Don Pedro cocktail

Perhaps the worlds tastiest drink. I used to drink this as a child even, and maybe that is why now, I am the way I am. Perfect on any day in any place.

Ingredients:

30ml whiskey or bourbon
30 ml coffee liqueur
1 cup vanilla ice cream
1 cup cream

Procedure:

1. Blend all the ingredients in a mixer and serve in a hurricane glass. The resulting drink is a frothy, thick, milk shake type drink. Mouth watering.

Hamburger

No need to mention that this is a popular meal not only in the USA. If prepared correctly, it can also be very healthy and nutritious, contrary to poular belief.

Ingredients:

Ground sirloin or equivalently fine beef
Hamburger rolls ( not the always soft and fresh chemical type. Freshly baked sesame buns or something similar is required.)
Lettuce leaves, washed and dried
Tomato slices
Onion slices
Cheese slices (optional)
Pepper ( always freshly ground,) salt
Optionally: Mayonnaise, relish, pickles and all your other favourite condiments.

Remember, the more you add, the more you kill the flavour of the fine beef.

Procedure:

The idea of frying a burger is not much different to frying any other fine beef steak. Do not allow your mind to be warped by the image of hamburgers depicted and provided by fast food retailers nowadys.

1. Form beef into a patty slightly larger than the roll in which you wish to place it.
2. Cover with freshly ground pepper on both sides. This should help develop the desired crust when frying or grilling. Do not under estimate the flavouring qualities of good, black pepper. It is almost endless in variety and a good cook should ensure he has good pepper in his grinder.
3. Grill or fry the patty in butter. Since you are frying sirloin, it is up to you how well fried you like the meat. I rccommend medium purely as to ease te eating process and stop too many juices from drenching the burger. I eat my steak rare just for the record.
4. Flip the patty only once if possible. Do not pierce or prod it. You want all the juices to remain in the patty.
5. Once the beef is done, salt to taste. Never do this earlier because it sweats out the beef and absorbs moisture like sand absorbs water. You will have a dry burger.
6. Asseble the burger as described below:

You are now left with a juice filled, beef patty in butter. This is the first thing that goes on the bottom half of the roll. It will absorb all the juices that drip and nothing goes to waste. On top of the hot beef goes the cheese, if it is being used. Next, the lettuce, onion, followed by the tomato. The tomato helps to neutralize the hot, sometimes overpowering taste of the onion. On this we pour some ketchup and add any other condiments you may wish.

Octopus and rice

One of my all time favourite sports is spear fishing. Onece in a while I would pull out an octopus and never really knew how to cook it. Here is a simple yet effective recipe I was taught by some Portuguese fishermen.

A word of warning:
An octopus is practically a living muscle. Its internal organs are in its hood and are usually removed underwater by the fisherman, with the hood being turned inside-out to make the octopus weaker. This does not make it any less impossible to kill. I have had one of these escape my kitchen after a whole day and night of storage in the refrigerator. Use the proven technique of pounding the creature really hard on a rock on the beach or on a similar object. This also helps tenderize the meat. Either way, make sure the beast is dead.

Ingredients:

An octopus
Rice
Vegetables, eg. peas and rice (optional.)
Salt, pepper.

Procedure:

1. Boil the entire octopus in plain water for about half an hour.
2. The boiled octopus should now be soft enough to remove the skin and suckers, do so. (Note, some people eat the skin and suckers, but I don't find them very appealing.)
3. Cut the legs into 1cm pieces, and the hood into similar strips.
4. Boil in salt water. This may take around 3 hours, so a pressure cooker is really recommended to spped the process up. Boil until soft.
5. Mix the boiled octopus pieces with the rice, season to taste, add vegetables if you wish and boil for a further 20 minutes or so until the rice is ready.

Serve with a fresh garden salad and some mixed, boiled vegetables. A glass of light white wine or Portuguese green wine is an excellent addition.

Grilled Salmon

Sometimes, the Japanese philosophy behind food needs to be kept in mind. I am a huge fan of spicy and aromatic foods, but some products need to be respected for their own flavour without too much enhancing. Salomon is a fish which needs no extra spices.
This method of cooking ensures that the fish is flaky and succulent, not deprived of its natural flavours. It is practically steamed in its own juices.

Ingredients:

Salomon fillet or steak.
Extra virgin olive oil.
Lemon wedges.
Optional: garlic butter.
Tin or aluminium foil.

