Use your oven as a BBQ
Steaks
Good chefs will tell you the only way to cook steak is to heat up a pan with a thick base. Place the steak and sear both sides. Place the pan and meat in the oven for 5 to 6 minutes and then pull the pan out and let it sit for 5 minutes. You won't taste better steaks.
Sausages
When cooking sausages there is no need to turn them when cooking. The Alfresco oven is so designed with equal heat at the top and bottom. I lay fresh asparagus out to cover the bottom of a pan and place spiced sausages on top. All is cooked within 6 to 8 minutes.
Cooking on Skewers
Place your metal skewers with food over a pan to support each skewer end and to catch fats and juices. Simply slide the tray into the oven. The skewers will only have to be rotated once because of the ovens equal heat.
BBQ Recipes
Below are some great BBQ recipes to try with your Alfresco oven:
Pakistani Kebabs
The spice mixture in the marinade for these kebabs is similar to a Pakistani curry. Use beef, lamb or chicken - or some of each. If you plan to serve a combination of meats, put each kind on an individual skewer.
Ingredients:
- 1/2 cups yoghurt
- 1 small onion, chopped
- 1 clove garlic, crushed
- 1 teaspoon chopped fresh ginger (or 0.25 teaspoon ground ginger)
- 1 small dried hot chilli pepper, crushed
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin seed, crushed
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/4 ground cardamom
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/8 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
- 2 pounds of boneless lean beef sirloin or lamb (shoulder or leg), cut in 1 1/4 inch cubes, or 5 whole chicken breasts, skinned, boned, and cut in bite-size pieces
Method:
To make the marinade, combine the yoghurt, onion, garlic, ginger, chilli pepper, cumin, nutmeg, cardamom, salt, cinnamon, cloves and black pepper. Stir meat into marinade (keep meats separate if you use several so you can skewer and cook them separately). Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Remove meat from marinade and string on skewers. Cook until browned and just tender - about 6 - 7 minutes for lamb and beef, 5 to 6 minutes for chicken. Makes about 6 servings.
Skewered Veal Barbecue
When making these kebabs, if you have any pineapple left over, drain it well; sauté the pieces in a small amount of butter until lightly browned and service as an accompaniment.
Ingredients:
- 1/3 cup soy sauce
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 2 tablespoons salad or olive oil
- 1 tablespoon dried oregano
- 2 or 3 veal steaks, 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick
- Dry red wine
- 1 can (1lb., 13oz.) sliced pineapple
Method:
Mix together soy sauce, onion, oil, and oregano. Cut the veal steaks into 1 to 1 1/2 inch squares, depending on the thickness of your skewers. Put the veal squares in a bowl, pour in the marinade, then add enough wine to cover the meat. Let the meat marinate all day and turn it in the marinade from time to time. Cut the pineapple slices into quarters.
About 2 hours before time to cook, string the meat on the skewers with a piece of of pineapple between every two pieces of meat. You'll have to work carefully as the pineapple might split if the skewers are too large. Arrange the skewers on a shallow pan (pizza trays are ideal), pour over the sauce and marinate, turning once. Baste with the marinade when you turn skewers. This fills 6 good sized skewers.
Skewer Combinations
If you are wondering what foods complement each other on skewers, here are some tried and true combinations:
- Pork cubes, pineapple chunks, green pepper squares, sweet potato squares.
- Steak cubes, brown-and-serve bread chunks, mushroom caps, tomatoes.
- Prunes, brown-and-serve sausage, small onions, spiced crab apples.
- Ham cubes, thick sliced banana, sweet potatoes.
- Figs stuffed with anchovies, ripe olives, salami cubes, brown-and-serve rolls.
- Polish sausage, cherry tomatoes, eggplant cubes, stuffed green olives.
- Cheese cubes and luncheon meat, cut in quarters, and threaded alternately with mushrooms or ripe olives.
- Meatballs, onions, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms.
- Knackwurst, small onions, potato or zucchini slices.
- Turkey cubes, pineapple chunks, ripe olives, sweet potatoes.
- Ham cubes, corn on the cob, cheese wrapped in refrigerated biscuits, stuffed olives.
Go back to our Recipes.
...Or imagine sitting down to a sumptuous wood fired Sunday roast cooked by you and your Alfresco for your family...
