Sometimes I just get the coolest jobs! This was a day doing canapes for a corporate day on the Spirit of New Zealand.

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I keep banging on about food should be fun, and this roast beef is one of those where the use of spices takes the whole meal to a new level. Nobody ever guesses that the lovely crunchy crust is really curry powder and salt. Use the mild curry powder and either rock or flaky salt.

Choose your meat carefully, cheaper meat tends to carry more fat not just on the surface but also in amongst the muscle fibre. Try Cambrian Meats in Judea or Harmony Meats at the good food trading company.

Roast Beef

2.5 – 3kg Beef roast

1 tablespoon Curry powder

2 tablespoon salt

Fresh ground black pepper

2 Onions , roughly chopped

1 Leek, roughly chopped

2 Carrots, peeled and roughly chopped

3 cloves of garlic, peeled

2 sticks of Celery, roughly chopped

1 tablespoon Plain flour

1 cup red wine ( optional but really good)

! litre of stock or water

Method

Mix all the powders together and spread on the fat layer of the sirloin.  (This will make it very crispy.) allow to sit at room temperature for at least 1 hour.

Put all the chopped veg in a high-sided roasting dish and sprinkle with the plain flour.

Place meat on top of the veg and flour and on the middle shelf of a preheated oven at 240˚C for 15 minutes per 450g plus 15 minutes extra, turning oven down to 190˚C after first 20 minutes.

Carefully lift the meat off the now caramelised veg, wrap the meat in foil and leave to one side to rest. Rest for at least 30 minutes before serving. While resting make the sauce by placing the roasting tray with the caramelised veg in over a high heat on the stove top. Get good and hot again and then deglaze with the red wine if using. Let this reduce by half, then add the stock or water making sure that you get all the lovely tasty bits off the bottom. Once boiling, sieve into a saucepan and keep warm

Top tip.

If you have a meat thermometer then these temps will guarantee doneness

Core temperature for RARE                                    50˚C

Core temperature for MEDIUM RARE                  56˚C

Core temperature for MEDIUM                           65˚C

Core temperature for WELL DONE                  75˚C

Roast Vegetables

I large potato, large dice

1 kumara, large dice

¼ pumkin, large dice

1 red capsicum, chopped roughly

1 yellow capsicum, chopped roughly

1 red onion, sliced

1 courgette, sliced

1 small carrot, peeled and chopped roughly

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 cloves garlic

1 cup spinach, chopped roughly

Vinaigrette dressing (see below)

Method

Roast chopped vegetables (except spinach), garlic and olive oil in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for 30 to 40 mins until golden brown. Remove vegetables from oven and add spinach and seasoning.  Add dressing and mix well.

Vinaigrette

Makes 400ml

½ tablespoon smooth Dijon mustard

50ml red wine vinegar

50ml balsamic vinegar

100ml hazelnut oil

100ml avocado oil

100ml olive oil

½ teaspoon salt

6 turns white pepper

1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed

Method

Place all the ingredients into a blender and blitz for 60 seconds.  Strain through a fine sieve.

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This week it’s all about risotto, in this case seafood risotto. Risotto can be as rich and fatty as you want to make it, which obviously in this case we’re trying to avoid that. The trick to avoiding fat is to recognize that fat is what we as humans find interesting and flavoursome, so eliminating it runs the risk of making our food taste a bit boring. Once you accept this you can see the importance of seasoning, spicing and building strong base flavours. The homemade fish stock is the start point that builds the flavour, and is so easy to make. just wash the bones before you use them and follow the recipe. you can get the bones from Sandfords (cheap or free) or if you’re out fishing keep the bones. Make lots as it freezes well.

For the risotto, I’ve shown the pan method though on monday I did it in the oven adding the fish just for the last five minutes, both work really well. I also added saffron to both the stock and risotto which brings a wonderful richness and colour. As i said earlier we tend to associate flavour with the fat content, so just removing it will leave your meal missing something. replace with real natural flavours and its a joy to eat again. See you next week.