Procedure:

1. Place salomon on tin foil.
2. Sprinkle with olive oil.
3. Wrap in the foil and grill for 5 minutes on each side.

Serve immediately and garnish with a drop of freshly squeezed lemon or garlic butter.
As an entire meal, this is good served with a salad and Portuguese tomato rice. I love to prepare lemon-garlic butter for this to soak the rice.

Spanish garlic soup

A very pretty dish to serve and very tasty. Rember that if you are afraid of having garlic smell on your breath, garlic requires unity. If everyone eats some, no one will smell it.

Ingredients:

2 whole heads of garlic, crushed or finely chopped.
2 cans of chopped tomatoes .
2 chopped onins
half a slightly stale/dry baguette.
Salt, pepper.
Eggs (1 per bowl.)
Bay leaf and oter herbs/spices.
Extra virgin olive oil.
400/500 ml chicken or beef stock.

Procedure:

1. Fry onions and all of the garlic in olive oil until golden in colour.
2. Add tomatoes and fry until the tomatoes are mostly dissolved.
3. Add bay leaf and herbs, chicken or beef stock.
3. Salt and pepper to taste.
4. Boil for another 5 minutes and add crubled up baguette. Boil for another 15 minutes. Add more stock if necessary, but the consistency should be fairly thick.
5. Pour some of the thick soup into a bowl and gently crack an egg onto the surface. Bake in a hot oven for a further 7 or 8 minutes, until egg is ready.

The egg creates a nice seal, once broken releasing this marvellous soup. Like most mediterranean foods, this goes well with a good wine. Also provide some good bread to go with the soup.

"Power" absinth shot

A fine way of drinking enough absinth in such a way as to hallucinate before you get too drunk to notice.

Ingredients:

Absinth
Tia Maria coffee liqueur.
Small shot glasses ( +- 25 ml )
Drinking straws, cut in half

Procedure:

1. Pour one third of a shot glass of Tia Maria.
2. Touch the edge of the glass with an inverted spoon and pour the absinth over it to create a seperate layer on top of the coffee liqueur. There should be 2 seperate layers of alcohol. Make sure the glass is full to the very brim.
3. Set the drink on fire using a cigarette lighter.

The idea is to drink it with the short straw after it has burned off some alcohol for about 1 minute, be patient. When it gets warm, insert the straw right to the bottom of the glass so that the sweet liqueur shoots down first, coating your throat.
The warm absinth follows, going straight to the head. With practise you will be able to drink these without blowing out the flame.

Beef in horseradish sauce

A recipe I devised myself. This one is for those who like it hot. The idea is to not lose the meal's flavour by making it too spicy for the tongue, so heat is empowered through the nostrils with the horseradish and the sour cream helps by dissolving the capsaicin to create an effec of internal warming instead of just burning the mouth.

Ingredients:

600/800 grams of lean beef.
180 grams of grated horseradish.
2 onions
Garlic.
mushrooms.
Beef or chicken stock cube. This may, of course, be real, concentrated stock.
Your favourite chili, piri piri or any other hot pepper.
Potatos.
Sour Cream.
Herbes de Provence.
Pepper, salt.
Beer (optional)


Procedure:
1. Cut meat into small cubes and chop onions, garlic and mushrooms.
2. Fry these together until golden brown. Add the hot pepper, black pepper andstock cube.
3. Lower heat and stew for long enough to soften the meat. You may add a little beer from time to time to create enough sauce for stewing the meat to ensure it will be soft. Water works instead of beer too.
4. Towards the end, add all the horseradish.
5. Once everything is well cooked, add enough sour cream to create a thick sauce.
6. Boil potatos and mash with some butter, sour cream and a pinch of Herbes de Provence. Salt and pepper to taste.

Serve this up with some vegetables and something to drink to soothe the hotness.

Mussel soup with white wine

Mussel soup An excellent, refreshing soup for a hot day. Needless to say, it tastes the best by the seaside, where mussels are the freshest.

Ingredients:

15-20 cleaned mussels, live in their shells if possible.
Fish head (salmon or other good fish)
Parsley
Onion
Leek
Garlic
Carrot
Pumpkin
Salt and pepper
Bay leaf
Dry white wine

Procedure:
1. Boil a strong, fragrant broth with the fish head (or just fish,) herbs, bay leaf,vegetables, salt, pepper and garlic.
2. Remove everything from the broth besides the carrot, pumpkin, a little bit of garlic and some onion. You can add some other vegetables if you wish, according to taste.
3. Blend vegetables and broth into a smooth cream.
4. Bring to a boil and add mussels.
5. Add a glass of wine or more, as you like, but make sure not to make it too sour. Boil for another 10 to 15 minutes.

