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April 8, 2015

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american, breast, classics, fakeaways, fast food restaurants, poultry, recipe card, savoury snacks, snacks, syn free, taster ideas, travel

KFC-style chicken

Classics Week continues with a recipe for KFC chicken – I’m not a fan of KFC, something about sticking my bone in a greasy box doesn’t appeal. But, nevertheless, it’s a recipe that seems to be doing the rounds on the various SW facebook sites so we thought we should give it a go. Recipe near the bottom, but first, MORE CHUNTERING ABOUT IRELAND.

You left us yesterday as we pulled up outside the cottage, and going forward, I’m not going to talk day to day as a lot of the days were the same (pootle about in the car, eat, eat some more, pootle a bit further, eat, stock up on ice-cream and nip back to the cottage in time for Tipping Point) – instead, I’ll just rattle off some incidents, high points and thoughts.

First, we managed to cause major offence within twenty four hours. Frankly, if you’re of a nervous disposition or candid talk of sex makes you green, just skip ahead a couple of paragraphs.

See, the cottage came with a hot-tub, and we decided to enjoy dusk in the hot-tub completely nude – pity the poor filters having to work overtime to drain out our back-hair and toenails. But, it was incredibly romantic and we were incredibly isolated, with not a soul around us (to the point where, at night, we could look across the valley and see only one solitary light for miles around), and being young, virile young men, we immediately got up to dickens. Well, it was my birthday after all.

Picture the scene – the bubbling of the steamy water, music playing through the iPad, the rhymthic sound of the jets, the twilit light bouncing off Paul’s wobbling buttocks (it would look like the Mitchell brothers were hiding just under the water), me playing a mean tune on the old ham trumpet – perfectly romantic for a married couple. Well yes, until a honking big tractor appeared at the end of the garden less than thirty foot away. How we had missed it was understandable – Paul was facing the other way and I was always told not to talk with my mouth full – but how the hell the farmer didn’t see until he was parked up I have no clue. Looking back, there would have been a hedge blocking his view until about 40 foot away, and then he probably just thought he was committed.

Good lord. You’ve never seen two people spring back as quick as we did – it was like someone had dropped a toaster in the water. Half the water in the hot-tub sloshed over the side exposing even more of our milky-white frames. Mind, he was no better – he looked like your very personification of a hard-bitten farmer – tattered cloth cap, wax jacket from the eighties, face like a drained field, and he ambled over with his hand pulling the brow of his cap over his eyes like he was Icarus approaching the sun. When really, it was the FULL MOON he should have been worried about. He spluttered something about the oil heating and asked if everything was alright – I assume, anyway, because we couldn’t hear or understand a word of what he said and I certainly wasn’t going to engage him in any chatter whilst my boobs blew around in the hot-tub jets. He sharp got back in his tractor and almost did a donut on the gravel drive way trying to get away.

So that killed the mood. To be honest, I’m not a massive fan of the hot-tub, it’s what people with bad taste buy when they win the lottery. What might look glamorous on the deck of a gorgeous chalet in the Alps doesn’t look quite so alluring pressed up beside a mouldy shed and the frame of a B&Q value trampoline in a shitpit in Southend. Nothing quite says class like drinking Bellabrusco from a plastic beaker as multi-coloured LEDs illuminate your bumhole. Anyway, that didn’t stop us, and despite it being a proper fan-on, we used that hot-tub several more times throughout the holiday.

However, I’m not convinced the filter was working correctly, because towards the end of the holiday, the water became murkier and murkier and started to smell. Not that such trifling matter stopped us – here, we’re Geordie, divven’t ya knaa – but I don’t think you should have to crack the top of the water like a crème brûlée before you get in.

Actually, that’s not even the end of the hot-tub tale, and nor was it the only time we were surprised by an unwelcome visitor. See, on one of the nights that we spent in the hot-tub under the stars, the local horse made an appearance, looming out of the dark about 5 foot away from Paul’s head and promptly did that noise that horses make when they blow air through their noses. Paul shit himself – no wonder the filters didn’t work – but soon calmed down when he realised what it was. All was well until the horse bit him on the head – at that point we called it a night. Ah, nature.

Well now look at that – see this is why I couldn’t write for a living, I’ve spent eight paragraphs talking about hot-tubs! So let’s put Ireland to bed for an evening whilst I mull over whether to categorise this post as x-rated or not.

KFC chicken!

Now, we used one wholemeal bun and it made more than enough ‘crumb’ for the two of us – one wholemeal breadbun being one person’s healthy extra. If you want to syn it, you’ll need 6 syns – 3 syns each. You can use smash and make it syn free but ew.

to make KFC style chicken, you’ll need:

ingredients: two chicken breasts (cut into strips), one breadbun, 1tsp of dried oregano, 1tsp of garlic salt, 3tsp of paprika, black pepper, a bit of salt, a tiny pinch of ground ginger and one big old bugger of an egg.

to make KFC style chicken, you should:

recipe:

honestly, if you struggle making this, you need to pop yourself into a nursing home now
blitz the breadcrumbs and the various powders together in a food processor – you don’t want it like dust, but just fine crumbs
beat your egg in a little bowl
take a strip of chicken, drop it in the egg, make sure it is covered, put it into the bread/spice mix, cover well, and place on a baking sheet. If you have cheap trays that stick, either grease them a smidge or use non-stick lining
into the oven they go – twenty minutes on one side, turn them, and fifteen minutes on the other on a 200degree heat
take them out if they burn, obviously
serve with BBQ beans (we added a drop of chipotle rub into our beans before cooking), fries (We use this little potato chipper to make decent shaped fries in a jiffy! Only £7), corn if you want and coleslaw if you can be bothered to make your own (syn-free coleslaw recipe here)

Enjoy!

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chubbycubs

Posted on

March 23, 2015

Posted under

airfryer, british, budget, classics, low syn, recipe card, sausages

slimming world sausages and mash

One thing I want to get off my chest is this weird habit people seem to have of serving up their Slimming World slops in those awful three part plates. I’m not talking about the plates where it looks like someone fresh off the ‘Special Ward’ has been let loose with a bag of Poundland felt-tips, I’m talking about these:

They’re bloody awful and they’re not a plate – they’re a bloody serving platter! The middle bit is for dip and the sides are for the Sprinters crisps and KP Nots. Plus it looks like the imprint that would be left in wet cement if Jordan did the splits above it. If you’re eating one main meal out of this, why not go the whole hog and get yourself a trough? Argh! It really annoys me.

I’ve had a genuinely quite lovely today at work – great fun. You remember that part of my job is being on a committee whose job it is to plan fun events and little surprises for everyone? When a colleague and I had to parcel up 160 pick-and-mixes for people? Well, I came up with the idea of a giant Easter Egg hunt, so naturally, Paul and I were in my office last night at midnight hiding 200 caramel, Lindt and créme eggs all over the place. Yes, I’ve had 200 or so eggs rolling around in the back of my car for almost two weeks. They were originally in the house but, no kidding, we had to put the eggs into the boot of the car and then put the car in the bloody garage to remove the temptation. So weakwilled and even then, we did a fair few mad dashes to the garage in our tatty boxers to grab a handful. I actually had to top up the eggs out of my own pocket. GASP. So yeah, imagine this greeting you every time you opened the boot:

Seriously, we hid them all over. We had them buried in people’s muesli, parcel-taped under desks, hidden down the tube of a roll of wrapping paper, in vending machines…there were even gold and silver eggs hidden for an extra bonus. The silver egg I managed to hide in the peel of a tangerine which I then wrapped up and put back in the communal fruit bowl. The lucky finder won the booby prize of a jar of pickled eggs. The golden eggs – individually wrapped Lindt eggs in gold foil – were hidden in especially difficult places, including sellotaped to the blind mechanism so it would only appear when the blind was pulled down, another in a carrier bag dispenser, one hidden in our rolling rack system with the clue ‘I’ve hidden it in Baghdad’ (In Iraq, see?) and my favourite, a gold egg in the form of a gold helium star, attached to the balcony on the sixth floor with a 40m piece of garish pink parcel ribbon. The idea being it would float serenely above the building (“Find an egg with a view”) but no, no it sank and smeared along the side of the client meeting rooms. Oops, what-am-I-like. Had to cut the ribbon and pull it back a bit.

