Bbq Bacon and cheese burgers with a pasta salad

Hey guys!!!

Its Friday and Im hungry!! Thinking about the burgers I made two nights ago.....yumm!!

There is something about making burgers from scratch. They are so much more juicier and full of flavor. 

I love that you can make them as thick as you want and with just about anything.

I also love the simple mayo-tuna-corn-pasta salad. Been making it for years and its still a hit with most of friends!

Well here is how it went down.

Ingredients:- [makes about 8 burgers]

Mince meat Beef [about 500 gr]
Cheddar cheese sliced
Burger buns
Mixed bag lettuce
Bacon Rindless
Mayonnaise
Can of shredded tuna
Can of sweet corn
Pasta 3 colours
Dhania /Correander
1 onion
4 cloves garlic
1 egg
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
Olive oil
Black peper
Cayenne pepper
Worcestershire sauce
Dark brown sugar
Ketchup

So I started up by boiling the water for my pasta. I then added the pasta, a dash of oil and allowed it to cook for about 10 minutes. Once that was done I drained the hot water and used cold water to cool the pasta.

After that I mixed them well with my hands and a dash of some olive oil to keep them from being sticky.

I then proceeded to make the burgers and allowed the pasta to sit and cool off completely by itself.

In a sufuria I mixed about 1 cup ketchup, 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, a dash of Worcestershire sauce and some cayenne pepper and stirred well as I heated it up on the cooking stove until the sugar had melted and mixed well into a nice thick brown sauce. I then put it aside.

Heat oven to 180 degrees.

In a bowl, I put all my ingredients to mix[ the mince meat, the egg, chopped dhania, 1 chopped onion and 4 cloves chopped garlic, breadcrumbs, 4 tablespoons olive oil, abit of salt, a dash of worcestershire sauce and some black pepper] I mixed it all well with my hands and formed into round burgers. I then oiled the baking tray and placed the burgers and baked for about 15 minutes. 

After that I cut the buns in half and placed them on the rack tray in the oven for 1 minute to get abit crunchy on the outside.*Be careful not to burn them. *

I then cooked my bacon in a pan.

 

When burgers were sizzling and the aroma had filled the kitchen, I removed them and placed the cheddar cheese slices on top and returned to the oven for 1 minute for the cheese to melt.

In another bowl I mixed about pasta that I had kept aside, 5 spoons mayonnaise, sweet corn and tuna *please drain all the oil out of the tuna* and added salt to taste.

Spread some mayonnaise on the bottom bun and place the burger meat on each. Follow with two slices bacon and the BBQ sauce on top. Wash the lettuce/mixed salad and dry it with a paper towel. 

Serve the burger on a plate with the pasta on top on the bed of lettuce/mixed salad.

Enjoy!!

These were honestlty the tastiest and juiciest burgers I've ever made or had!!! No lie!!
Awaiting your Feed-back!!
Invite some friends over this weekend and make them this easy and fun meal!

Salmon with baked baby potatoes and a creamy mushroom sauce

Hey guys!
Hope you all had an awesome love weekend! :-) I sure did.

So I was planning to make this dish over the weekend but sadly I had the worst migraine throughout. I'm much better now so I was eager to finally get in the kitchen last night and create this masterpiece that I had in my mind all along.

Im a great fan of salmon. I find it to be the tastiest fresh water fish there is. The only problem is that it is not found locally here in Kenya so we usually import it at a very high price. I bought three fillets for about 800 ksh!! YAIX!! I had missed eating salmon which was one of my weely meals in Spain since it was so much cheaper there. All in all we all have to pay a price sometimes for something good and worthwhile.

I decided to bake it and once I saw some baby potatoes during one of my supermarket errands I figured I'd give them a try aswell. Since Im a fan of mushrooms-I opted to make a thick creamy sauce with some cream and white wine that I had in the house and even added some peas for some flavor and color.

Ingredients:-   

Salmon fillets [and not the steak since the steak has bones]
Baby potatoes or normal potatoes [depending on preference]
1 pack mushrooms
1/2 cup peas
1 onion
4 cloves garlic
Extra virgin olive oil
Cooking cream
1/2 beef cube
2 tablespoons Unsalted Butter
1/2 cup white wine
Oregano
black pepper
Salt to taste
Dhania/correander
Foil

Heat oven to 180 degrees.
I started of by washing and boiling the baby potatoes as they were without peeling them. I allowed them to cook for about 20 minutes. [You can poke with a knife and if the potato slides of know that it is cooked.]
Once they were done I drained the water and put them on a large baking tray, sprinkled some olive oil, a dash of salt and some chopped correander/dhania over them and popped them in the pre-heated oven for about 7-10 minutes.

I then cleaned the fillets and placed each fillet on a piece of foil paper. I chopped and added 2 cloves garlic, some oregano, salt and a dash of olive oil over each and wrapped them well in foil.
I then placed the fish in the oven to bake for about 15 minutes.

