Pork Tenderloin

Pork tenderloin from Bank Holiday Monday’s BBQ.

This is my latest flamed grilled creation and I took a lot of inspiration from Mr Fred Marco (Kansas City BBQ supremo) with regards to the tenderloin.  Fred served one at his place with a beautiful tangerine glaze and I have to say I’ve been dying to give it a whirl since; although I fancied giving it a bit of an English twist and that’s precisely what i did.  I couldn’t get over how inexpensive this cut of meat was.  I shall definitely be buying it again because it’s amazing value for money (considering you’re lucky if you can get a poxy pair of chops for that price now; this is quite literally all meat).

Basically I purchased a Pork Tenderloin from Sainsbury’s (£3.99 I kid you not!) and washed it down as I always do with a little water, then put two caps of olive oil into a pyrex dish and rolled the tenderloin around to get a nice even coating of oil on it.  Afterwards I took some of the sage and onion from the stuffing mix (I didn’t have any fresh her to use but don’t worry, that’s next) and rubbed that all over the surface.  Lastly, I just rubbed a little rock salt over the meat along with some fresh cracked black pepper, skewered the mother and away we go!!!!.

I wasn’t sure how the meat was going to cook, so I decided to whack it on the grill itself, just turning regularly.  It soon started to brown off and the fat dripping down created some lovely searing flames to seal it.   I eventually cut some slits into the meat itself to get a little even heat into the whole thing, I was worried by doing so that it’d dry the meat out but I was pleasantly surprised.  Inside everything was really cooked through well and I hadn’t gotten that really horrible dry pork texture.  Eurrgh.

I honestly haven’t a scooby (Scooby Doo = clue) how long I had it on the grill for, purely as I dangling on various meats, but when you get the following texture and no pink on the inside (not good) then it’s ready to go.  As you can see in the pic I eventually used the skewers to almost spit finish it at the back so that I had extra space on the grill as wel.  I could not believe how tender and succulent this meat was, even with the slightly crispy outside.  I just want to cook another one, it was a lot of fun to throw on I have to say!

GALLERY – Click for a larger image

BBQ – Take two

I’m about to go and BBQ in a bit.  This afternoon I will be serving:

  • Tandoori style chicken (with all my ingredients this time).
  • Panceta and parmesan filled pork sausages
  • Prime piece of sirloin steak
  • Pork tenderloin (which I’ve brushed with olive oil and rubbed sage, onion, black pepper and a little salt over). 
  • Pilau rice, coleslaw and all the usual side nibbles.

Might post pictures later if I don’t burn it all!

 

The beauty of ASCII art…if WordPress didn’t kcuf it up ^_^ 

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If you are desparate for some 80’s ASCII art thrills, then click here.

edit: Gawd Blimey…it looks like WordPress have sorted out the problem…now everyone can drool over the naked ASCII lady…WOOOHOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ASCII TITS!!!!!!

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Mad dogs and Anglo-Indians out in the midday gloom

Last night on the way home from work I popped into Sainsburys to buy some groceries.  Having walked down the aisle I noticed that the BBQ charcoal was on offer and thought it’d be a good idea to throw some chicken on the grill today.  I love to make up my own tandoori chicken style marinade and grabbed the very basic ingredients (minus butter as I wanted it to be low fat) along with some peppers and veg to grill.

Normally my tandoori marinade consists of:

  • 1 pot of low fat greek (or normal) yoghurt
  • 2-3 tablespoons of garlic and ginger paste
  • 1 tablespoon of fresh ground chillis
  • 1/4 cup of melted butter (or ghee)
  • 2-3 tablespoons of tandoori powder
  • 1 tablespoon of garam masala
  • 1 tablespoon of olive oil
  • A little pepper
  • The juice from 3-4 lemons
  • A splash of tap water to the mix to make things a little more watery than creamy to soak the chicken thoroughly.

So as you can see below, this is the kind of mixture I go for.  There is a definate ‘gloop’ factor to the mix and if you finger off the sauce you’ll see that the chicken is well soaked.  Dip it back in after though because you want a bit of sauce when grilling.  I tend to use much bigger fillets of chicken normally, and cut gill slits into it before marinading so that it really soaks in.

The weather today was really, really grim.  A far cry from yesterday apparently when it was beautiful and I was in the office.  Still, I won’t be beaten by the British weather.  I sat by my window and after the first downpour I noticed the clouds were moving fast so I ran down, threw on the bag of self-lighting charcoal (you need to use a match so that’s a lie!) and off we go!

So here we are, the coals are hot and the food is cooking.  This is my slightly pensive face as I can see the skies are beginning to change again with rain clouds (very heavy) starting to build up.  April has always been called ‘April showers’ in the UK, and last year it was our warmest month (practically summer) so it was perhaps an irony that the British weather decided to go back to normal today when I wanted my food.

