Tag Archives: Garlic

2x Spare Ribs on the BBQ

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P1000338

Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes

Now that we finally are getting some sun in Belgium, after all it is only June 3rd … the barbecue can come out of the garden shed.

A BBQ meal ever so successful for the lover of meat, are grilled spare ribs. Like the Americans say ‘the rack of ribs’. In Belgium the rack of ribs is actually cut in half lengthwise and one rack is about 10-15 cm wide and 30-40 cm long. Just the size an average person can dispatch during an evening diner.

Ribs are always great, served as ‘finger food’ with the aperitif as appetizer, or as a main dish served with a jacked potato with some sour cream or garlic butter, and a simple green salad and tomatoes. Simple, cheap and a definitely a treat deluxe.

The following post is not about grilling, it is about marinating. If you want to surprise your audience, marinate your spare ribs in advance. These are 2 of the summer marinades my hubby specifically developed for ribs.

The Ingredients: marinade for about 2 rib racks

DSC00463

Chinese spicy ribs:

  • ketchup
  • Chinese (or Asian) pili-pili (bottle)
  • 2 gloves of garlic
  • salt & pepper

‘Distinguished’ ribs

  • 1 lime
  • 2 tsps. smoked paprika powder
  • 3 tbsp. sugar
  • 2 globes of garlic
  • salt & pepper

The work:

Cut the garlic, squeeze the lime and mix the marinade ingredients and smear them on the ribs. Cover up the ribs and keep them in the fridge to marinate at least 2 hours before you grill them. You can even prepare this the evening beforehand.

When it is time, grill the ribs and use the left over marinade to baste the meat from time to time while you are grilling. You can use one of these modern heat resistant kitchen brushes.

Et voilà, you can discover for yourself how different the 2 preparations taste.

The tip:

I you can’t find the smoked paprika, you can improvise by mixing regular paprika powder with cayenne pepper.

The secret:

Each year we dedicate our first weekend of summer to contribute to one of our town’s festivals ‘de Zomerfeesten’. Our contribution is limited the hard work of serving mojito’s for 3 days. Depending on the weather, mojito sales vary from good to extremely good. In one of these not so extremely good years we ended up with a lot of left over limes. After having preserved a large part for use in the winter tagines, my husband kept on searching what he could do with them. Apart from the obvious lime sorbet, the ‘distinguished’ marinade was invented.

Hei, but if you ever need the recipe for mojito…

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Vongole

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P1000323

Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes

The Ingredients: for 4 persons

  • 500 g spaghetti
  • 1 kg clams or cockles
  • olive oil
  • 3 shallots
  • 1 small dried chilli
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 bunch parsley
  • salt & pepper

The work:

Make sure your shells are clean. Rinse as many times as you have to, to get them clean. Cut the shallots and grate or press the garlic. Cut the parsley.

Heat a pot of water with salt to boil the spaghetti and cook the spaghetti al dente.

Heat about a half a cup of olive oil in a pan and gently simmer the garlic, shallots and the pulverised chilli in it until tender. If your spaghetti is not ready yet, then take the pan of the heat until about 5 minutes before the pasta is ready.

Add the clams to the pan with the olive oil and shallots and heat until all shells are open. Put the lid on so you steam the shells to open them.

When the pasta is ready, take it out of the cooking water with kitchen tweezers and add it to the pan with the clams. Add parsley and mix everything gently. Serve is a deep dish.

The tip:

P1000315The golden advice is to rinse rinse rinse rinse… and rinse the shells until no sand or dirt is in the water anymore. Hateful it is when you are enjoying these delicacies from the seas and hear the sand grind between your teeth.

Don’t be dispirited if you have difficulties finding clams or cockles, you can surely find some shells to replace them, even mussels will work great.

Olive oils can have a very distinct taste. Taste your olive oil(s) beforehand to see if its taste is not too dominating, since you are using a lot of it in this recipe it can really start defining the dish’s taste.

The secret:

P1000318Less is more! Keep it simple, it will make everything better.

Our secret ingredient is the small dried chilli which we add to give the dish more pit.

Lamb Stew with Tagliatelli

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DSC06849

Preparation Time: 1 hour

The ingredients for 3-4 portions:.

  • 750 g lamb shoulder
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • a couple of rosemary sprigs
  • 3 tbsp. of oil
  • 1 tbsp. butter
  • 1 small can tomato paste (70 g)
  • ½ cup meat broth
  • salt & pepper
  • 3 tbsp. water
  • 300 g tagliatelle
  • parmesan cheese

The work:

Cut the meat in chunks; make sure you watch out to remove small bone fragments while cutting the meat.
Peel the garlic, wash the rosemary and dry it with paper towel.
Cutter the garlic, rosemary, broth and tomato paste with the blender.
Fry the meat on all sides in the hot oil. Then throw away the fat from frying.
Add the meat, the butter and the mix in one pan and add salt and pepper.
Let the ragout simmer for about 30 minutes. Keep the lid on.
Cooking time can run easily up to 1 hour, depending which lamb.
Cook the tagliatelli in a lot of water, just as you usually do, when your stew is almost ready.
Serve on a large plate: pasta with some stew on top, finished with a sprig of rosemary and grated parmesan.

Enjoy!

The tips:

Green pasta fits perfectly with this dish, so does a fresh green salad.
We have the habit of removing the fat which builds up at the surface while the stew is cooking.

The story:

We’re three people in our household: a man, a women and a daughter. Initally 2 out of 3 voted against lamb. It may sound funny, but this happened ages ago. At a certain moment the one voting for, went shopping, cooked the dish, didn’t disclose it was ‘the’ lamb dish, and served it. It became an instant hit. Our simple lamb stew is one of our family favourites. Funny how prejudices can prevent us from trying new tastes.