refresh under cold water, drain and then put down on the platter first before placing all the other ingredients on top.

The chicken could very easily be substituted with prawns and / or pork. In fact I think this would be a great salad with left-over turkey.

I would also like to try substituting the crushed nuts with toasted rice. In a dry frying pan put about 1 tbsp uncooked rice and over a medium heat cook until nice and brown. Place in mortar & pestle and grind until you are left with a pretty coarse powder. Sprinkle over the salad instead of the nuts.

I would like to add this dish to my BBQ repertoire. It would be nice to have the whole salad prepared and on the table, then to quickly BBQ the chicken, chopped it up, throw it on top, spoon on the dressing and serve straightaway.

Enjoy!

Completing the BBQ Menu

Following on from the posts about marinades, side dishes and grilling various meats I am going to finish off the BBQ promotion week with some other ideas for dishes to accompany a grilled meat –fest.

Tomorrow normal service will be resumed with yet more restaurant reviews, recipes and some thoughts for the next feature.

Generally a lunch or dinner al fresco at the HMHB household would consist of a large platter of grilled meats (rib-eye steaks, chicken thighs and some lamb leg). Over the meat, or in a pot to one side, will be some coarsely chopped salsa verde.

I like to serve quite a hearty potato dish as I think you need a little bit of heavy stodgy carbs to go with the various salads. My all time favourite potato dish is THIS ONE, please do try it, it is seriously great and so easy to put together.

I also usually serve the following salads:

Caesar Salad

Mixed bean salad with balsamic dressing

Mozzarella salad

In fact this menu has become such staple fare that my lovely wife has been begging me to expand my repertoire, so clearly it is time to try some of Alexander’s great recipes.

Well we hope you enjoyed the BBQ week, now onto newer things!

Sticky Chicken

Forever to be called 'sticky chicken' over at McNabb Mansions, this marinade is dark and spicy, sweet and pungent and most definitely Thai, or at least Asian, in its influences. You'll need kecap manis, an Indonesian ingredient which mixes soy sauce and palm sugar to give a sweetly salty condiment that is truly a miracle ingredient. If you can't get it (and you should, without huge trouble, be able to) then mix date syrup or treacle with an equal measure of dark soy sauce. But it's not the same, you know...

Ingredients

• 2 tsp red curry paste
• 1 tbsp coconut milk powder
• 4 tbsp kecap manis
• 2 tbsp light soy sauce
  
• 4 tbsp lime juice
• 4 tbsp wine
• 4 chicken breasts
  

Mash the curry paste into the lime, wine and kecap manis, adding the coconut powder and light soy sauce. Give it a good stir to mix everything in (the coconut won't quite combine, but don't lose any sleep over that) and then steep the chicken breasts in the mixture. Barbecue or grill, either way you'll get a dark, rich coating on the chicken which will need a light, fruity salad to set it off.