The golden eggs were swapped for fancy-pants Easter eggs, see, hence the difficulty! Finally, we had nipped to Poundland (I still can’t get the smell of chip-pan out of my coat) on the Sunday and bought five ‘nests’ which we filled with several little eggs and they were stuck all over the place too. Aaah it was great fun! It’s genuinely one of the best parts about my job because I love shit like this, and being able to indulge it does cheer my soul.

Actually, I love treasure hunts full stop. For our first anniversary, I set up a massive treasure hunt all across Newcastle which started off in our flat – the first clue being frozen in a block of ice that could have sunk the Titanic. The second clue was hidden on the living room wall in giant letters – only I’d done it with UV paint, so it only showed up when Paul used the UV light on his keyring. Once we’d done the treasure hunt, we took great delight in writing all over the wall in the windowless hallway with UV paint – if the new tenants in Ouseburn Wharf somehow decide to rig up a UV light, they’re going to be mortified at what they find. I mean, swearing is so much more fun when no-one can see it…

…mind, that’s not the worst thing I’ve splashed on a wall. Not sure why me and my flatmate thought this was a good idea to do when we’d been on the pop one New Years Eve…

The worst part about this was that, although we painted over it several times with Wilko’s own brand shitty beige paint, it was like painting with milk, and we could never quite get rid of his evil staring eyes. Probably why we lost our deposit. That and the iron-print burn in the kitchen lino when someone tried to straighten my then-long hair with an iron. Oops.

Anyway, this was only supposed to be a quick post but I’ve ended up chuntering on, so here’s a recipe. Well not really a recipe, given it’s pretty self-explanatory…

Mushy peas are free, as is mashed potato (with added cauliflower just in case the peas don’t turn your arse into a mustard-gas factory) and indeed, so are the Slimming World sausages from Iceland. How are they? Alright. They look like someone’s pooed into a condom in some people’s photos but we seem to have cooking them down exactly right – chuck them in the Actifry and watch Judge Rinder for fifteen minutes. By the time you’ve heard him bitching and sassing and flouncing around his pretend courtroom in his black cape like a haunted toilet-roll cover, the sausages are just right. Gravy is synned at 1 syn per 50ml made up gravy and unless you’re one of those people who drown your food in gravy, that’ll be way more than enough.

Anyway christ, this was only meant to be a quick post…!

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chubbycubs

Posted on

March 18, 2015

Posted under

fakeaways, italian, kebab shop, low syn, pizza, recipe card, savoury snacks, snacks, taster ideas, vegetarian

syn free cheesy garlic bread

I can’t begin to describe the absolute cuntnugget that I happened across yesterday. I was queued up in Subway awaiting my usual lunchtime trough of food (plain chicken, all the salad bar onion, double gherkin, double pickle, honey and mustard, no drink, cheers yes, haha) when in walks some twat wearing a top-hat. In Newcastle, in Subway, with a waxed pointy moustache to boot. It gets worse – when he got to the counter, he actually came out with ‘So how on Earth does this work, then’. I was filled with irrational hatred. All I could think about was dashing back to the counter, pushing his face through the glass sneeze-guard and holding his head down in the pickles container until he stopped struggling for life and the police arrived to take me away. He was singularly the most achingly try-hard hipster twat that I’ve ever had the absolute displeasure to orbit.

It is, without doubt, the worst ‘subculture’ that exists right now. Zip backwards fifteen years ago and it was easy (at our school at least) – you had normal kids, then on either side of those you had chavs or Goths. And mind, these Goths were the starter Goths – none of this professional goth/emo whatever you see around town. They all had knock-off coats like Neo from the Matrix and a Livejournal account for photos of their self-harming. I had long, black hair for a good portion of my later school years but I was never a goth, not least because I was too fat – there’s nowt worse than a tiny muffin-top popping out over a pair of New-Rock boots. One of my exes told me he was a goth before we met up but that only extended to have long hair – I’m not sure how gothic giving someone Enya’s A Box Of Dreams on a first date is.

Chavs on the other hand are less tolerable but I just put most of that down to being thick. It was the time of coke-can fringes and Kappa tracksuit and for the most part, given it was a fairly posh school I went to, we’d only really see them out and about in the wild, their tracksuits rustling in the breeze. As I get older I find myself growing more contemptuous of a subculture that seems to revel in stupidity and an ability not to throw a trampoline on any square of dog-shit littered grass bigger than a postage stamp, but that’s by the by – it’s hipster that draws my true ire.

It’s just so loathsome, so affected, so nonsensical. Every year – including going backwards and forward through time, no doubt – it’s the same. Newcastle becomes awash with students all trying to outdo each other on the poncy twat stage. Instead of the booming Geordie dialect ricocheting around the streets of the city centre, you’ll hear trust-fund rah-rah knobheads, whose idea of living dangerously is a quinoa salad on a terrace in Jesmond, stumbling around in their lollipop trousers and 1920s make-up. We have bars opening up all over the town catering to such predilections, all copying the ‘trends’ that London washed its hands off three years earlier – a drink served in a jam-jar? Oh outrageous. And I fucking hate it.

I don’t hate garlic bread, mind, but being a fat twat means I can’t have it. Sniff. But I can have this…

This photo doesn’t really do it justice, I must say. I had to hurry through the kitchen like Electra from the Starlight Express whilst Paul juggled three separate courses at the same time. This tastes almost exactly like cheesy garlic breadsticks you get from the takeaway, with the exception that it’s healthy!

This will make about eight breadsticks – enough for two.

to make syn free cheesy garlic bread you’ll need:

one cauliflower (or 600g-ish defrosted cauliflower florets), one egg white, 2 cloves of garlic, 40g grated cheese (2x HexA), salt, pepper, oregano

to make syn free cheesy garlic bread you should:

preheat the oven to 190 degrees (gas mark 5). Cut the cauliflower into florets and bung into a large food processor. Blitz until it has a ‘rice’ texture with a few bigger chunks. Spread out onto a baking tray or Pyrex dish and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes. Allow to cool for about five minutes. Tip the mixture into a dry, clean tea towel and pull the corners together. Squeeze the ball of mixture as much as you can (if it’s still too hot, let it cool down for a bit more). This will take about ten minutes of squeezing, until it has quite a dry, crumbly texture. In a bowl, add garlic and egg whites to the cauliflower with 10g of grated cheese and mix well. Tip onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and shape until it’s about half a centimetre thick. Top with the remaining cheese and bake in the oven for about twenty minutes, and grill for about three. Cut, and enjoy!

