Pork

Pork Spare ribs

~ nzthermomixmum

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http://www.chelsea.co.nz/browse-recipes/smokey-pork-spare-ribs-treacle-dipping-sauce/

Sticky pork ribs

We had two Chelsea Winter spare rib recipes ( links above)  to chose from and because I couldn’t decide which one to make , decided to really go to town and try both. The  “sticky pork spare ribs” are towards the bottom right of the picture; recipe   from her website  and the “smoky spare ribs “are pictured top left;  a recipe she developed for Chelsea Sugar. They were both great but we were split 50:50 which tasted the best.  The sticky ribs were very soft falling off the bone, the smoky ribs had a bit more bite to them but still tender to eat.

The sticky pork spare ribs are cooked slowly for 2 hours at 160c while wrapped in foil then baked at high temperature 220c for 15 minutes to finish browning. The younger girls; miss 9 and her friend and dad preferred these sticky soft ribs.

The smoky pork ribs  were marinated the day before and cooked in 200c for 30- 40 minutes. Miss 14 and her friend and I preferred the smoky ribs.

My preference was for the smoky ribs because there is less time needed in the kitchen on the day you want to cook and preparing in advance is not difficult. Both recipes make copious amounts of sauce. I only used half of the smoky sauce and froze the other half rather than make a dipping sauce. And I also halved the sauce for the sticky ribs and made a dipping sauce from the cooked liquid remaining in the tray from braising.

Here is the converted recipe for Thermomix

Smoky spare ribs 

Ingredients

  • 30 g olive oil
  • 1 small onion
  • 4 cloves garlic
  • 1 tsp sweet smoked paprika
  • 2 tsps cumin powder
  • 2 cups (500g) beef or chicken stock
  • ½ cup (125ml) tomato sauce
  • 2 tbsps apple cider vinegar
  • ½ cup (125ml) Chelsea Treacle ( used maple syrup as we didn’t have treacle  )
  • 2 tbsps Chelsea Caster Sugar
  • 12 (1.8kg) pork spare ribs

Method

  1. Add garlic to tm bowl, chop speed 7, 3sec. 
  2. Add onion to tm bowl, chop speed 7 for a few seconds
  3. Add  30 g olive oil to tm bowl
  4. Sauté garlic onion and oil 3 minutes , varoma temp, speed 2
  5. Add all other ingredients and simmer with MC off  15-25 mins , 100 c , speed 2.   (Kept adding more time cooking until the sauce thickened , we used maple syrup instead of treacle so it may have been runnier )
  6. Pour half sauce over ribs and marinate overnight in fridge or for 4-5 hours.
  7. Roast ribs in oven over a wire rack for 30- 40 minutes at 200- 220c, basting with marinade and turning occasionally, or until golden and cooked through. –
  8. Return the remaining sauce to small saucepan and simmer over low heat until it thickens and becomes syrupy. Allow for sauce to cool and pour into dipping bowl. ( Nb we didn’t use the other half as dipping sauce just froze for use as marinade another day and I upped the temperature to 220c for the last 10 minutes cooking the ribs to increase the browning )

For the sticky rib recipe, I halved the marinade ingredients and used the Thermomix to make the marinade then followed Chelsea’s instructions for baking 2 hours and browning the ribs in the oven.

 

Pulled Pork with Homemade Tortillas

~ nzthermomixmum
Pulled pork tortilla
Pulled pork tortilla

http://www.recipecommunity.com.au/main-dishes-meat-recipes/bbq-pulled-pork/221932

Combined a method from the community (link above)  for cooking pulled pork and adapted the flavours from a Pete Evans Family Food recipe. Seared the seasoned (salt and pepper) meat pieces first then made the sauce.

Sauce for Pulled Pork

  • 3TB maple syrup
  • 3TB garlic powder
  • 1/2 tsp dry mustard powder
  • 2 TB onion powder
  • 1/2 tsp white pepper
  • 1/2c barbecue sauce ( can make your own) I used bought one this time
  • 1/4 c Worcester sauce ( adjusted down from  1/2 c which seemed alot)
  • splash of water to thin only (his recipe has 750 ml of water but this must evaporate in oven which he sets for 180C then to 100C for 6/7 hours so not needed in thermomix because temperature is set at 90C.)

Combined the meat and sauce in thermomix and cooked for 2 hours, (60 mins at a time ) 90 C, reverse speed stir. Then shredded meat in thermomix  2 sec, speed 4 after it finished cooking. Coleslaw is the simple guided recipe and done in a few seconds.

Pulled pork, lettuce, coleslaw and tortillas
Pulled pork, lettuce, coleslaw and tortillas

Homemade Tortillas 

Tortillas

The tortillas are super easy to make. Only takes a a few minutes to whizz up in the thermomix (link above) and no proving or resting required, roll out and pan fry eight tortillas takes a couple minutes for each tortilla but worth the effort to have freshly made warm tortillas. Made earlier and kept under a tea towel and reheated for dinner. Will make another great weekend lunch option because there’s no proving required.