This is the very teasing and tempting view I had when cooking.  It taunted me the whole time and I decided to share it with you all.  See how the big piece on the left calls to you and says “EAT ME!!!!”?  I only got a small bag of charcoal so it took slightly longer than normal too.  All the while the precipitation gradually increased almost in time with the chicken.  In the distance, I could hear thunder.  Yay!

The chicken had literally about 2 mins left to cook and the rain started coming down, very gently at first but enough to make me get out the brolly.  The cooking finished and I ran into the house rather smug that I had beaten the British weather system once more.  As you can see I decided to wear my lucky clover t-shirt that I picked up in America during St Patricks day.  Worth every penny, to be sure to be sure!

Et voila!!!  Chicken a la Antikrish (slightly more cooked than I would have liked but had to run and get a brolly!) with chargrilled veg and low fat tortillas from Sainsburys.  Alex will be the first to tell you that you can make it a lot more authentic and from scratch, but if you wake up at 9am, think “hmmm I want some funky chicken” then all you do is throw that lot in a bowl and let the chicken marinade in it for a minimum of two hours.  And whilst I’d definately say the authentic tastes way better (Al’x mushroom curry is to die for) this still isn’t too bad.

Pukka!

GALLERY – Click below for larger images

Noisy gits in their gardens at night

Good evening fellow trumpeters!  

Greetings, salutations and welcome to one and all; may I say a special wangtastic-welcome to the Mulsim Feather Tickling Society who have travelled all the way from sunny Clackton to be with us today.  Please ladies and gentlemen, be upstanding and give our esteemed guests a round of applause!!!  But don’t look the ladies in the eyes!

Yes, I’ve finally lost the plot.

Having worked 6am-4pm today of my own volition (I’m an overtime whore) I came home this evening, changed my bed linen (being the metrosexual man that I am), had a nice bath, then had a shave and finally slunk into my duvet for an early-ish night.  And then I got wanged by Baal and his daft minions.

Confound, blast, bugger and crumpets, every complete smeg and their hispanic maid are in their gardens tonight taking advantage of the hottest day of the year so far.  Right now I can hear several pissed bints shouting “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyy!” as loud as they can followed by precisely 4 seconds of clapping and then a prompt reprise of “oi oi!” from someone sitting next to a potting shed (I devise this having heard the unique sound of slurred nonsensical jabber with added terracotta echo).  I’m all for people having a good time but why does Wallington become Aya-slapper when the temperature rises above 15oC?

In addition to this, every single little annoying yappy dog in England sounds like it’s currently outside my window tonight barking away; but where do all the big dogs go!?!?  Maybe they all go away on holiday and that’s why the little terriers come out and yap all night long free in the knowledge that a Great Dane won’t stroll down the street, jump over the fence and twat them with a club hammer?

Is it wrong to secretly hope for rain so that Sharon, Sharon and Shaz go inside and take ‘Mr Tinkles’ with them?  Being a quarter chocolate drop I do think that It is entirely a shame that our Native American (Indian) namesakes were bestowed with the power of the rain dance; whereas my bretheren chose to play Kabadi instead.  I do love the sport of Kabadi don’t get me wrong; but right now I’d happily dance naked in my garden if it meant bringing on the precipitation. 

Ah ha, that said there is now silence outside my window.  So I shall bid you all farewell and take full advantage of this by sneaking off into slumberland……..BUT………hear me Odin………I swear upon your almighty beard that I intend to take my revenge on said yappy dogs in the coming weeks by sprinkling your divine ex-lax chocolate into all gardens so that these dogs may go into the houses of my enemies and desecrate their ikea furniture!!!!!  NORSE POWER!