Don’t be put off by the cauliflower – yes, it does taste a little like cauliflower but if you’re not a fan of you really won’t mind – it gives a great ‘doughy’ texture. Make sure it’s nice and firm when it’s cooked so it’ll hold it’s shape for dipping. If it sags a little, bake for a few minutes more.

On a final note…

This uses half a cauliflower each as a base. Some might consider it a tweak and therefore requires synning, but given that half a cauliflower isn’t an extravagant amount of veg to have in one go and you haven’t magically deep-fried it in lard as you moved it from the oven to the tea-towel I haven’t bothered. You can if you wish.

Buon appetito or summat.

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chubbycubs

Posted on

March 15, 2015

Posted under

budget, dips, fakeaways, lunch, persian, recipe card, savoury snacks, snacks, syn free, taster ideas, vegetarian

syn-free houmous four-ways

Only a small post today as it’s mother’s day (so I need to go visit Ripley) and I’m ‘on-call’ for work, with the expectation that I’ll be expected to work into the wee hours again. Fingers crossed this doesn’t happen but it’s not as if I could just turn my phone off…

I am very lucky to have a mum (and dad) like I do. They handled my being a back-door-deirdre with sensitivity and aplomb, which aren’t words you’d immediately associate with our family. I always felt incredibly supportive and they even put up with the various boyfriends that I brought up like a cat with a dying mouse without too much commentary. They even let my ‘friend’ stay for two weeks at a time during the summer holidays. Such a memorable summer. I know a few other gay lads who weren’t so lucky with their parents – I’ve mentioned on here before about the guy who, enthused about being gay since I broke him in, rushed home to tell his parents the good news only for his dad to throw him against a wall and hold a screwdriver to his throat. Good old religion! My parents came through then too – they let him stay at our house and ‘hid him away’ despite his parents turning up in the village where we lived and asking on doors if people had seen him! Crazy times. I think I’ve managed to grow up well-adjusted and happy in myself thanks to my parents and I love them very much for it.

Anyway, enough bloody treacle. In honour of dear old Mother, here’s a rare picture of me and the good lady on a night out. Don’t we look glam?

What a trooper. Still, better get in the car, nip to the graveyard to pick up a nice bunch of flowers for her, and be away. I can fudge away the ‘With Sympathies’ card easily enough, I’m sure.

Here’s a recipe to tide you over:

to make syn-free houmous four-ways:

I love how this looks in a photo, and all four varieties of houmous taste different and fresh in their own ways. All syn free too! They’re just variations of the same basic houmous recipe, below:

lemon and garlic (add an extra couple of garlic gloves, a squidge more lemon juice and decorate with finely grated lemon peel) (don’t take the pith, literally, as that is very bitter – just the top layer, please)
basil and parmesan (10 torn basil leaves, 10g of shaved parmesan, bit of salt) – up to you if you want to syn such a tiny portion of parmesan but bearing in mind you’ll be getting what, 2.5g of it, I wouldn’t bother)
pickled red cabbage (just a few chunks of pickled red cabbage and some of the pickling vinegar added to give it colour)
paprika and sun-dried tomato – I chucked in 1tbsp of sundried tomato paste (1.5 syns, but again, through the laws of dilution, it’s up to you if you syn it)

The basic houmous recipe is simple enough – for enough to fill one of those little square bowls above, you’ll want to use one small tin of cooked chick peas (syn free), a nice round tablespoon of fat free cottage cheese, a garlic clove, pinch of sea salt and some lemon juice. Blend it together, adding a little more lemon juice if you like it runny or keeping some back if you prefer it chunky. It’s up to you.

You may remember Delia Smith banging on about these when she wasn’t pissed off her nut. They’re genuinely amazing and it’ll make just the right amount of houmous to fill one of the bowls above. I use it all the time.

BUT OH NO:

Before the Tweak Police are on the phone to Margaret and she’s clambering into the back of a battered Ford Transit with a sock full of batteries to take me out, FAIR WARNING. This could technically be considered a tweak on the Slimming World diet. Is it? Is it bollocks. You’re not eating more chickpeas than you could reasonably eat, and this filled us up enough to skip our evening meal, so kiss it! I’ve done a whole article on tweaking which, if you’re new to this site, you’ll probably get a right good kick out of. It’s here.

Serve with pitta chips (one WW 50/50 pittas (branded as love fibre) is a HEB – toast it and cut it up) and all sorts of superfree slices – cucumber, red peppers, carrots, tomatoes. World is your oyster.

Happy mother’s day all.

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chubbycubs

Posted on

March 14, 2015

Posted under

beef, beef mince, fakeaways, italian, kebab shop, low syn, one-pot, recipe card, syn free

cheesy meatball skillet

I am gutted that, yet again, we’re sending a load of dross to Eurovision! Have you heard it?

It sounds like the type of ditty that would play out over a Buy as you View advert. I’m not one of these tubthumpers who claim we’ll never win Eurovision because if we sent a decent act, pumped a lot of amyl nitrates into the air and actually spent some money on publicity, we’d do well! Paul and I will still be watching it, eating our Austrian food (that’ll be our European tour country for that week) and screaming at the telly, but just once I’d like to see us succeed. Still, it’ll be a good night in front of the TV regardless.

We don’t watch a lot of TV – at least, not British TV. We used to be well into Coronation Street (rock and roll lifestyle) but that went dull, fast – and Eastenders is only decent when something big is happening, otherwise I end up trying to cut my wrists with the butter knife by the time it’s over. We’ll take in the odd documentary and we do love a good drama (for good drama, I’m talking about stuff like Lost over crap like Broadchurch – if you want to see Olivia Colman cry, watch a film called Tyrannosaurus, she’s brilliant in that). If you like reality TV but with decent production values, download a programme called The Amazing Race – UK TV doesn’t show it because we’d sooner watch tone-deaf bumholes singing on a talent show. Doctor Who is a guilty pleasure as is popcorn fodder like 24. What we DO enjoy is a good quiz show, not least because we like shouting at thick people on TV.

That said, I’d be shit on that new show, 1000 Heartbeats, where your heartbeat is monitored as you answer questions and your clock counts down faster the quicker your heart beats – I’d be so out of breath climbing the three steps up to the podium that I’d only have four seconds to answer fourteen general knowledge questions whilst getting shouted at by besuited Yorkshire lamp-post Vernon Kaye. I’d love to have a go in The Cube, but I know for an absolute fact that when they did that swooshy camera movement where it spins 360 degrees around The Cube in slow-motion, my arse-crack would be hanging out of my George boxer shorts and I’d be pulling that cum-face I usually pull when I’m concentrating – tongue half out, brow furrowed like a crinkle-cut crisp. I’ve mentioned before that Paul and I would adore the chance to go on Coach Trip, and indeed we auditioned successfully for the show, but then they took it off air for three years, perhaps hoping our clogged-up arteries would kill us off before we had a chance to get on the bus, call someone a jumped up shitbag and get asked to leave Lithuania in an armoured car.