Fish Stock

2kg soaked and washed fish bones

50g fresh herbs

3 litres cold water

12 white peppercorns

2 medium onions

2 bay leaves

2 white leeks

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 sticks celery

600ml white wine

Method

Sweat the vegetables and herbs with the olive oil until soft but without colouring them.  Add the fish bones and stir to coat.  Add water and wine to cover and bring to the boil.  Skim and simmer for 20 minutes.  Allow to cool (about 3 to 4 hours), sieve and store in the fridge or freezer.

Easy Risotto

The main point to remember when making risotto is that any liquid that you use, whether it is stock, wine or cream, should be boiling hot before you add it to the rice.  This will stop your risotto from “clumping”.

For 2 – 3 main servings:

1 cup Aborio or risotto rice

2½ cups stock, boiling

½ onion or 2 shallots, chopped

1 – 2 cloves garlic, chopped

Extra virgin olive oil

100 ml white wine

Salt and pepper

Parmesan, grated

Extra hot stock, olive oil or butter

Method

Heat the wine gently (and saffron, if using.)  In another large pan, heat a little olive oil and sweat the “soffrito” slowly – garlic, onion and any other root vegetable being used (e.g. carrot, leek).  Add the rice and heat through for 1 – 2 minutes (called toasting).  Add hot wine and allow to reduce.  Add the boiling stock all at once, bring back to the boil and add seasoning.  Cover and simmer for 15 – 18 minutes.

Add flavourings, rest for a few minutes and then stir through parmesan, a little extra stock, gently heated cream, extra virgin olive oil or butter – the amount depends on how ‘allonde,’ or creamy, you like your risotto.

Suggested additions:

  • Ø Porcini: Soak 15g dried porcini in 250ml warm water for at least 20 minutes.  Strain and use some of the stock in risotto.  Add sliced porcini at halfway point.  Add heated cream at the end, along with parmigiano and chopped Italian parsley.  Drizzle with Truffle oil.
  • Ø Smoked Mushrooms: As above, but use Aromatics Smoked Mushrooms instead of porcini.
  • Ø Smoked Salmon: Add chopped leek to the initial ‘soffrito’.  Before adding Parmesan, add chopped, cooked Smoked Salmon.
  • Ø Chorizo & Saffron: Add a pinch of crushed saffron to the wine/stock and, before you add the Parmesan at the end, fold through 2 cooked, chopped chorizo sausages.
  • Ø Pumpkin: Cook cubed pumpkin slowly in EVO with garlic and some red wine and add with the Parmesan.
  • Ø Lamb, Feta & Capers: Add 1 – 2 seared lamb fillets, marinated in Balsamic Vinegar and Infused Olive Oil (Lemon or Porcini) plus 2 tablespoon salted capers, soaked and rinsed and 100g cubed Creamy Feta.

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This blog is following the feeding of The Bay of Plenty Steamers through the next ten weeks. I’m writing it for the players, so that they can keep track of the recipes that we are using and hopefully gat a bit of fun and taste back into their food. That said I hope it can be of interest to  others. I will be talking directly to all the team and most of the advice will be rugby specific and in line with the teams dietary needs. If anyone has questions or need help please email through this site or facebook.

So on to this week, I really wanted to introduce Quinoa to the team as frankly it is an astonishing superfood, high in vegetable protein and gluten free. Almost more importantly it is really quick to cook and available in most supermarkets. You’ll see from the recipe that you need to panfry or dry toast the washed seeds for a while and then cover with boiling water, the easy trick is to heat the pan and fill the kettle, drop in the slightly damp quinoa and turn the kettle on. Use the time it takes the kettle to boil as the dry toasting time, then carefully add the boiling water (carefully, because it will hiss and spit for the first few seconds, then calm down). The toasting stage is important as it will release the natural nutty flavour of the quinoa.