Euston Station – The great blow up doll mystery

I’ve got another cold at the moment, and when I am ill I tend to retreat back into my fairly eidetic memory; so, struggling at work I drifted off and eventually sat reminscing about some of the great escapades of yesteryear. And one in particular came to mind, I thought I’d share it with you:
The yarn. Circa – sometime in mid-late 1990’s.
Alex was coming back from visiting his mum in Wales, I agreed to meet him at London’s Euston station to give him a hand getting some stuff back to Croydon (because there was quite a bit he was bringing back).
Anyway, I met Al and he gave me a backpack and together we jumped on the tube to London Victoria; just as we were ready to get off I suddenly realised that I’d left the backpack on the platform by the bench at Euston.
Realising what I’d done we both immediately got off at the next stop, got on a return tube and proceeded back to Euston. Alex as always was cool as a cucumber but as soon as I got off at the platform and there was nobody there (this was around 6pm on a Sunday and it would normally have been packed); my stomach sank, I knew immediately that I’d sparked a major security alert.
Thankfully the tube we got on was not diverted (it can either sit at a safe stage before the alerted station) – good old British rail) and we were ushered up the escalators and into the main waiting area ready to be escorted out the building.
At this point, the station was completely empty; bizarrely all except for a BLOW UP DOLL someone had left inflated and left standing up on one of the telephone kiosk just inside the main doors. I’d have to say that seeing this thing standing there (it was blonde with massive red lips and looked a bit like Paris Hilton) was one of the more obscure experiences of my life. Alex will most certainly vouch.
Anyway, I took a deep breath, turned my attention away from the inflatable love-raft and approached security by the stairs. I owned up, yep, it was me. The security man was both relieved and rather annoyed that I had admitted it had been my error and that the property was in fact ‘mine’ and not an IRA bomb (this was god knows how many years ago). I walked down the relevant platform escorted by 2 security guards and approached the backpack.
The somewhat beefy security guard asked me what was in the bag? Blimey, how did I know It wasn’t mine? Alex was still waiting up at the top of the escalators and now I was about to get shot. I was honest, I didn’t know and told them I’d be happy to open the bag.
Nervously I opened the strap, pulled over the cover and there standing in full view of me was a stuffed fox’s head on a platter. Now to me this was quite a normal thing for Alex to have (he eventually got rid of it because it had worms) but the poor security guard looked like I’d put his nads in a vice and tightened them. Panic over. Phew.
I sealed the bag, walked up the escalator and we walked out, laughing about the incident all the way back to Croydon.
The blow up doll vanished and wasn’t there when we left, where did it go? Who took it?
That will forever remain, a mystery………ooooooooooooooh, dun dun dun!
The end…….!?!

But I Carry On – Jam – 16th April 2008

We both took the day off work today to have a jam and record some music, unfortunately for Alex he woke up at 4am and never got back to sleep and we had to cut short the recording part.  The jam itself was still pretty funky and we have lots of new ideas for various drum tracks; to be very honest it was nice just having a catch up with Al and just playing some guitar compared to the pressures of recording (oooooh the pressure!!!).

Anyway, today we focused on the faster version of BLICK, the ever-racuous COME ON, and a riff I’d recorded for a song tentatively entitled ‘MARVIN’.  I’d been listening to to Marvin Gaye and I often give things temporary names or something that’ll remind me of my inspiration and any particular mindset at the time of writing.  Don’t knock it, that’s my bag man!

Anyway, we quickly worked out drums and tried various tempo changes which changed it from a groove to funk and then back to groove again.  It seemed to fit rather well, in fact, I felt at the time it felt TOO familiar and it was really bugging me.  The more I kept playing it the more it felt like I’d stolen a riff or something. 

Just before we ground to a halt (Alex was pooped because of his insomnia and just couldn’t find the energy; especially after several cakes during a break) a revelation struck me.  The ‘MARVIN’ riff perfectly fit an old song that Alex had written just as I’d started doing music with him named “BUT I CARRY ON”. 

It’s a favourite of mine and I always did sod about by playing it with a slight Reggae rhythm but originally it rolled on and on like a mantra and had a very funky bassline.  Funnily enough I suggested to Alex that ‘MARVIN’ should be more like a mantra so it was genuinely spooky when I found ‘MARVIN’ fitted perfectly into the song complete with the already established chorus and middle eight.  How weird is that?!?!

So now we have something to really have a go at!  I recorded the basic riff on my webcam the other night (below) and although it’s got a few duff notes and I have my guitar face going on, it’ll give you an idea of how the riff sounds (albeit that it needs to be played at a faster tempo to fit ‘But I Carry on’).

Oh yes, and you’ll see my VERY funky new guitar strap that I bought in Kansas City. It’s nice innit?

The power of the subconscious mind?!??

Biscuits ‘n Gravy!

Thought it was about time I put some pictures on here from my recent trip to the States, I started eating healthily today AND I needed to put a new category on here for food and cuisine (Alex is quite the chef); So it occurred to me that I should celebrate quite possibly my favourite American dish by putting a quick thread on it, thus giving a nostalgic nod to the delicious dishes that have made me go a bit stocky of late.

My favourite American dish has got to be biscuits and gravy, it’s a breakfast effort which s far more appetising than it looks (at least to the average person, the very sight makes my mouth water!).  It’s a fairly rustic and honest dish, it’s pretty much the equivalent of the full English that my Dad would often knock up on a Sunday or drag me down the cafe before going to see a game of footy.  Speaking of which, I made it for my Dad once and it was one of the few dishes he really liked; always a critic father’s aren’t they?

The biscuits aren’t really biscuits (all you non-Americans out there stop pulling faces), they are in fact very flakey tasty butter rolls that you use to tear off and eat the sausage gravy with.

I do make it for myself, especially now that I get supplies sent in the mail, but there’s really nothing quite like going out to a store, getting the stuff and sitting salivating whilst Amy breaks out the grub.  And what fantastic grub it is!