I’d have been absolutely top at The Crystal Maze though. I say that from the comfort of my living room, admittedly, but I would have been a guaranteed two-crystal winner and that weekend canoeing in Middlesex could have been mine. Of course, no sooner was I old enough to apply, they took it off the bloody air. There’s been talk of bringing it back time and time again, including, horrifically, the idea of having Amanda Holden present in the Richard O’Brian role. Amanda Holden! A woman so pointless and personality-free that you could put a privet hedge with a crow stuck in it where she sat on Britain’s Got Talent and people would be hard-pressed to tell the difference. That’s what ruins TV – ‘celebrities’ famous for fuck all (in her case, having the dubious honour of turning down Les Dennis’ cock in favour of the unfunny one from Men Behaving Badly) taking part in shows and quizzes in lieu of decent folk from Ordinary World. Even if they somehow resist the urge to throw celebrities into the mix at every opportunity, they try and turn the ordinary folk into celebrities instead – like the gay couple from Gogglebox for example. Yep, they’re funny, but why are they in an advert with Kevin Bacon for bloody mobile phone services? Actually, why the hell is Kevin bloody Bacon in an advert for a mobile phone service? Kev, I’ve seen Footloose, you’re worth so much more!

Gosh, that was a bit of a rant. See that’s probably why they didn’t come back to us re: Coach Trip.

Anyway, it’s just a little post today because I want to spend the day with Paul as I’ve seemingly been at work since Tuesday morning. But, because we care, here’s a recipe for cheesy meatball skillet. A quick google shows that a skillet is pretty much the same as a shallow frying pan, but we’ve actually got a proper cast-iron skillet so we used that. Whatever you use, make sure it can go under the grill. Something like this would be perfect, plus you could use it for frittatas and other nonsense!

This serves four.

We used the new Slimming World meatballs (syn-free) available at Iceland and do you know, they were actually pretty decent! Nothing like proper meatballs and I’ve got a syn-free recipe for those right here. Getting quite good at this cross-linking on my blog-posts!

Also, in my tomato sauce, I added 175ml of red wine (hence the syns) but that’s only because we had dregs left over in the fridge. You can easily leave this out, but it does add a nice note to the sauce.

to make cheesy meatball skillet, you’ll need:

ingredients: meatballs (either Iceland or home-made), two tins of tomatoes, one large red onion, garlic (powder or grated (especially if you use this fancy pants microplane grater), dash of worcestershire sauce, red wine (optional), big ball of reduced fat mozzarella (65g is one healthy extra which is more than enough, but because we’re decadent bitches, we’re using 130g – that’s fine for Paul and I as it is a healthy extra each, but if it’s just you, remember mozzarella is 5 syns for 50g if you’re synning any extra). You can decorate with chopped chives, if you’re feeling poncy.

to make cheesy meatball skillet, you should:

cook off your meatballs in the pan – if they’re homemade, great, as they’ll release oil that you can use in the next step, but if they’re not, just keep an eye on them to make sure they don’t catch. Once they’ve cooked through, set aside
chop up your onion nice and fine and add that into the pan (with a tiny bit of oil if the meatballs haven’t released any) and gently soften – then add garlic, and cook a little longer
whack the heat up, throw in the red wine, let it deglaze the bottom of the pan and simmer off for a couple of minutes, then add the tomatoes
pinch of salt and pepper
add the meatballs, put it on a medium heat and let it bubble down for a bit until the sauce has thickened
cut the mozzarella into discs and scatter them carelessly all over the pan
whack it under the grill for five minutes or so until the cheese has melted, bubbling and looks ready
SERVE.

Have a think about what you want to serve this with – spaghetti is fine, but this would also go well with any old pasta you’ve got knocking about, or even slimming world chips and a salad. Enjoy!

Posted by

chubbycubs

Posted on

March 11, 2015

Posted under

beef, chinese, diced beef, fakeaways, low syn, noodles, recipe card, rice, travel

takeaway style beef and broccoli

Yet again I find myself working late with nothing but a Wagamama menu to look at. I’m lucky to have a fairly interesting job and I do enjoy working in the city centre, but it’s an absolute ballache if I have to work late as the only places near me that deliver are Wagamama and Pizza Express. I mean, I COULD walk further, but I’m a lazy, lazy man. So – as I’m busy working – I’m pressing the button on a ‘saved’ blog-post – my fourth chapter on our visit to Germany. You can read the previous instalments here, here and here. Because we’re amazing, there’s also a recipe for takeaway style beef and broccoli at the end which is genuinely delicious. Enjoy! Normally skip holiday posts? Give this a whirl – feedback welcomed!

Now, I’m going to be honest, I lost my page of notes for the last day of what we did in Berlin, so I can’t go into any great detail – good riddance I hear you cry, this’ll be a short entry. Nope…

We woke on our last day in Berlin with a heavy heart, and only a small part of that was down to the amount of cholesterol and fats we had taken on during our short stay. Berlin was amazing – something happening on every corner, history all over the place, fantastic mix of people. Having all of the Christmas markets on only added to the atmosphere and neither of us would hesitate in going back. Heartily recommend. Nevertheless, we traipsed down to the checkout, gave our luggage to some hipster fucknugget who had left his little afro-comb in his afro (argh!) and wandered out to kill the time before we were to get our overnight train to Munich.

One last look at the view…

First, Checkpoint Charlie, which took us about forty minutes to find. It shouldn’t have – if we’d just turned left instead of right as we breathlessly climbed out of the underground station, we’d have been there, but instead we walked for forever in a massive circle until we found it. Meh. I know it’s historically very important but I felt its impact was lessened somewhat by the McDonalds just to the side of it. Plus, they had a really ropey statue of a soldier with a bit of tinsel on his head. How respectful!

Afterwards, we spotted the Ritter chocolate museum on a map, and headed there. Again our sense of direction failed us, and we wandered and wandered and wandered, all passive-aggressive sighing and bitchy looks at everyone else who were clearly going exactly where they wanted to go and knew exactly how to get there. The smug twats. After gradually turning our feet to corned-beef in our shoes, and with the blood pouring out over the top of our socks, we FINALLY found Ritter World. Well, honestly, I was expecting Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, I got Billy Vanker’s Chocolate Camp. It was full of tourists and fat children jiggling about with sticky hands and gleeful expressions.

Paul immediately managed to cause international offence by declaring loudly ‘well you’d know all about that’ in response to young slave workers picking cocoa beans along the chocolate highway – he was actually talking to me in response to eating chocolate but the young Puerto-Rican couple in front of us looked pretty crestfallen. I’m surprised he manages to brush his teeth in the morning – whenever he opens his mouth his boot automatically falls in. We loaded ourselves up with 24 bars of Ritter chocolate, ostensibly to give to co-workers – we had the box open by the time I’d put my wallet back in my pocket.

A trip to an experimental computer art-gallery followed next – yet again our normally faultless navigation failing us, leading us into a proper run-down sink estate where I started my ‘protect everything in my pockets’ Macarena dance that I mentioned in a previous entry. In our defence, the art-gallery was tucked away down a side street full of chavs smoking weed. I felt like I was in a Paddy Considine movie.

Oh! We did spot this. Goodness me.

The art gallery was, as you may expect, full of experimental videogames and controllers, and we had a whale of a time geeking out. It was smashing but the best part was the virtual reality headset at the end. Paul normally can’t manage anything like virtual reality – he gets dizzy looking at a magic eye puzzle due to his boss-eyes. Ah bless. He’s got lovely blue eyes – one blew to the East, one blew to the West. Kaboomtish.

We did stop for one of these. My reflex action already had me on my knees until Paul pointed out it meant garlic bread.

