Spare Ribs With Huli Huli Sauce, Roast Stuffed Peppers, Potted Mackerel

This blog entry was supposed to be something so different. You see, we had a Hawaii tapas theme. Slow roast spare ribs in a rich Hawaiian bbq marinad, dry-cured salmon, slightly seared with a lime salsa and sweet potatoes roasted in a ridiculously spicy Huli Huli sauce (yeah I know, what the f...?). Sounds great right? And it was... the problem however, is we can’t share the photo’s with you because we, as in me, failed to charge the battery for the camera. So after enjoying some food at the temperature it was intended to be eaten, it was decided that we would simply have to prepare three more dishes for the following night. Tapas Saturday. Basically, we would be doing a double this weekend. Good thing we love this blog and the food we do on it so much.

We will feature Hawaiian tapas at some point down the line, but for now, here’s a picture of a chocolate mouse with some pineapple and coconut.


Stuffed Roast Peppers

Ingredients: 3 peppers of any colour, class or sex, halved and seeds removed; 4 cloves garlic

Sauce: 250g mince beef; 1 carrot, 1 celery, 1 onion, 4 cloves garlic – all finely chopped. 4 tomatoes chopped. Squirt of tomato paste; pinch of saffron threads; cup of chicken stock

Pre-heat your oven to 180c. Sprinkle some oil over your peppers and garlic and season well. Roast for about 20 mins.

While the peppers are roasting prep the sauce. Sweat off your veg except the tomatoes. Add the mince which should be at room temp so as not to loose all the juices. Once coloured add some smoked paprika and hot paprika and stir. Add the tomato paste and cook for another min or so. Add the tomatoes and cook until they are soft and mushy. Once you are happy with how things are going, dissolve the saffron in about a cup or so of chicken stock. Can’t help thinking of Marco P W here. Add to the pan and let it reduce down to a happy consistency. Take the roasted garlic and while still hot squirt them into your sauce and give it a good stir. This will do things to your sauce that you never dreamed possible. If those dreams were about how to make it sweet and garlicky that is. Pour your sauce over your roasted peppers and return to the oven for another lets say maybe 15 mins? Serve with an air of confidence.

Spare Ribs With Huli Huli Sauce

Ingredients: spare ribs for the marinade we used about 100ml soy sauce, 3 tbsp oyster sauce, 2 squirts of ketchup, One shake of YR sauce, 1 tsp harissa, chilli flakes, 3 tbps brown sugar, 50ml rice vinegar, black pepper, chopped pineapple and crushed garlic.
Huli Huli Sauce: Soy sauce, minced garlic and ginger, juice of one lime, crushed chilli and a tsp of brown sugar.

We managed to salvage something from our proposed Hawaiian tapas. We had spare ribs spare, as in left over and some Huli Huli sauce. We marinated the ribs overnight, turning them in the morning. To cook, simply heat your oven to about 200c. Put ribs covered in marinade on a tray or oven proof dish and stamp into the oven. Turn the heat down to about 170c and cook for 3-4 hours basting every time you could be bothered. This is pure indulgence. I just had a dinner and am actually getting hungry thinking of this right now.

Potted Mackerel With Capers

Ingredients: 4 fresh mackerel fillets. A cup-ish of sour cream; 6 shakes of Tabasco, chopped chives; some capers, flash fried; butter, melted.

Pan fry the fish skin-side down for 2 mins, turn and continue to cook for another minute. Remove, let cool slightly and peel away the skin. Flake the flesh into a bowl. Season well. Lots of pepper. Do the hippy-hippy-shake with the Tabasco and add the chives and sour cream. Mix and mix and mix some more. Tightly fill cups, bowls, ramekins or whatever you have with the mixture. Pour over some of the butter. Add the capers and slide into the fridge to set. Demolish with grilled sourdough. We used a marker to get the grill lines.

Shopping List:
Minced Beef €3
Mackerel €3.82
Spare Ribs €3.80
Veggies, herbs and spices €4.20
.........................................................
Total €14.82

Drinks:
Rosé da Peceguina, 2009, 13.5%

On the stereo:
Nouvelle Vague, Vuvuzelas, The Bronx