Now to the chicken, try to buy whole chickens as it will be cheaper in the long run and learn how to butcher it (any problems, let me know and I’ll show you how next week). Leave the bone in as it will add more flavour. With the seasoning try to avoid the jar type and stick to the powder, as they tend to add all sorts of rubbish to the jar that you don’t need. The best powder I’ve found is the one at Cambrian Meats in Judea, although the supermarket ones would do.

Usually Butter chicken is made with cream, but in this case we’ve substituted with lite coconut milk to cut the fat content.

Mild Butter Chicken

1 whole chicken, preferably free range

2 tablespoons of butter chicken spice powder

1 tin crushed tomatoes

500 ml lite coconut milk

small bunch coriander

seasoning

Separate the breast, legs and thighs of the chicken from the bones and sprinkle with the spice powder. Place in a sealable box and refrigerate overnight, (including the bones)

Start by bringing the coconut milk to the boil and reduce for 5 minutes then add the tomatoes. Meanwhile panfry the chicken pieces for colour and flavour, and place in a casserole dish. Pour over the sauce and place in a medium hot oven for 25 minutes.

Season to taste and sprinkle with chopped coriander, Serve.

Quinoa Salad with Roast Vegetables & Halloumi

Serves 6

1 red capsicum, chopped roughly

1 yellow capsicum, chopped roughly

1 red onion, sliced

1 courgette, sliced

1 small carrot, peeled and chopped roughly

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 cloves garlic

1 cup quinoa (pronounced ‘keenwa’)

Salt & pepper

1 cup spinach, chopped roughly

150g haloumi cheese, grilled until golden brown, (optional)

Vinaigrette dressing

Method

Roast chopped vegetables (except spinach), garlic and olive oil in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for 30 to 40 mins until golden brown.

Meanwhile, wash quinoa with cold water in a sieve and squeeze dry in a clean tea towel.  Place quinoa in a pan, place over a medium heat and fry until lightly toasted.  Cover with boiling water and simmer gently until all the liquid has been absorbed.

Remove vegetables from oven and add to quinoa with spinach and seasoning.  Add dressing and mix well.  Place in a bowl with grilled haloumi on top as a garnish and serve.

Vinaigrette

Makes 400ml

½ tablespoon smooth Dijon mustard

50ml red wine vinegar

50ml balsamic vinegar

100ml hazelnut oil

100ml avocado oil

100ml olive oil

½ teaspoon salt

6 turns white pepper

1 clove garlic, peeled and crushed

Method

Place all the ingredients into a blender and blitz for 60 seconds.  Strain through a fine sieve.

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Why is that sports’ desperate need for money is being serviced by the very corporations that damage us the most? I know its just a fact of modern life but for me it just highlights how damaged and skewed our society is.

We try to teach our kids how to make appropriate choices and then when they excel at their sport they receive a MacDonald’s voucher. Some would say that we should be grateful for the financial support that this sort of sponsorship brings, to me its just a cynical marketing exercise.

When you look at the London olympics they have done a great job creating a food legacy that means that all the food is sustainable, local and as organic as possible. sounds good doesn’t it. Now to the big but, the hardest part of setting the food standards for this flagship sporting event was negotiating Macdonalds into agreement, and now since they are spending so much to be a title sponsor, no other supplier is allowed to mention their involvement.

Food is all about trust, and the sooner we all make friends with our food suppliers and stop believing marketing spin the better all of our health will be.

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As a chef I’ve always been my body is a funfair, instead of a temple, kind of person. You know, experience everything and when the time comes go out with a bang. Now this served me well right up until I broke into the forties and started to teach professional rugby players how to cook. Let me tell you nothing makes you feel short, fat and old like walking into a room full of atheletes.

So like many men with a mid life crisis, I’m trying to get fit again and recreate the vision that my memory assures me  I once was. Thats the nice thing about breaking forty, you can now lie to yourself.

So just to make this more public I’m working with a wonderful pair of fit young things on their online gym. Sounds good doesn’t it? don’t be fooled, I’m doing the cooking but am determined to try to use heavier pans.