Anyway, you think me writing about videogames is exciting? Well you haven’t heard anything yet, because after the videogame museum came the…font museum! That’s right! We saw this on tripadvisor and thought it would be right up our street, and indeed it was, being only a mile or so mince from the videogame museum. We’re sticklers for the right font – it really makes my face itch when I see screenshots that people have put on from their phone and they’ve chosen to use Comic Sans as their display font. Comics Sans should only be used in care homes to illustrate which tap is hot and which is cold, and nothing more. The museum was full of ‘letters’ – random letters from hotel signs, train stations, massive installations – some old, some new, some neon, some metal – it was really quite interesting! I don’t know if I’d pay the amount we paid to go around but I still got to crack a joke as I left and they shook the ‘suggested donations’ box at me – I said ‘Are you taking the P’. Well, as you can well imagine, how we all laughed – we were still chuckling and shaking our heads whimsically as Paul pulled me out by my fagbag. Spoilsport.

By this time the night was cutting in, so we wandered back to the hotel, picked up our suitcases and nipped into the closest restaurant for a last-minute meal before we got on the train. Well fuck me. We couldn’t have picked a more German looking place, it was like being in a themed restaurant. The waitress was wearing lederhosen, there was oompah-oompah music playing, the menu was full of words longer than this bloody blog post…you get the picture. I ordered something that sounded like a bad hand at Scrabble and received a pile of meat and potatoes which was absolutely bloody delicious. I washed it all down with a bathtub sized glass of German beer and suddenly the restaurant seemed like the finest on Earth. Paul had duck and a fizzy water, the great big puff. We settled the bill and waddled, clutching our stomachs full of fermenting beast, to the train station.

We were planning on driving to Munich but I’ve always fancied an overnight train journey, and it was around £200 for the both of us to have a private cabin. That makes it sound infinitely more grand than it was, but it was surprisingly roomy, with two bunkbeds, your own netty, a table to rest at and even a shower! A shower! On a train! The only time I’ve ever managed to get wet on a train is when I’m sitting next to the toilet on a Pendolino and it lurches around a particularly sharp corner.. Once the train pulled in, we were escorted to our ‘room’ by the train conductor, yet another officious looking man with a face full of woe who looked as though he’d push you under the train if you asked him anything. He assured us he’d ‘look after us through the night’ like some creepy fez-wearing Harold Shipman. I was left more than a little terrified. He shut the door and Paul immediately dashed to the toilet ‘to try it out’. I optimistically hoped that this meant testing out the flush or, at a push, having a tinkle, but no, it meant hearing the world fall out of his arse, punctuated by ‘OOOH THAT’LL BE THE CURRYWURST’ and ‘I’M NEVER HAVING SAUERKRAUT AGAIN’. Just once I’d like to be able to relax in a new environment for longer than ten minutes without having to hear my other half straining out a poo. It’s not too much to ask. Course, it gets worse – no sooner had he pressed ‘flush’ then the train conductor clicked the door open and asked whether or not we wanted food. Fuck food, all I wanted was a tank of oxygen, and he totally knew what Paul had just done because I saw his nose wrinkle. Frankly, I’m surprised his nose didn’t burn up like a dry leaf in a bushfire. He didn’t come back until the morning.

The glamour! Look at that size of that toilet – now imagine how small the shower is, to the immediate right of the loo – then read on…

Mind you, it wasn’t just Paul causing embarrassment – about half an hour into the journey I remembered that we had a shower in the tiny bathroom and immediately undressed. The shower cubicle was approximately 80% the size of me but by gaw, I was determined. Through the human equivalent of pushing a beachball into a postbox, we managed to get me in, but I literally didn’t have space to move, so it was a case of standing there letting the water pool around my shoulders as Paul lathered shampoo into my scalp. Finally, there was a loud sucking noise and the water found a way through the dam of my back fat and down my bumcrack and disappeared. I win again! After ten minutes, Paul pulled me back out of the shower and back into the little living room area. Now this is where it gets embarrassing – in all the excitement of working the shower, we hadn’t realised that the train had stopped at a rural passenger station and was obviously taking on a few more people – us looking out the window could barely make anything out because our room was bright and it was night outside. This situation wouldn’t have been so bad had I been dressed, but I’m ashamed to say that at least six good, honest German folk on the platform opposite were treated to the sight of Paul changing into his nightwear and my hairy arse pressed up against the glass like two paint-filled balloons. We only realised our error as the train pulled away – probably ahead of schedule to save my blushes. Wars have started over less than my arse in a window, trust me.

The rest of the journey passed without incident, although I had trouble sleeping through the rocking of the train. Paul was out like a light, but I remained fitful on the bottom bunk, sure that every creak and groan of the metal bed above was a sure sign that he was going to come crashing down on top of me and that I’d be smeared up the side of the train like a fly on a windscreen. I kept myself amused by writing up the first few days of the holiday and looking wistfully out of the window as the night turned black. Oh, saying as I indulged in some toilet talk before, I’ll add a bit more – the combination of good, rich German food and the rocking of the train meant that we were both full of wind – and when one wasn’t farting, wafting and laughing, the other one was taking up position. The poor bastards in the room next door must have thought a brass band was tuning up before a key performance. When we awoke in the morning, the air was so thick I almost swam to the toilet. Even putting on my glasses didn’t remove my blurred vision. I’m only thankful it was a no-smoking train else it would have been like the Paddington Rail Disaster all over again. At six there was a sharp little tap on the door and the conductor, barely hiding his wince, set down a tray of breakfast goodies on the table. It was the usual German fare – apple juice, jams, bread (the bread was fresh when brought in but after two minutes in the fetid air of our room, had gone a lovely toasted colour) and minced animal. They love their indistinct pâté, that’s for sure. Still, it was free food and I couldn’t waste a crumb, so I didn’t, and it was delicious.

The train pulled into Munich at around seven and we were unceremoniously dumped on the platform as the train hastened away, probably to be burnt to ashes thanks to our almost inhuman farting. We jumped onto the underground and after a short ride, we were at our hotel. The guy checking us in clearly thought we were checking him out, and he was posing and fluttering his eyes and being all coquettish. He didn’t have a fucking chance, he had more make-up on than Dame Barbara Cartland for one thing, and he gave us a proper ‘knowing’ leer when he realised that we were a married couple with a king-sized bed. I really hate that! He might as well offered us an upgrade, rimjob or felch for the amount of subtlety he was displaying. We gave him fairly short shrift and were allowed up to our room, where I’m disappointed to say we stayed for the rest of the day. Actually – disappointed is the wrong word, a holiday is for resting, and we had a lovely day in the room, ordering room service, watching the German version of Air Crash Investigation and sleeping. No word of a lie – we pretty much slept from 8am to 8am the next day. The room service was extortionate – €60 for two burgers, although they were the size of footballs and delivered with the usual German élan (i.e. no care at all – they crashed the tray down like they were delivering a verdict on England itself).

Mind you, that’s not surprising, given our hotel room probably smelled like the countryside of England did when we had the foot and mouth crisis and all the cows were being burnt. Fact: the foot and mouth outbreak started less than a mile from my house. I still blame my mother for feeding the dog Aldi stewing steak and starting it all off.

I’ll write more about Germany tomorrow, but in the meantime, speaking of well-cooked beef…

This recipe is dead easy to make and only takes about fifteen minutes or so. It might be helpful to have all your ingredients prepared beforehand. Having the beef cut into smaller chunks means it goes further, and cooks faster.