Serve hot, garnished with a pinch of fresh parsley and accompanied by a bottle of good, white wine.

Escargots (snails in garlic butter)

I don't want to say Burgundy style escargots because I do not consider snails to be all that French after all. Poland is the world's primary supplier and I have eaten them in various countries and styles. This is my favourite:

Ingredients:
12 live and healthy escargots per person.
A lot of butter.
Garlic.
Concentrated veal stock.
Selection of aromatic herbs.
Coarse salt.
Bicarbonate of soda ( if you don't have snail dishes.)
Bread cut into strips

Procedure:
1. Taking into account that snails often feed on poisonous plants and also that the true connoisseur eats the snails with their digestive tract, the tract needs to be emptied. To do this, hang the snails outside in a " cage" for 4 or 5 days and do not feed. All the muck will flow out through the openings at the bottom of the cage, starving the snails. Make sure the mesh is fine enough to keep the snails in.
2. Boil a large pot of water and drop the snails in for about a minute to kill them. Make sure you throw in only healthy, live snails.
3. Pull the snails out of their shells and clean out whatever black muck may be left.
4. Rub the snails with some coarse salt and rinse. Reapeat this until you get rid of all the slime.
5. Boil the snails with all the aromatic herbs in enough veal stock to just cover them. Adding a drop of dry white wine is also not a sin. Boil over a very low flame for 2 or 3 hours.
6. If you do not own a snail dish, prepare the shells by boiling in water with a couple of table spoons of the bicarbonate of soda for half an hour to clean them well.
7. Mix butter and crushed garlic, optionally with some finely chopped parsley. Salt to taste.
8. Place snail in dish or cleaned shell and cover with garlic butter.
9. Bake in hot oven for about 20 minutes.

Serve immeadiately with bread strips for dunking in the garlic butter.

Roast chicken on salt

For those who have tried to find the optimal solution to keeping your roast chicken, amongst other things, moist, you will have found that there are many techniques. A few successful ones involve placing a jar or can of water up the birds open rear end. The one I am going to describe is the easiest and works the best.

Ingredients:

A cleaned chicken.
Your favourite spices.
1 apple.
Garlic.
Salt.

Procedure:

1. Rub the chicken with some crushed garlic and your favourite spices.
2. Cut the apple in 4 and stuff the pieces into the chicken.
3. Cover the entire baking tray with a thick layer of salt, roughly half a cm or so. This will soak up all the juices and fat, steaming them up constantly around the chicken. Salt also helps the chicken "sweat" out more fat.
4. Place the chicken on the salt-covered tray. Avoid turning it or moving too much or it will be too salty.
5. Bake at 160 degrees celsius for 1.5 hours.

Serve whole on an appropriate serving dish. To go with the chicken I reccommend fried potato slices and a tomato, lettuce and onion salad, sprinkled with extra virgin olive oil and some vinegar.

South African, outdoor, underground turkey

This is a recipe for those who are going to spend an entire day outdoors, and are prepared to wait so long for the food to cook. It is an extremely fun, yet slightly laborious meal, perfect to finish off something like a fishing or hunting trip, or on the last day of camping.

Ingredients:
A whole, large, cleaned turkey.
Flour.
Water.
Oil.
Variety of fruits (apple, pear, pineapple, bananas, peach, apricot all work well.)
Garlic.
Spices.
Fresh herbs.
Onions.
Optionally buckwheat.

Additionally: Thin metal (steel) sheet which will withstand high temperatures, a shovel or two, firewood, large and deep baking pan (must fit turkey,) large surface and rolling pin.

Procedure:
1. Rub the turkey down, inside and out, with crushed garlic mixed with salt, oil and your favourite herbs and spices.
2. Stuff the turkey with the whole onions, garlic, selection of fruit. Make sure the entire turkey is stuffed with an assortment of good things (like the buckwheat).
3. Make some dough with the water and flour, also adding a tiny bit of oil or butter. Roll out a large, circular sheet of the dough which will accomodate the turkey.
4. Place the dough so that it is lying on the large, previously greased baking tray. The surface of the dough should be a lot larger than the tray.
5. Place the stuffed turkey on the tray, on which is the dough, and wrap the dough up and over, forming a sort of bag around the turkey. Fasten the top by moulding it together, so that now the stuffed turkey is completely encased within the dough.