This recipe for spinach tortillas looks good too.

http://www.recipecommunity.com.au/baking-savoury-recipes/spinach-tortillaswraps/139450

Non Fried Rice

~ nzthermomixmum
Non fried rice
Non fried rice

http://www.recipecommunity.com.au/pasta-rice-dishes-recipes/non-fried-fried-rice/134448 Yummy …. This very  popular recipe from the community is great because we didn’t have to cut anything up or stir anything or stand by the stove. And it’s not fried, it’s steamed so less oil and healthier. For us fried rice is a regular meal so to find a supremely simple thermomix recipe is exciting. The thermomix cut up the onions and garlic, cut up the bacon, cut up the vegetables, cooked the eggs, veges and the rice at the same time. All you have to do add some cooked chicken ( here’s another use for the shredded chicken made and posted a few days ago) Flavour with salt and pepper, soy sauce , oyster sauce  and it’s ready to eat. I added some chorizo to the eggs for a little heat and spice and used about 1000g of luke warm water to make sure the basmati was properly cooked. Total cook time about 25 minutes for this recipe but in that time  you can wash up or read a book or even go for a walk while it’s cooking. Awesome definately lives up to the 157 positive 5 star ratings and rave reviews. Post note- tastes even better the next day!

Stir fried noodles

~ nzthermomixmum
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Combination noodles

Used thermomix to precook the noodles by adding boiling water and noodles to TM bowl followed the boiled pasta guided recipe.  Tipped cooked noodles into a thermoserver to keep warm. Then used the chinese style stir fried vegetables guided recipe to cook  vegetables ( left out chillies ).  Whilst the Thermomix was cooking the vegetables, mixed sliced pork with cornflour, salt and white pepper. Fried the pork in pan, added seafood and fried altogether until cooked. Flavoured with soy sauce, salt , oyster sauce and sesame oil. Once the vegetables are cooked, combined with meat and seafood,  and tossed into noodles. Notes Can add sesame oil and some toasted sesame seeds.  Can add a little chicken stock, water and cornflour to make a sauce with pork and vegetables.

Pork/chicken san choy bau – Lettuce cups

~ nzthermomixmum
Pork San choy bau
Pork San choy bau

http://www.recipecommunity.com.au/starters-recipes/san-choy-bau/174069

One of our favourite meals San choy bau is low carb, simple tasty, fast food. I turboed two chicken thighs to make mince and turboed some leftover cooked pork in the thermomix separately.  Soaked a packet of bean thread vermicelli in boiling water for a few minutes Many recipes don’t have this addition but it’s one way to bulk up this dish simply.  You could just add more chicken or pork. Chopped and cooked garlic, ginger and spring onion, in the thermomix.  Added the chicken and pork  meat and cook with sauces to taste; any combo of fish sauce, tamari, soy sauce, oyster sauce, tsp honey works well. Lastly added vegetables and vermicilli. This is such a versatile meal because you can add anything ; carrot,  zucchini, capsicums,  spinach, shiitake mushrooms, bean sprouts, cucumber, water chestnuts, sesame seeds or nuts.  For this meal, julienned  carrot and  zucchini using a mandolin but they could be easily chopped in the thermomix as per recipe link above. The vegetables when finely sliced need no more than a toss in the sauces. Served all together in lettuce cups topped with coriander and chilli sauce. My kids love eating these cups because it’s relaxed finger food. There’s something fun about heaping the lettuce cups yourself and adding your own herbs, seeds and chilli sauces.

A san choy bau closely resembling our recipe from the community is pasted above.

Steamed pork buns

~ nzthermomixmum
Steamed buns
Steamed buns
Miss 13 makes buns
Miss 13 makes buns

After initially not being convinced they were authentic char siew pow, we now totally love these buns. The filling was again leftover lamb diced finely with oyster sauce, hoisin sauce and soy gravy. I left out the onion  and used the homemade thermomix chicken stock for additional flavour. Yum yum yum. The thermomix is king, the dough was so easy and took literally less than five minutes to make in total. Miss 13 helped me roll and wrap the filling, then into Varoma to steam for 10 minutes, t’s a super quick scrumptious lunch.

recipe from  A Taste of Asia , thermomix cookbook P 79

Char siew pow – steamed pork buns

~ nzthermomixmum
Steamed bun
Steamed bun

I have always wanted to make steamed pork buns. The recipe in the ” A Taste of Asia” p79 looks so simple, no rising needed,  so had to give this recipe a go. Probably considered sacrilegious to substitute lamb for pork but I made up the filling with leftover lamb finely diced and using the oyster sauce hoisin base. The result is not  what I expected most likely because the buns did not require proving.  The buns, of course, are the same size as I put in the Varoma even though there was yeast and baking powder in the recipe. Kids loved them and they were demolished in seconds but not the fluffy steamed buns we are used to. I will search for a recipe from the community next.  What I do like about having the thermomix is the inspiration it gives us to try new recipes. Internet has been down and so haven’t had access to the recipe community website. Can’t wait to look now.

Note Just this minute my daughters have just requested I make these again, they think they’re better than the normal buns that require rising and funnily enough I may even agree! So we may be onto another lunch box winner.