This serves six people.

to make takeaway style beef and broccoli, you’ll need:

ingredients: 500g diced beef, 1 tbsp cornstarch, 2 tbsp + 60ml light soy sauce, 1 large onion, 5 cloves of garlic, 2.5cm cube of root ginger (grated/minced), 250g broccoli florets, few pinches of red chili flakes, 250ml beef stock

to make takeaway style beef and broccoli, you should:

recipe: in a bowl drizzle 2 tbsp of soy sauce over the diced beef and mix until it’s coated. Heat a large non-stick pan on a high heat, add Frylight (or use a drop of oil, like sensible folk) and add the beef in one layer for one minute, and then flip over for another minute. Put the beef to one side on a plate.

In the same pan and still on a high heat, add more Frylight (see above) and saute the onion, garlic and ginger for three minutes. Add the broccoli and two pinches of the red chili flakes and sauté for another three minutes.

In a bowl mix together beef stock, 1 tbsp of corn starch and 60ml soy sauce. When mixed and there are no lumps pour this over the broccoli mixture and mix to combine and cook for a further three minutes. Add the beef back into the pan, mix, and serve immediately over rice.

Posted by

chubbycubs

Posted on

March 3, 2015

Posted under

american, bacon, beef, beef mince, fakeaways, italian, low syn, pizza, pork, recipe card, taster ideas

bacon cheeseburger pizza

I very nearly became a Slimming World consultant, you know.

I say very nearly, it was as near as most of my other fleeting fancies, but I made the effort to make contact, drop in my details, attempt to find out more. I had plenty of cold hard cash ready to be handed over gladly to Magic Margaret and her Synning Sisters but alas, despite chasing three times, I got one phone call which was rearranged and then totally ignored. Ah well. Part of me remains disappointed because I think I’ve got the sassy people skills to really get a group moving. But most of me thinks that my money (well, our money) is better off in my pocket and that’s that.

I’ve been going to Slimming World classes on and off for over ten years now, and they’ve never changed. Which is clearly a good thing, because the results speak for themselves and I’ve been lucky – I’ve never been to a bad class. Actually, tell a fib, yes I have – I had to sit through twenty minutes where the class gave advice to someone with piles – what best to eat for soft poo. Plus, if you get a boring consultant, the class drags something chronic, although I haven’t had one of those in a long, long time. I did have some great ideas – Paul stepping in as my Debbie McGee in a glittery bikini on the payment counter, a wheel of fortune to win something decent other than a banana that fell off the side of the ark and a Mugshot, interactive recipes…the works. But it wasn’t to be.

The reason I’m bumbling on about classes is because of our recent decision to move to a different class – it’s primarily so that we can stay to class as I feel we get a lot more out of it, not least because I get to blabber on about recipes and make smutty jokes. When we get weighed and go out the door, we almost lose a sense of responsibility – that although we are following the diet, we’re only paying lip service to it. So, we needed to find a class that works for us in terms of times, and although ironically we have managed to miss tonight’s because of a late finish at work, Tuesday evening will be our new weigh-in.

Finally, as an aside, I made a post in a FB SW group about people not being able to say please or thank you. It’s always the same – some blurry, off-brand yoghurt thrust too far to the lens on their phone with a comment like ‘HOW MANI SINS’ and it does my nut in. I’ll personally help anyone if I have the time, but I can’t bear bad manners. Thankfully, and somewhat reassuringly, most people have weighed in with complete agreement, with only the odd little dolt kicking up a stink at someone having the temerity to ask for manners. Well. The day I take criticism who has Inside Soap listed as a ‘favourite book’ on their facebook page is the day I shut my bollocks in a car-door. MANNERS MAKETH THE MAN.

Tell you what else maketh the man? Meat. And pizza. And cheeseburger. Well, look at this for goodness sake. You might as well jog on if you’re one of those people who won’t use syns on their dinner, despite THAT BEING EXACTLY what they are for…!

so, to make bacon cheeseburger pizza:

This is six syns for a quarter, but it makes a big pizza, and served with chips will fill the hole nicely. Put it this way, if you were to have a big pizza from Dominos, you’d be racking up syns in the sixties and seventies. Treat this as a treat…

ingredients for the crust: 125g of strong white bread flour, a packet of yeast (7g), 75ml of lukewarm water and a pinch of salt

ingredients for the topping: use a HEA for each of you – so 65g of mozzarella is one HEA, and 40g of grated light cheddar is the other. You’ll also need lean mince (5% or under), gherkin slices and a few medallions of bacon. Hoy some chilli flakes on too.

recipe (which I’m going to split into bullet points from now on for this blog – step by step):

make the crust – put the flour into a mixing bowl or a stand mixer, add yeast on one side, salt on the other, water in the middle and knead it together using your hands (wash them first, I know where they’ve been) or a dough hook (infinitely easier). When you have a big lump, stop, cover the bowl in cling film and leave it to prove for an hour or so;
prepare the toppings – grate your cheese, fry off your mince in a tiny drop of oil and some onion powder, fry off your bacon and cut into strips, cut your gherkins, do a little dance, make a little love, get down tonight;
stretch your dough, hoy some tomato puree over it, add cheese, add mince, gherkins, tomatoes if you want them, bit more cheese, bacon;
cook in the oven for twenty minutes and serve with chips.

Tasty!

Posted by

chubbycubs

Posted on

February 25, 2015

Posted under

burgers, fakeaways, recipe card, syn free, vegan, vegetarian

falafel burgers

For some reason, Jehovah’s Witnesses have taken to standing around outside of Eldon Square of a lunchtime, thrusting copies of The Watchtower at me as I shuffle past with my headphones in and trying desperately not to catch their eye. I feel like I can’t be mean to religious people in the same way I often am with chuggers – I usually just point at my ears and pretend I’m deaf, and I once told someone collecting for Alzheimer’s Research that she’d spoken to me just a few minutes before, didn’t she remember…she called me a very unsavoury name, and perhaps rightly so. But the JWs are a bit creepy – too earnest with the smiles, too keen to stop people and try and engage them, too comfortable with being told to fuck off. Perhaps tomorrow I’ll rock up to them and ask what they can do for me, as a blood-giving (sssh), civil-partnered sodomite who believes in abortion and hard living.

I’ve never been a religious person – the only time I went to church growing up was at Easter to get a free Easter egg (although it was always a Spar special egg, dead cheap with white bloom on the chocolate) or Christmas for the same reason, substituting egg for a chocolate jesus. It didn’t help that the guy delivering the sermons had an almighty lisp, which as a child was immensely hilarious. I know, cruel, but there you go. Actually, unusual disability seems to have followed me around through religion – our RE teacher in middle school was amazing (used to let us watch South Park rather than read the bible) but he had a tremor in his left hand, which combined with his hand all clawed up through arthritis, looked like he was wanking all the time. Awful I know, but that also used to cause much hilarity during lessons – teacher twittering on about God whilst calling him a wanker with his left hand.

I haven’t had much experience with other religions either, sadly. As part of a cultural exchange, our class had to go and visit Newcastle Hindu Temple – the idea being our minds would be broadened by their lavish food, colourful buildings and pleasant atmosphere, whereas young Hindu children would get to come and sit on the rock hard pews and listen to a man in a frock lisp his way through All Thingth Bright and Beautiful. Well see it was all going swimmingly until we had to sit cross-legged on the floor and listen to the brahmin explain Hinduism – champion. Except I, coming from an environment where the only spice I consumed belonged to Ginger, Baby, Scary, Sporty and Posh, was having a bad reaction to the pakora we had been given at the start and, genuinely accidentally, let out a fart that, pushed between my flabby schoolboy bumcheeks and the hard, polished floorboards, was ridiculously loud. And long. Once it was coming, there was no stopping it – at least ten seconds easily of earth-shattering, hair-burning fart. It sounded like the police helicopter was hovering overheard, it truly did. No-one believed me that it was a genuine accident and I got made to stand outside, although to be fair that was probably to give my nipsy a chance to cool off in the autumn air. I got detention and summarily bollocked for that little incident. It’s no wonder there’s so much tension these days – if only there’d been a bit more tension in my sphincter, eh.