How to make biscuits and gravy:

First off, get a decent make of sausagemeat, my preferred brand is Jimmy Dean, the ‘hot’ is nice as it’s slightly warming with the peppers in it, the extra hot is amazing!  At home we’re spoiled for choice (especially if like me you have access to a Farmers market once a fortnight) and I have used Cumberland sausage which goes nicely!

Next up you need to get some biscuits, now you can either make them from scratch (Amy can, I’ve never had the patience to wait), buy a tube of ready-to-go Pillsbury Doughboy Biscuit Dough from a grocery store or you can get a Bisquick mix and make that up (what I usually do). For the sake of prosperity (and the sake of my stomach) we grabbed some ready made throw-in-the-oven dough (Pillsbury). Stick the oven on, stick the dough on a tray and oh Mamma!

Get the sausagemeat, put it all in a hot pan (no oil, there’s enough in the sausage fat!) and break it up into pea sized amounts using a wooden spoon, stir it round until cooked through and then reduce the heat.  I’m going to start adding chilli peppers to mine when I make it again!  that obviously might be quite some time yet thought.  Here’s hoping they invent very cheap liposuction on the NHS.  Oh wait, they have?!

Check on the biscuits as they’re made with butter and are likely to burn if you don’t! Nothing worse than burnt biscuits (fnar fnar) which can be used as a frisby or a North Korean conscripts helmet.  Although obviously if they got shot in the head wearing one then it’s not going to save their life.  That’d be stupid.  Well, it might with a pellet gun?

With the sausage cooking slowly and the biscuits doing their thing it’s time to get the gravy ready. Again, I love Jimmy Dean country gravy mix, Amy adds a little ranch seasoning into it to give it a little flavour. Again she can make it from scratch but I’m impatient and you don’t want to mess with the Anti-Hulk when he’s hungry trust me. With the Jimmy Dean you add milk to the mixture and stir until you get a nice thick consistency (use more milk if you like it creamy, hyuk hyuk).

Right, time to get shakin’. Get the sausage and stick it in the gravy, mix it up good momma. Mix it up good, oh yeah!  This is my favourite part, when you mix up the sausage I get something of an obscure satisfaction watching it all come together. “Here come old flattop, he come grooving up slowly, he got biscuits n gravy, he got festered up arteries”.

So, get the rolls out, stick em on a plate, traditionally you either pour the mix over the biscuits or you can have them on the side. I prefer the latter. And that’s it. A taste of Midwestern goodness!

“GALLERY – Click an image for a larger size.

Antikrish – ACE Clan sharpshooter extraordinaire!

Yaaay!  It’s my day off, having worked flat out 6:40am – 4:40pm Saturday and Sunday (overtime) I decided to take today as a days holiday and it’s effectively going to be my weekend!  I woke up at 8am, sauntered down to Sainsbury’s at 9am and grabbed my food to begin my diet; yes folks, I’m as big as a house at the moment and it’s time to get back to being a svelte demi-god. 

So apart from an imminent fiddle with the Danelectro (in practice for Wednesday) the rest of my day is going to be spent playing the xbox 360 with a few online buddies.  I have just started playing again after a slight break (xmas time roughly due to a kaput xbox), I spent Saturday night online with a few members playing with my Clan, no not the Ku Klux Klan but the ACE clan.  Big shout to Dilligaf, Kaka, Peds, Spanner and Ductapekiller.  No we don’t wear white sheets and I didn’t make them up either!

Since buying my xbox a few years ago my favourite online game was Rainbow Six : Vegas (right up up until Call of Duty 4 came out at the end of 2007).  Vegas was very much a thinking mans first person shooter (FPS) and I enjoyed sodding about with the ACE clan, having a few drinks and throwing C-4 around on a Friday night whilst exchanging tons of banter over our headsets.  Call of Duty 4 is a different kettle of fish to Vegas, it’s awesome to the extreme.  You can call in airstrikes, have chopper support if you have a string of kills without dying, fantastic stuff.  Nothing funnier than ruining a few cocky American kids and having them go off crying to mommy when I’ve shot them through the eyeball with a sniper rifle.  ‘KERPOW!’ “My bad!” (that was a joke, see previous Anti-rant entitled ‘My bad’).

So, I have decided to post a few threads about gaming, it’s something I’ve had a passion for since before I even started school; having a brother 7 years older than you with an Atari and a BBC Acorn Electron can do that to a guy, and I spent most of my youth in and out of gaming arcades.  Subsequently I’m something of a hardcore gamer (yes, even at 30 years old), Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, PSP and PC mainly, but I still like to play my Megadrive and Snes (more often than not on the PSP, emulation is a godsend thanks Al!!!)

More to follow today once I’ve tried out the new online multiplayer maps on COD4, and also sunk my teeth into Vegas 2 a bit more.  Decisions decisions!!!