In a pan I put the remaining 2 cloves chopped garlic, 1 chopped onion and some butter to cook.

Shortly after that I added 1/2 beef cube and 1/2 cup white wine and left to reduce.

I then added the mushrooms to sautee for 5minutes.

I then added the cooking cream, approx 3/4 cup and the peas and allowed to cook for another 5-8 minutes.

Make sure you stir well and continuously through this process so that the mushrooms dont burn in the bottom of the pan.

Once salmon is cooked remove from foil and serve over creamy mushroom suace with some baby potatoes on the side.
Enjoy!

ION: Celebrating 600 likes on my facebook "cooking with Jaz" page!!!

Thankyou all!

Thankyou for liking and sharing this blog and my page. For trying out the recipes and for your feedback!

Tomorrow I have something awesome instore!

Also look out for the new "Bachelor meal of the week" feature!

Think easy. Think quick. Think "minimal ingredients!" YESSS!!!

Spicy pork-beef meat balls with macaroni and cheese

Happy new week all!!!
Im excited about this recipe! After seeing a friend's post on facebook saying how she'd just made some meatloaf, I reckoned that it was time I had  a go at making meatloaf myself. Now I had never had meatloaf before but from the info I had seen online it looked like something I would enjoy *I mean who doesn't love a meat based meal!!! #carnivoresunite!!!*
I saw very many recipes online that gave me an idea of how to do it. As usual I had to JAZ-ify it and I decided to add a few ingredients to spice it up.
My main worry was that it may turn out dry but to my surprise and with the help of the extra ingredients it came out extremely moist and juicy. Now Ill have you know that I didn't have a bread baking tin so I opted to make meat balls instead but by using the same meat loaf ingredients.

Hope you enjoy this one guys, I sure did. My boo had an extra serving cause it was that good!!

Ingredients (serves 5-7)  
Mince meat 500g
3 Farmers choice spicy pork sausages
1 egg
3 slices white bread
1 cup milk
Unsalted butter
2 onions
6 cloves garlic
coriander/dhania
Worcestershire sauce
Bread crumbs
salt
black pepper
1 pack Macaroni
Oregano
Parsley
Basil
Royco
beef cube
Parmesan cheese
Cheddar cheese
1 bottle BIO Cooking cream
Red pepper /hoho
Pack of mixed veggies
1/2 cup Ketchup
1/2 cup Dark brown sugar
2 tomatoes
Vegetable oil/olive oil

Method
I started off by boiling the water for the macaroni. After the water was boiled, I added them and cooked for 7-10 minutes with a dash of salt and two tablespoons vegetable oil. I then drained them and put them aside. To stop the cooking process, run cold water through them and then add a bit of oil and mix well with your fingers so that they don't stick to each other. Heat oven to 180 degrees.

I then put 1 chopped onion and 3 cloves garlic to cook. After a min or two I added the chopped red pepper, abit of oregano, parsley and basil and the macaroni shortly after. I then added some cooking cream (1 cup), 1 teaspoon black pepper and a dash of salt (but not too much because cheese has alot of salt) Make sure you stir well. 

I then took it off the stove and started mixing the macaroni with the cheeses and the remaining cream in my baking tin. 

 After that I put the macaroni and cheese in the oven to bake for about 7 minutes (or as long as cheese starts melting and the top browns a bit) Once it is done, remove and leave to sit for about 5 min before serving.

Steam veggies with 1/2 beef cube and 1 teaspoon royco for some flavor for about 10 minutes. Make sure not to overcook so that veggies remain crunchy.

In another pan, I sauteed my chopped onion and the remaining cloves of garlic with 3 tablespoons butter.

In a bowl I soaked three slices of bread in 1 cup of milk. 

In a small bowl I grated two tomatoes, added half a cup brown sugar and mixed with half cup ketchup and put aside to glaze later.

I then took the three spicy pork sausages and removed the inside stuffing and threw the covers away. (see pic below)

In another bowl I put the minced meat, the chopped dhania/correander, 1 egg, Breadcrumbs, the pork stuffing, the sauteed onions and garlic with their butter, a dash of worsestershire sauce, a dash of salt and mixed with my hands. I then added the soaked bread and mixed well. 

After that I formed little balls out of them and put them on a greased oven tray. I then covered each one with the sugar mixture that I had previously put aside and put in the hot oven to bake for about 25-30 minutes. 

Every 10 minutes I opened the oven and moved them around to prevent them from sticking. I also added the sugary salsa on each one twice in between baking.

At this point the aromas coming out from the oven were simply heavenly!!!

The sugary salsa compliments the spice perfectly. After they were sizzling and cooked, I removed them from the oven to serve with the macaroni and steamed veggies!!!

So there you have it! Moist, juicy mini meatloaves served with creamy mac& cheese and crunchy veggies.

Now who wouldn't find that yummy. 

Simple and incredibly tasty!

Awaiting your FEEDback!