Lamb and porcini kebabs with sage and parmesan

Maybe I've got a bit overexcited with all the sun this week but the barbecue season doesn't seem that far away so it was good to find Dan Vaux-Nobes' 101 BBQ and Grill recipes arriving through my letterbox.

Dan (who's a friend so maybe I'm just a teeny bit biased) has selected some great recipes and given each a practical and quite often hilarious introduction, typical of his blog Essex Eating. The intro below is comparatively restrained but he picked the recipe because it was one of his favourites from the book and could also be cooked on a ridged grill which is useful since it could well be snowing next week. You never know at this time of year.

This is what he says: (good tip about the porcini!)

"Beautiful Italian flavours of sage, porchini mushroom and parmesan are used here to compliment chunks of chargrilled lamb. The recipe calls for fresh porcini which unless you live in rural Italy isn't the easiest (or cheapest) thing to obtain so use the dried and reconstituted in water variety - just make sure you get a pack with dried pieces and not a bag of dried dust. Good luck with threading that on a skewer! Otherwise use chestnut mushrooms. Lovely stuff!"

serves 4

1 lb. (500g) tender lamb, from the leg or shoulder, cut into bite-sized chunks

2 tablespoons olive oil

freshly squeezed juice of 1–2 lemons

leaves from a bunch of fresh sage, finely chopped (reserve a few whole leaves)

2 garlic cloves, crushed

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

4–8 fresh medium-sized porcini/ceps cut into quarters or thickly sliced

To serve

truffle oil, to drizzle

Parmesan cheese shavings

grilled or toasted sourdough bread

* Put the lamb pieces in a bowl and toss in the oil and lemon juice. Add the sage and garlic and season with salt and pepper. Cover, refrigerate, and leave to marinate for about 2 hours.

* Thread the lamb onto skewers adding a quarter, or slice, of porcini every so often with a sage leaf. Brush with any of the marinade left in the bowl. Prepare a charcoal grill. Cook the kebabs for 3–4 minutes on each side.

* Serve immediately with a drizzle of truffle oil, Parmesan shavings, and toasted sourdough bread, if liked.

What to drink: Frankly any medium-bodied red would be pretty good with this but given the influence is Italian I'd probably go for a Chianti or other Tuscan red. That said, a pinot noir would be great too, especially with the truffle oil.

101 BBQ and Grill Recipes compiled by Dan Vaux-Nobes (CICO Books, £12.99)

Photos © Richard Jung

Beef bourguignon pie

Why has no-one had the genius idea of putting beef bourguignon into a pie before? Here's the recipe courtesy of the brilliant Ginger Pig Meat Book which I reviewed here.

We started making meat pies around eight years ago as we had a lot of offcuts of meat that was too superior to make into everyday mince. After getting a classic recipe from old farm cookery books, I adapted it to make it more interesting.

Makes 1 large pie (24 x 12cm/9 1/2 x 4 1/2in) or 4 small (12 x 6cm/4 1/2 x 2 1/2in) pies
Takes 2 hours, plus overnight chilling

For the filling
1.3kg (3lb) chuck steak, cut into 2cm (3/4in) cubes
350g (12oz) cooked dry-cured bacon, diced
200g (7oz) button mushrooms, chopped
1 onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 small garlic clove, crushed
1 tbsp soy sauce, preferably Kikkoman
350ml (12fl oz) red wine
2 tbsp cornflour
leaves from 4 sprigs of flat leaf parsley, chopped

For the suet pastry
700g (1lb 9oz) plain flour
350g (12oz) suet
tsp salt

For assembly
25g (1oz) lard, melted
1 tbsp plain flour
1 egg, beaten

1 Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4. Place the beef and bacon in a roasting tin and brown in the oven for 15 minutes, then stir and cook for 15 minutes more. Add the mushrooms, onion, garlic, soy sauce and wine. Cover with baking parchment, pushing it down over the ingredients, seal with foil, and cook for 1 hours.

2 Drain off all the liquid into a saucepan. Blend the cornflour with a little water and
mix into the cooking juices, then place on the heat and stir until boiling and thickened. Return the liquid to the meat, add the parsley, mix, and leave to cool completely.

3 Now place the flour and suet in a food processor and blitz until very well blended.
Transfer to a mixing bowl, add 300ml ( half pint) water and mix until smooth. If making individual pies, divide the dough into eight balls, four weighing 185g (6.5oz) and four weighing 115g (4oz). If making one large pie, divide it into two balls, one 740g (1lb 10oz) and the other 460g (1lb).

4 Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/gas mark 5. Brush the inside of the tin or tins
thoroughly with lard, then dust lightly with flour. Roll out the larger pastry balls and use
to line the tin or tins. Divide the filling between them. Brush the pastry edges generously with egg, roll out the smaller pastry balls and place on top, pushing the edges together. Trim off the excess with a knife and crimp around the edge. Brush with egg, and decorate with pastry trimmings. Cook for 50 minutes. Leave to cool for five minutes, then turn out of the tins and enjoy hot or cold.

Suggested wine match: burgundy is the classic French match for a Bourguignon but given the pie treatment I go for a more rustic and substantial Rhne red or southern French red.

From Ginger Pig Meat Book by Tim Wilson and Fran Warde, £25 Mitchell Beazley

Real Texas Style Beef Brisket

With July 4th falling on a Saturday chances are you’re going to be thinking barbecue this weekend. Here’s an authentic Texan style BBQ recipe from “Slow Fire, The Beginners Guide To Barbecue” by Ray Lampe, aka Dr. BBQ.

I’ve kept the American measurements though you can convert them using this guide

Dr BBQ writes: A real Texas brisket is always a whole brisket cooked with most of the fat intact. It’s seasoned with something simple and a little spicy and then cooked for a long time over oak wood. The traditional accompaniments are sliced raw onion, pickles, and jalapenos. Hot sauce is often used as well but traditional barbecue sauce is not.

