Homemade Lamb Burgers "a la Purple" | You've Got Meal!

Take that for a title, internet! Honestly I had no idea what to call this other than lamb burgers, but it does have a powerful purple touch because of the veggies used. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

For 400 grams of minced lamb meat, prepare an infusion of spices: smoked paprika, ground ginger, cardamom, garlic powder, salt, pepper.

Also, mix in the burger meat a small amount of olive oil  and 1 egg or 2, this will help bind the lamb together. The rest of the burger components are red onion, beet, fries and a yogurt- garlic sauce that I will get to a bit later.

The onion and the beet I’ve cooked in the oven (just clean them, wrap them in some thin foil with some olive oil and salt, cook the onion for 20 minutes and the beet for twice more- I had a big beet) . This will give you sweet, juicy vegetables that bright up the plate. Oh, and the fries you just make them by frying potatoes, I think J.

We also served the burgers with sime small tempura zucchini, that turned out really nice, semi-crunchy and fresh..

A quick note here: I didn’t have and I was too lazy to go buy, but some crispy iceberg salad and fresh tomatoes work really well here.

Now, the sauce:  greek yogurt, salt, pepper, lemon juice, olive oil, a crushed clove of garlic, finely chopped mint. Mix everything together, balancing the oil and the lemon juice.

Place all the components in a warmed bun, grab a cold beer (a chilly Spitfire works for me with these burgers) and remember summer. It’s only 6 months before it comes back again….. L

Enjoy,

Fried Fish Sticks with Broccoli and Okra Recipe | You've Got Meal!

Super easy recipe for fried fish in beer batter, served with a healthy vegetable side dish.

Do you hate fish? Really? Why? Doesn’t matter, you will love this way we cook it, in an airy and fluffy beer batter. Actually we’ve covered the recipe before here, so I won’t insist too much on it. It is one of the best recipes for us, because the nutmeg give it a nice flavor and the batter is always very fluffy and it does not get very oily. So, go on, check the recipe, don't be shy!

Needles to say that it worked perfectly again, but this time with a little spin on the side dish. Fish wise, we used black cod, can’t say that it was better than perch, but it did the trick.

For the side dish, I have to confess that I was lazy. Not  “lazy so I cook something terrible” (that doesn’t happen in the YOUVEGOTMEAL kitchen – a touch of modesty there), but “lazy so I will use frozen veggies”. 

• So, I pack of frozen broccoli, 
• 1 of frozen okra, 
• 1 chili, 
• 1 onion, 
• 2 cloves of garlic, 
• cardamom, 
• all spice, 
• curry leaves, 
• coriander seeds, 
• lemon juice, 
• salt , pepper and olive oil. 

You probably realized that the differences from the post above are the spices and the okra. About the latter, it is a vegetable that is used in Lebanese cooking, but I’ve seen it as an ingredient in Mediterranean dishes as well. The thing about it is that it gets gooey when cooked if not treated with an acidic ingredient (say vinegar or lemon juice). Traditionally, I’ve cooked this by boiling it with salt, vinegar and various spices and added the okra at the end.  But, considering that a lot of lemon juice was already being used for the broccoli, this wasn’t the case. Start of by sautéing the onion, chili and garlic in the olive oil on medium heat for a couple of minutes, until the onion gets nice and shiny. Add the broccoli, okra and the spices. Cook this mixture for 5 minutes, then add a couple tbs. of water and the juice of 1 lemon, cover the pan and cook for another 7 minutes . 

As a last touch, increase the veggie power in your dish and get “lazy” again by getting a small can of baby carrots and peas and mix them with the other greens after turning the heat of. The spicy fish and this health bomb (be it even from frozen/canned veggies) of a side dish will make your day.

Enjoy,

PS: why give your liver a break ? Get a nice bottle of sauvingnon blanc and turn this into an adult menu *wink.

Chicken Roasted on Salt

   

I’d like to start this post with a confession: I’m not a big fan of chicken, maybe it’s because I get to eat it pretty often and it’s mostly fried. But this time, I actually was excited about cooking it, and for 2 reasons. First, because I got my hands on this beautiful organic, yellow, plump chicken at around 2,5 kilos. I don’t  say this easily, but this meat was just both gorgeous and delicious. 

The second reason to be excited was the fact that I wanted to cook the chicken on salt, a first in the YOUVEGOTMEAL kitchen. The cooking was a 2 step process, first marinating the meat and the roasting it on salt, on low heat in the oven.