Whilst I’m talking about religion, a quick comment on the upcoming Pegida march through Newcastle. I find it shameful, utterly shameful. People say it isn’t racist but you’ve only got to look at the comments on Facebook to see the true colours. I’ll say only one thing – people bleat on and on and on about what asylum seekers get given – but they base it on hearsay and what they read in the paper. Take a moment, do some proper research – they get next to nothing. I worked for a charity for over a year and the state of some of the properties that these asylum seekers were living in would make you weep. It really would. You’d hear stories of what they went through, what they’d seen, and you’d know straightaway why they tried to get away. Awash with benefits? Absolutely not. And do you know, it was always, always, ALWAYS the same type of person complaining about foreigners getting this that and the other – bone-idle, lazy bastards who had never worked a day in their life, or even intended to. Give me 1000 asylum seekers over just one of those type of people each and every time. That’s all I’m saying – don’t like to tubthumb on a funny blog, but it boils my piss.

Anyway! Let’s move on. Tonight’s recipe is these lovely falafel burgers, served with tzatziki dip.

Assume you’re using your bun as your healthy extra, this is syn free. Admittedly I had two, but ssh.

to make falafel burgers you will need:

1/4 chopped onion, three cloves of garlic, a good handful of parsley (or rocket), 2 tsp cumin, pinch of smoked paprika, salt and pepper, 1 tsp of lemon zest, 1/2tsp of baking soda, pinch of pepper. You’ll also need 250g of chickpeas but NOT the tinned version, no, get dried and soak them for around 36 hours – just cover them, leave, drain and dry. I chucked in some shredded chicken that I had in the fridge but you don’t need to.

to make falafel burgers you should:

blend everything together, gently – you want a coarse, grainy paste, nothing too smooth. If you need to dry it out a little, add breadcrumbs (6 syns for a wholemeal roll). Shape into four burgers and put in the fridge for 30 minutes. Bake on 180 for thirty minutes, serve with tzatziki in a wholemeal bun!

to make tzatziki you will need:

mix 200g of finely chopped cucumber, a small red onion finely chopped, 200g of fat free yoghurt, a bit of garlic finely chopped, 1 tbsp of lemon juice and salt and pepper. Season to taste and put in the fridge until you need it.

Enjoy, enjoy.

Posted by

chubbycubs

Posted on

February 24, 2015

Posted under

american, beef, beef mince, pork, pork mince, recipe card, savoury snacks, snacks, syn free, taster ideas

rolled stuffed meatloaf

Only a little preamble tonight, because the recipe is a corker and I need my wordcount for that. BUT remember my Muller yoghurt letter? There’s a new (well, old) letter to read below…

I visited Poundland today – all I wanted was a money-tin, all I got is my eyes opened. I’ve said many times before that I’m not a snob but do you know, maybe I am. I’m snobbish about good manners, for one thing – asking me to do something without saying please is as bad in my eyes as taking my packed lunch and crapping in my salad roll. The reason I mention manners is the amount of people zombieing around Poundland, death-rattling and spluttering and sniffing was beyond the pale. Since when did it become acceptable to cough without covering your mouth, or sneeze right in someone’s face without attempting to cover it? At one point I went to pick up a pack of Haribo only for some wispy-chinned gasbag to cough the bottom of her lungs right across me and THEN keep on moving without so much as a backwards glance. Poundland? I almost pounded her head off a shelf full of knock-off Elsie and Anal Frozen figurines.

What makes Newcastle’s Poundland more interesting is that it is right next door to Waitrose, so you get people coming out of Waitrose, all full of puff and OH LOOK AT ME BUYING MY QUINOA AND DOLPHIN TEAR SALAD quickly nipping into Poundland to buy some cheap batteries, and people coming out of Poundland going into Waitrose to get a free coffee and finger all of the posh fruit. I’m not a huge fan of Waitrose, it’s absolutely rammed full of yah-yah-mummy students and people who think they’re the Big I Am. Have you tried any of Heston Bloominghell’s nonsense food from there? I can safely say I’ve tried most of it and thought it was all overpriced piss. Just because you can coat bacon in mushy pea puree and the hope of a orphan doesn’t mean you should.

Hey actually, speaking of Poundland, a few years ago I actually wrote to them – ironically, about a moneytin – and if you’re a fan of my fruity letters to organisations, you’ll enjoy this. Here:

poundland-complaint_page_1

Oh young James, you should have known better. They replied with a proper arsey letter.

Anyway, what YOU should do is try this recipe, it was bloody delicous – and only the coleslaw is synned, so you could leave that out and have a syn-free dinner that looks a treat! It’s your normal meatloaf recipe, but with three ingredients in the middle – sweet potato, shaved sprouts and very finely chopped mushroom.

to make the hot and spicy coleslaw you will need:

100g of red cabbage, 100g of radishes, 100g of white cabbage, one carrot large enough to make your eyes water, 100g of fat free natural yoghurt, salt, pepper and 1tbsp of horseradish sauce (1 syn but it makes enough to feed six, so your choice but I’ll say syn free).

to make rolled stuffed meatloaf you will need:

900g of a mix of lean pork mince and lean beef mince, 1 large red onion, two garlic gloves (grated) PLEASE, get a microplane grater. Like this one on Amazon. It’ll make it so much easier! You’ll also need two large eggs, 2 tablespoons of parsley, 2 tbsp dried mustard powder, 1 tbsp of thyme (fresh or dried, see if I’m bothered), 1 tbsp coriander seeds crushed (can leave these out, I won’t tell), 1sp of onion powder, some salt and pepper, and a tiny bit of baking powder.

For the stuffing, you’ll need 3 sweet potatoes, half a bag of sprouts, half a pack of mushrooms and an onion.

to make hot and spicy coleslaw you should:

Finely grate your cabbage(s), radishes and carrot into a bowl. Add yoghurt, horseradish, salt and pepper and mix well. Put it in the fridge.

to make rolled stuffed meatloaf you should:

Then the meatloaf mix – combine the meat, chopped onion, garlic, eggs and all of the spices and seasoning and mix it in a bowl until you get one lovely lump. Too wet? Add breadcrumbs. One wholemeal roll is a healthy extra – blend and add as much as you think you need. You’re aiming for a well mixed lump. Put it in the fridge to cool.

Next, pierce and microwave your sweet potatoes for around 15 minutes. Once cooked and cooled, scoop out the flesh into a bowl and add salt. Eat the skins, they’re fucking tasty. Next, finely chop the mushroom and onion. I used my Kenwood chopper here. It does make things a lot easier, even Delia says so. Mind it does nothing that a sharp knife can’t do but you are looking for finely chopped. Put into a pan, cook for five minutes or so on a medium heat to draw out the moisture. Set aside. Next, very thinly slice your sprouts. You can again use a knife or if you’re a fan of speed and danger, use a mandolin. This is mine, and it’s only £11. Stick the sprouts in a microwave bowl, cook for two minutes so they soften just a little, and set aside after draining and getting as much liquid out as possible.