Makes about 12 to 15 servings

¼ cup Barbecue Rub #67 (recipe below)

¼ cup Dr. BBQ’s Fired Up Fajita Rub (recipe below)

1 USDA Choice whole brisket, about 12 pounds

3 cans of beer, preferably Lone Star

In a small bowl mix together the Barbecue Rub #67 and the Fired Up Fajita Rub.

Prepare your cooker to cook indirect at 235° using oak wood smoke for flavour. With a boning knife trim out some of the fat that is in between the two muscles so they will cook evenly. Trim any extreme fat from the top, but most of it should remain.

Wet the whole brisket with half of one of the beer cans. Season all the exposed meat liberally with the mixed rubs. Drink the other half of the beer. Place the brisket in the smoker fat side down. Cook for four hours. Pour half of another beer can on the brisket and cook another 4 hours. Drink the other half of the beer.

Pour half the remaining beer can on the brisket and flip to cook fat side up. Drink the other half of the beer. Cook until the the brisket is tender when you stab it with a skewer. This should take about another four hours and about the time the internal temperature reaches 195°.

Wrap the brisket in foil and transfer to an empty ice chest. Top with a lot of crumpled newspaper. Let the brisket rest for two hours minimum and up to four hours. Remove to a cutting board and trim away all of the fat. Slice the brisket through both muscles across the grain and about 3/8” thick. Serve with sliced raw onion, pickles, and hot sauce.

Barbecue Rub # 67

This is a very traditional barbecue rub that’s good on just about anything. I like the texture of this one to remain a little bit on the coarse side so I use it as is. If you want a finer grind just put it in the food processor with a metal blade and pulse until it reaches the consistency you’d like.

½ cup Sugar In The Raw

½ cup Kosher salt

3 tablespoons chili powder

3 tablespoons paprika

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon onion powder

½ teaspoon black pepper

½ teaspoon lemon pepper

½ teaspoon ground coffee

¼ teaspoon cayenne

Combine all the ingredients in a medium bowl and mix well. May be stored in an airtight container in a cool place for up to six months.

Makes about 1½ cups

Dr. BBQ’s Fired Up Fajita Rub

This is a big bold spicy rub that will really fire things up! This one’s not for the meek and mild eaters! It’s great for fajita or taco meat where the tortillas will help mellow things out. But also try it on meats that will be used as part of a salad. It just might help out your pot of chili too.

¼ cup kosher salt

¼ cup good quality chili powder

1 teaspoon chipotle powder

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon onion powder

½ teaspoon garlic powder

½ teaspoon black pepper

½ teaspoon lemon pepper

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Combine all the ingredients in a medium bowl and mix well. May be stored in an airtight container in a cool place for up to six months.

Makes about 1 cup

All recipes © “Slow Fire, The Beginners Guide To Barbecue” by ray lampe, Dr. BBQ and published by Chronicle books. Available through Amazon

What to drink: I'm not sure I'd go along with the Lone Star but an American or American-style IPA would be cracking. Or possibly even a stout.

Wilhelm Coetzee's Butterflied Leg of Lamb

I first met winemaker Wilhelm Coetzee back in 2006 when he was working for Flagstone. He's now working at Durbanville Hills and this is his favourite 'braii' recipe.

"In South Africa a lot of our lamb meat comes from the "Karoo" (an arid but beautiful part of our country and a place where the farmers are very passionate about their meat). The shrubs that these lamb feed on (free range) is very herbaceous and spicy, so when you buy the meat it's already tender with a natural herby/spicy character. For the recipe you need a small leg of lamb (1.3kg), deboned and butterflied.

The marinade:
500ml Bulgarian yogurt
2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1 tbsp of grounded coriander seeds
1 tsp of grounded cumin
1 small onion finely chopped

Mix all the ingredients together, keep half of it aside (store in a airtight vessel) to serve with the barbequed lamb, cover the lamb with the rest, put in a plastic bag remove the air and leave in the fridge for two days.

Before you barbeque, remove the lamb from the bag and wipe off excess marinade with paper towel.

Basting sauce for the barbeque:
250g good quality unsalted butter
100ml Verjuice
1 clove garlic finely chopped

Put the ingredients in a saucepan and melt the butter over a low heat.

Barbeque over medium hot coals but not too close to the heat. Turn after 10 minutes, baste, and season well with Maldon salt and black pepper. After another 10 minutes turn again and do the same as above. Now you can start turning every 5 minutes, basting after every turn. Take the lamb off the coals when medium done (about 50 minutes) and let it rest for 10 minutes. Slice thinly and serve with the marinade that was kept aside. (What I also like to serve with the meat is a fresh coriander pesto made with salted pistachio nuts instead of pine nuts).

With the leg of lamb I like to serve oven roasted vegetables. I prefer to use red and yellow veggies like:
Red and yellow peppers
Red onion
Nice sweet tomatoes
Butternut squash
Carrots

Just drizzle with olive oil, season and pop into the oven at 200 degrees C until they're tender (about 40-45 minutes)

To complete the color scheme do a salad of green baby leaves and parmesan shavings, squeeze some fresh lemon over and drizzle with olive oil.

To all this you add good friends and wine and have a feast!

Wine to serve with this:
Originally Wilhelm suggested the Flagstone Dragon Tree 2004 (a blend of Cabernet, Pinotage, Shiraz and Merlot) as the ideal match but since he moved to Durbanville Hills he's loyally suggesting the Durbanville Hills Bastion 2011, a smooth, minty Cabernet Shiraz blend (not currently available in the UK so far as I can make out but any similar Cape blend or Cabernet blend would do)

Image © sumos - Fotolia.com