Articles Tagged with “Beef”

10/02/2008: Mince & Dumplings

Ingredients

Mince

• 450g minced beef
• 250g beef stock or water
• 1 large onion, finely chopped
• 1 large carrot, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp tomato puree
• 4 strands thyme
• small bunch parsley
• 1 tbsp Worcester sauce
• 1 tbsp sunflower oil

Dumplings

• 150g plain flour
• 75g suet
• salt
• pepper

Method

Heat the sunflower oil in a pan and fry the onion and beef until brown. Add the carrot, tomato puree, Worcester sauce, herbs and stock. Leave to simmer while you prepare the dumplings.

Preheat an over to 200°C.

Mix the suet, flour and seasoning in a large bowl. Add a little water and work into a heavy dough. The dough shouldn’t be particularly sticky — add a little flour if it is.

Divide the dough up into eight pieces and roll them into balls.

Transfer the beef mix to a casserole dish. Place the dough balls on top of the beef mixture. They shouldn’t sink in too far. Bake for about 35 minutes, uncovered.

31/08/2003: Spaghetti Bolognese

Yes, I know Spag Bol isn’t actually Italian, but it is Italian-style. The sauce doesn’t just have to be served with spaghetti - any other pasta will do, as would chips, baguettes, garlic bread or jacket potato.

Ingredients

• 450g tin of chopped tomatos
• 500g of lean minced beef, frozen
• 4 rashers of pancetta or smoked bacon
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 to 4 mushrooms, chopped
• 2 to 3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• 1 glass of red wine
• 1 1/2 teaspoon of dried chopped basil
• 1 teaspoon of dried chopped oregano
• a little beef gravy powder or cornflour
• salt and pepper to taste
• olive oil
• 150g dried spaghetti
• 2 to 3 tablespoons of mushroom ketchup (optional)
• 10 black olives, sliced (optional)

Method

Grill the pancetta or bacon until it starts to crisp. Then leave to cool. Once cool, chop as finely as possible.

Fry the onions and garlic in the olive oil until they start to become transparent. Then add the minced beef. Cook the beef, stirring occasionally, until it has browned. Now…

31/08/2003: Chilli con Carne

Ingredients

• 2, 3 or 4 (depending on how hot you like it!) chilli peppers, deseeded and chopped
• 500g minced beef
• 450g tin of chopped tomatos
• 450g tin of red kidney beans or mixed beans, drained
• 1 green pepper, chopped
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1 or 2 sticks of celery, chopped (optional)
• small handful of coursely chopped corriander
• Mexican spices
• gravy powder or cornflour
• oil

Spice Blend

OK — I have decided to reveal my tried-and-tested cajan/mexican spice blend exclusively on my website. You might want to make a big batch of this blend in advance. The quantities shown below will make too much spice blend for a normal sized batch of chilli!

Level one spices — use about three teaspoons of each:

• cumin (seeds, toasted and roughly crushed; or powder)
• chilli (dried flakes, or powder)
• oregano (dried)

Level two spices — include about two teaspoons of each of these if you have them:

• corriander (crushed seeds and/or dried leaves)
• garlic (dried powder, or crushed)
  *…