Now, assembly. Hoy the oven onto 180 degrees. Get a loaf tin and grease the sides. You’ll then need to get some parchment paper or greaseproof paper or anything but the Daily Mail and line the tin. Doesn’t have to be precise, you’re not on the Krypton Factor and I’m not Gordon Burns. Next, get a flat sheet (preferably a baking sheet, it’ll make it easier for you) and line that with greaseproof paper. You want to be able to form a rectangle of around 8″ by 13″. Here’s a tip, don’t let a man measure this for you – the amount of men I’ve met in my life who think 5.5″ is 8″ is surprising. Dump your meat into the middle and flatten down to create an even rectangle, nice and flat. Take your time.

Now, spread the sweet potato over the top, nice and thin – don’t worry if it’s a bit patchy, but take your time to keep it smooth. Add the sprouts, then the mushroom and onion.

This is the tricky SOUNDING part, it’s actually quite easy. You want to roll the meatloaf. Start by getting hold of the parchment paper at one of the short ends of the rectangle and slowly roll the meat over itself – tight, but not ridiculous. Peel off the paper as you go. It’ll make sense when you do it, trust me. Take your time, rolling and peeling, rolling and peeling, until you’re left with a lovely roll of meat. Oooer etc.

Next, lift carefully into your loaf tin – remember it must be lined. Place the meat seam side down. Decorate the top with tomatoes or bacon or whatever.

In the oven for fifty minutes, take it out, drain the excess liquid away carefully, put back in oven for fifteen minutes, then crack the door open and turn the heat off and let it sit for 15 minutes. Cut and serve with chips and coleslaw and a big fuck-off smile on your face. Well done!

Posted by

chubbycubs

Posted on

February 18, 2015

Posted under

classics, fakeaways, kebab shop, lamb, lamb mince, recipe card, syn free

doner kebab

Warning: this post is miserable as syn. Pun intended.

I woke up in a proper huff today. No particular reason, just I wanted everyone I saw outside of my immediate circle of friends to be immediately blinked out of all existence. Humanity seemed to be doing its bit to bring me to my knees – if I’d had a shotgun and could carry off a leather knee-length coat with any sort of panache then there could have been genuine trouble. Things got off to a sour note as soon as I checked my facebook over my morning banana – which isn’t as filthy as it sounds – and saw…

…people queueing up outside of Iceland to get a ready meal. I mean for heaven’s sake. You need to understand that I wouldn’t queue up outside of a shop if they were giving away free blowjobs and pug-faced kittens, but I can just about see the point of it if you’re desperate for a bargain. But for a fucking ready meal? I’ve seen trolleys awash with them like each one contains a mini Margaret who will come and jiggle your fat-shelf up and done to tone it whilst you watch Eastenders. I apologise profusely if there are any readers out there who queued and enjoyed themselves but I find it despairing – like Black Friday but sweatier. Plus the sausages look like an old poo in a condom, though admittedly I’m basing that on a photo that Ray Charles himself seemingly took using a potato. Nevertheless, each to their own and all that. So…

Every song on the radio into work was the wrong one. My iPod wouldn’t bluetooth up to the car music system meaning I couldn’t have my music on. Every person in every single other car on the road was driving like an arsehole – either too slow, reading their phones, or swerving all over the road trying to get their iPod to bluetooth up to their car music system. Well, honestly. I nearly ran someone over who thought stepping out in front of the bus was the best way to continue their life and then I got stuck behind a bin-lorry who had parked up in a single-lane street so the driver could have a cigarette. And you can’t remonstrate with a binman, everyone knows that. That was just the journey in.

Work was work.

Lunchtime came and by this point, all I wanted to do was eat my lunch and doze for half an hour in peace so I picked up my Thermos of bloody awful watery vegetable soup (I had nowt in last night to make something fancy) (Paul calls it care home broth) and made my way over my car in the multi-storey in Newcastle’s Chinatown. No sooner had I poured my soup when some piss-eyed old bugger tapped on my window and told me to move my car as they were doing electric works on the lamppost behind. I duly obliged, working my way through my entire bank of swearwords as I moved around to find a space whilst all the while holding a cup of soup in one hand. Having done so, I finished my ‘delicious’ dinner and was about to nod off for twenty minutes when what sounded like the entire country of China paraded through the street below, banging drums and making noise. They were practising the Chinese New Year march and it was like being under attack. I would have had a more restful half hour if I’d managed to set my face on fire with the car lighter. Dejected and tired, with a fetching orange stain on my shirt from where I’d jumped the first time around, I headed back in.

But no! The joy didn’t end there. Work continued being work. Over the rest of the day I managed to drop my pass into the toilet when I went for a piss and then drop it again down the stairs on the way out of the building. I also managed to leave my car parking ticket on my desk at work, meaning I had to go back for it, and then, the final insult, I got stuck behind the only AUDI driver in existence who DOESN’T think they need to go 150mph in their shite company car who was tootling merrily along the 60mph road at 30mph where the bends and hills precluded any overtaking. I like to think she at least heard the sound ‘UUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNT’ as I finally overtook.

Anyway, I’m home now. Deep breath. I appreciate that this entry is one long moan but I needed it, and now I feel better. Here’s a recipe for doner kebab. Normally I’d shy away from a doner kebab, believing it’s only really suitable for soaking up bile and half-digested carrot before promptly being upchucked in a technicolour yawn by some drunken trollop in the Bigg Market before she settle downs in an alleyway for a foamy piss and regretful sex. A tortuous example. But you get my drift, it’s not exactly classy fare.

to make doner kebab you will need:

500g of extra lean lamb mince, 1 tsp of oregano, 1/2tsp of thyme, onion powder, garlic powder respectively, 1/4tsp of cayenne pepper, 1tsp of salt and some black pepper. Listen, if you don’t have onion or garlic powder, no need to shit the bed, just use fresh onion and garlic chopped fine. You can use a tiny bit of flour to dry it out if your lamb is particularly wet. Syn that though – 25g is four and a half syns but a) you’ll not use that much and b) you’re not eating the whole lot, so don’t worry about it too much. Eat it in a pitta bread – weightwatchers wholemeal pitta (x1) is a HEB. You’ll need whatever salad you want in there.

to make doner kebab you should:

preheat the oven to 180degrees. Chuck absolutely everything into a big old bowl and mash mash mash with your fists. Imagine you’re punching the face of someone you hate, or you’re trying to birth a cow against the clock. You want that mixture smooth, not lumpy because you couldn’t be arsed. No excuses. Think of the body magic. If you sweat and it drops in, just reduce the amount of salt you add. When you’ve got it so smooth and well-mixed that you want to take a picture and show it to the neighbours, stick it in a parchment-lined loaf tin and cook in the oven for around 90 minutes. After 45 minutes, turn it over and skim off any shite that has oozed out. Once cooked, take it out, let it cool, slice it thin.

Now, stuff it into your pitta with as much salad as you want. Because I’m not very exciting, I just went for spinach and tomato and onion with a raita made from fat free yoghurt, mint and a bit of garlic. Whoo, right? You could have an extra pitta for five syns more and who is going to know? I’m not telling anyone, I’m still in a bad mood!

Enjoy. Goodnight.

Oh: before I forget! Thank you all for your comments, we really do appreciate and love each one. Don’t be discouraged if we don’t reply (we always try to) – I sit in front of a computer all day and once I’ve typed this up, I normally turn off the computer and concentrate on relaxing or teasing the cat. But we thank you all 🙂

twochubbycubs

slimming, sassy recipes

Category Archives: fakeaways

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