Nicola and Ben from foreverfit.tv

Nowonto a recipe that workes so well as the animal fat is cut the dish is so full of flavour.

Fish “En Papillote”

Serves 4

4 fish fillets, e.g. snapper, blue nose, swordfish            4 gourmet potatoes, sliced

1 onion                                                                                    Handful coriander, chopped roughly

1 leek                                                                                                Lime juice & zest

4 cloves garlic                                                                        2 cups white wine

4 Kaffir lime Leaves                                                                        1 cup Grove avocado oil

1 stalk lemongrass, sliced finely                                                Pinch of saffron and seasoning

Method

Put fish with onions, leeks, garlic, potatoes, kiwi and flavourings in four parcels of tin foil.  Place on a hot barbeque or on a hot baking sheet and bake with the lid down or at 230˚C in the oven for about 10 to 12 minutes.  Flatter fish, e.g. snapper, will take only about 6 to 8 minutes.

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Sports Nutrition in the Real World with The Bay of Plenty Steamers

Lets start with the generally accepted definition of sports nutrition, this time taken from that font of all knowledge, Wikipedia.

Sports nutrition is the study and practice of nutrition and diet as it relates to athletic performance. It is concerned with the type and quantity of fluid and food taken by an athlete, and deals with nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, supplements and organic substances such as carbohydrates, proteins and fats. Although an important part of many sports training regimens, it is most commonly considered in strength sports (such as weight lifting and bodybuilding) and endurance sports (for example cycling, running, swimming).

Now before we all fall asleep lets move this book out of the science and into the real world, because lets face it when was the last time you popped to the supermarket and bought 500g of protein?

The idea behind this blog is quite simply that although there is a plethora of scientific tomes published on sports nutrition there is a sad lack of an easy to use handbook on how to feed elite sports people.

We will demystify the science and look at the real food that the Bay of Plenty Steamers and their sporting friends use and enjoy while fulfilling their training and event needs.

Fish “En Papillote” with Tapenade

Serves 2

2 fish fillets, e.g. blue nose, swordfish

½ onion

½ leek

2 cloves garlic

1 tbsp tapenade

2 tomatoes, sliced

Handful flat leaf parsley, chopped roughly

Lemon juice & zest

1 cup white wine

Method

Put fish with onions, leeks, garlic, tomatoes and flavourings in two parcels of tin foil.  Place on a hot baking sheet and bake at 230˚C for 10-12 minutes.

Papardelle with Char-Grilled Chicken & Green Beans

Serves 2

1 x 200g chicken breast, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

1½ garlic cloves, finely sliced

Sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

1 batch tagliatelle (see ‘speedy pasta’ recipe above)

1 tablespoon olive oil

100g baby green beans, topped (not tailed) and sliced from end to end on the diagonal

65ml (¼ cup) chicken stock

Good quality parmesan cheese, grated

25g basil leaves

Method

Place the chicken, EVO oil and garlic in a bowl and stir to combine.  Season with salt & pepper.  Cook pasta in a large pot of rapidly boiling salted water until ‘al dente’ and drain well.  Meanwhile, 5 minutes before pasta is cooked, place a large frying pan over a high heat until hot.  Add olive oil and heat for 5 seconds.  Add chicken with marinade and sear quickly for 30 seconds.  Add beans and reduce heat to medium.  Cook for another 2 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Return heat to high, add the stock and simmer for 30 seconds.  Add pasta and toss to combine.

Divide pasta evenly between two bowls and top with freshly grated parmesan cheese, basil and freshly ground black pepper.

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Food for elite sports people is an incredibly complex area to talk about, and to be honest I’m not a dietician. What I am is a chef who can translate the complex science into the real world so that our elite and future elite sports people can achieve their dreams.

Over the years I’ve had the pleasure of working with all manner of sports people from professional rugby players.

to ocean yacht racers

I’ll keep posting every time I find something new.

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