Now dig a hole in the ground about 1m deep, prefferably asking some friends to help you. Light a fire within the hole and let it die down to what looks like red coal.
Place the turkey in its dough bag and tray on the coals. Place the steel sheet on top of the turkey, but in fact not touching the bird. Instead, the tray needs to be deep enough to support the sheet above the creature.
On the sheet, which is roughly the same size as the hole, light another, big bonfire.
Keep a nice campfire going for around 6 or 8 hours to cook the turkey. Dig it up when done, and observe that the turkey is within a shell. Crack this open with a machete and tremble at the aromas.
Serve with the stuffing and anything else you please. Dry white wine is also a good companion.

Polish Schabowy with sauerkraut and potatos

Polish cuisine is delicious. There is one meal which seems to be more traditional to the Pole than Hamburgers to the American. I sometimes get the feeling that certain people live on nothing but this dish there. The reason for this could be that its simply very tasty and not too hard to prepare. It also helps you get through a cold, winter day well as it's filling and nourishing. I present crumbed pork loin.

Ingredients:

Pork loin cutlets (1 per person)
Breadcrumbs
Egg (1 or 2, depending on amount of meat)
Crushed garlic
Sauerkraut
Butter
Flower
Cumin
Potatos
Parsley for garnishing

Procedure:

Cabbage:
1. Boil sauerkraut until soft. Time varies between different cabbage types.
2. Strain some of the water to leave sauerkraut just moist.
3. Salt and pepper to taste and add about half a teaspoon of cumin.
4. Make a roux by frying about 3 tablespoons of butter with about 2 tablespoons of flour. The consistency should be creamy. Fry until golden.
5. Add roux to cabbage and simmer for another 15 minutes.

Pork:
1. Tenderize meat by pounding it with a special hammer-like object.
2. Rub with garlic. Salt and pepper to taste.
3. Beat egg well on a plate. Pour breadcrumbs onto another plate.
4. Coat cutlet by dipping in egg, then transfer to plate of breadcrumbs and coat well on both sides.
5. Fry in oil over a medium flame on both sides until golden in colour.

Serve with potatos, either mashed with some butter and/or milk or sour cream or just simply boiled in pieces. Pour some of the oil from the pan over the potatos and garnish with a little parsley. I also like to squeeze a slice of lemon on the cutlet just before I eat it.
It is also popular to substitute the sauerkraut with beetroot, prepared hot or cold.

You would think that with such a fatty diet the girls would be ugly. On the contrary, as Polish beauty, Joanna Krupa wishes to point out:

Banana dessert

Here is a simple yet very effective dessert which is almost obligatory to do on the barbeque. The very desperate may prepare it in the oven.

Ingredients:
Bananas
Lemon
Honey
Tin foil

Procedure:
1. Gently cut through the skin on one side of the banana, lengthways. Open it up to expose the banana.
2. Grate a little of the lemon peel on a fine grate. Avoid grating the white pith.
3. Sprinkle some of the lemon peel and juice over the banana inside its skin.
4. Pour desired amount of honey over the banana.
5. Wrap in tin foil and bake on grill for at least 15 minutes.
6. Eat with a spoon while hot.

Steak

One of the finest meals on this planet. Simple to prepare, endless in variety, absolutely delicious.
The number of steak types and cuts of beef is very large and everyone has their favourite cut. I am a big fan of T-bone and Filet Mignon. The latter is cut from the tenderloin and is the most tender of all the beef cuts. It therefore does not require marinading.
Marinading has 2 primary purposes: to tenderise the beef and to add flavour. Since the number of recipes for steak marinades are endless, it is best you use your favourite.
Another important aspect of steak is maturing or ageing. Either the whole carcase is "dry-matured," which is the best method but not done at home, or "wet matured" where individual steaks are packed in vacuum bags and left for up to 14 days. The reason for this is to allow the meat's natural enzymes to break up certain proteins, tenderising the beef.
As far as cooking methods go, most steak is best grilled or on a hot rock, but can be fried. Filet Mignon is different and this is the one I will explain how to cook.

Ingredients:
Filet Mignon beef cut
Butter
Garlic
Baked potato
Sour Cream
Salad:
Lettuce
Cucumber
Tomato
Olives
Feta cheese
Onion (thinly sliced)
Red or green bell peppers
Olive oil
Vinegar
Oregano(optional)

Procedure:
1. Chop up vegetables for salad, sprinkle with olive oil and vinegar, salt and pepper to taste, mix, top with feta cheese and a optionally a tiny pinch of oregano. Onions can be substituted with garlic.
2. Heat frying pan till very hot and throw on a cube of butter and let it melt. The trick to keeping the steak juicy is to first fry it on both sides on a very hot pan. This will create a crust which will keep in all the juices. Avoid poking the steak with a fork as this will break the seal and juices wil escape. Turn with a spatula.
3. If you do not like your steak rare or medium rare, finish it on a lower heat or in the oven.
4. Top immeadiately with a little bit of garlic butter. Serve with the baked potato and cream and salad on the side. Provide proper steak knives to maximise the pleasure.
Pamela Anderson has just eaten some steak Tex-Mex as you can see:

Champagne breakfast

This is a breakfast influenced by the South African version of the English breakfast and by the continental too. Ideal to start off a long, sunny, lazy Sunday. Actually, it always tastes good.
Ingredients:
(breakfast for 2)

Yoghurt
Muesli
Buttered toast
Jam, marmolade
Eggs (2 per person, 3 for some)
Bacon (3 strips per person)
Freshly squeezed orange juice
Bottle of champagne or sparkling wine
Croissants (1 or 2 each)
Cream cheese (or cheese platter)
Grapefruit
(Optional: Tomatoes, can be green. Mushrooms, can be from a jar. Pork sausages)

Procedure:
All of the dishes should be served at the same time, prefferably on a sunny, sea-side terrace.
1. Fry the eggs in a decent amount of oil, next to the bacon. Make sure the white is well fried and the yolk is still soft so you can dip your bread or toast in it. Salt and pepper to taste.
2. Mix bottle of Champagne or sparkling wine with an equal amount of orange juice. Serve in a jug with nice glasses.
3. Serve yoghurt in dessert bowls with the mueseli seperate and optional)
4. Cut open grapefruit so it can be eaten with a spoon. Some like to sprinkle it with sugar. Sometimes a surprising but effective option to rid a grapefruit of its bitterness is to sprinkle it with a little salt.
5. Croissants can be served with the cheese and jams, and the toast seperately to go with the eggs.
6. Optionally, fry up some tomatoes, mushrooms or sausages to serve with the above.

Goulash

Goulash Is often confused with Porkolt. Goulash is a Hungarian soup and Porkolt is a thick, red, meaty stew. The stew is the one I wish to describe. This is obviously the best when prepared over a camp fire, when one can add the final touch of a little pinch of ashes from the fire for extra flavour.

Ingredients:
Meat. Two different types. Pork or/and beef will do.
Lots of onions
Garlic
Tablespoon of mustard
Frying fat (lard/oil)
Paprika, quite a lot (3 or 4 tablespoons)
Hot paprika to taste
Ground cumin (not too much))
Red wine (dry or semi-dry)
salt, pepper
Stock (beef or chicken)

Procedure:

1. Cut meat into 1 cm cubes and marinade with mustard, a bit of wine, garlic, salt and pepper. Leave in cool place for a couple of hours.
2. Fry meat in fat until half done, then add sliced onions and chopped or crushed garlic and fry until onions are golden.
3. The trick, if you want the stew a lovely red and to avoid bitterness, is to add the paprikas now, into the hot fat in the meat and onions and fry it for a couple of seconds, as if creating a sort of "roux."
4. Cover all this with some stock, enough to get a nice, not too diluted consistency. Leave this to stew over a small flame. This can take anywhere fom an hour up to three. Add wine as needed and stew down so that all the onions dissolve and you are left with meat in a fairly smooth red sauce. Add cumin towards the end of the stewing process.
5 . Serve with special Hungarian noodles or potato. Provide hot pepper sauce for those who like it very spicy.

Biltong

We begin with a recipe for South African Biltong, which is a food by far not popular enough outside of this country and deserves to be taken into consideration. It is basically dried meat, vaguely resembeling American beef jerky. Its popularity in South Africa is similar to fast foods such as chips and if you try it, you will know why.

Ingredients:
Meat. Any game, (buffalo is good) ostrich or simply beef.
Some coarse salt
Some pepper
Some vinegar
Some whole coriander seeds

Procedure:
1. Cut meat into 2 cm strips at an angle against the grain.
2. Dip meat in vinegar.
3. Crush coriander and grill for a few minutes on a frying pan.
4. Mix coriander with salt an pepper. You could if you wish add some brown sugar.
5. Keep meat in fridge over night or at least for a few hours, then drain off any blood.
6. Quickly dip meat in a water/vinegar solution to remove excess salt

The last step involves drying the meat. If you don't live in a hot, dry climate you will need some assistance. Usually a good way is to hang the meat (I recommend paper clips as little hooks) over a regular light bulb and have an electric fan blowing at the meat. The key is to avoid humidity. The Biltong is ready in 4-7 days, depending on the thickness of the strips. As simple as it sounds, this stuff is addictive, so be careful.