Now, I decided to cut the chicken into pieces, but you can choose to cook it whole, that gives it a more grandiose look (in my case, our tiny oven couldn’t handle a whole chicken). I cut the meat into 5 pieces: 2 whole legs, 2 pieces of breast, each with its own wing attached, and the back of the chicken, that I used to make some stock for later use in the kitchen. For the marinate, use  some olive oil, the juice of 1 lemon, thyme, basil, garlic and pepper. Mix everything together and massage it into the meat, then leave the chicken to rest for 1 hour in the flavored juices. The cooking process is a piece of cake (or salt, if you prefer, that actually sounds easier than making cake). Prepare the baking tray by cutting a big enough piece of baking paper, pop it under some tap water, the just crumble it into your hands then return it to its original shape. This will help you handle it easier when you place it in the tray and it will protect it better from the heat (it will make cleaning the tray a piece of salt- see what I did there?). Next, take 1 kilo of salt and place it in an even layer in the tray and place the pieces of chicken on top, skin side up, and pour the remaining juices on the meat. 

Put the tray in a preheated oven, on medium-low heat and cook the chicken for about 80 minutes. You can check if it’s done by running a knife through the breast, if it goes in easily, remove it from the oven. Leave the meat to rest for 10 minutes before cutting it. I have no idea how the salt work, but the meat was tender, fresh and had a nice crisp on the outside and it didn’t taste like, well, salt. Definitely worth making. As a salad that suited the meat, we just  mixed some lettuce leaves (something called latuga bowl), chopped endives leaves, pomegranate seeds with a dressing made of olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper and honey – tangy, crunchy, sweet, perfect.

Enjoy,

Spicy Chicken Wings and Special Fries | You've Got Meal!

The title doesn’t really do justice to this dish as it is a very nice fusion of American, Chinese and Italian cuisine (the Italian part being the beautiful Nero D’Avola that accompanied the meat and potatoes J). This thing is a singe to make and it guaranteed to impress, especially with the spicy food loving crowd.

We used 10 wings that we cut in half, you can adjust the amount of wings according to your own desire. The idea behind cooking the meat here is that we wanted to cook it in a healthier way that just frying it, and we managed to do just that without sacrificing taste. Making these wings is a 2 step process. Start of by flouring the wings (that you’ve thoroughly washed) and placing them on an oven tray that you pop in the oven, at high heat for around 30 minutes. Meanwhile you have time for the second part, another dead easy step. Heat up 75 grams of butter on bain-marie, and this will serve as the base for a sauce that will coat the oven cooked wings. To the butter add 2 (or more, you hot devil J)hot pepper sauce -  I used tabasco, 1 tbs Worchester sauce and 1 tsp of red wine vinegar (I find this step optional, as the hot sauce usually has a fair amount of vinegar in it). Next, choose you condiments. My suggestion is to use ground ones, that mix well in the butter, and don’t overdo it as you can get a dusty feel to the meat. I used  smoked paprika, ground ginger, cardamom, dried garlic powder, curcuma, salt and pepper. Mix the spices with the spicy butter. After the wings are done, remove them from the tray and place them in a large bowl. Pour the sauce on the wings and mix really well, making sure the meat is fully covered with the spicy goodness, and you’re done with the meat. I find this recipe to hold its ground over traditional deep fried wings and you can choose it when you want to avoid an oily situation.

This being a super easy wings recipe, the side dish couldn’t be far away from it. For the Chinese style fries you’ll need to slice your spuds thinly and evenly – think of a No.2 pencil and quarter it- that’t the size you want. Clean the potatoes really well, making sure you get rid of that starch, and let them rest in salted water for 10 minutes. The other things you’ll need are 2 tbs of dark sugar, hot sauce- about 2-3 tbs., and (optional, I’ve explained above why), 1 tbs of rice vinegar, 1 tbs. of soy sauce and some cucumbers, cut the same way as the potatoes. Heat up your wok, add a couple tbs. of peanut oil (or vegetable oil) and add the sugar, hot sauce and vinegar. Immediately pop in the potatoes and mix them well to make sure they are coated with the flavor base. Cook them until almost done. Next add the soy sauce and cucumbers and cook those for another minute or so (you can sprinkle some chopped coriander on top for a more Chinese touch).

I can assure you that this wing and fries mix has nothing to do with its fast food cousins. It may be fast, but make no mistake, it packs a big punch and it is poised to surprise you.  

Enjoy,