Saturday evening BBQ

It has been a while since we had a BBQ. The weather has been nice and dry for the past few days, so I decided to cook us all a BBQ feast today.

Our grill was purchased locally until the double gas burner we orginally wanted was in stock. However we have used this grill several times now and it definitely gets the job done. The gas version is now available but I don't feel the need to upgrade just yet. We will continue to experiment with this grill.

A trip to the wet market this morning sourced fish, prawns and chicken (we also wanted squid but surprisingly couldn't get any today). We made the chicken marinade at home this morning from scratch, filling our home with a nice aroma.

The fish we grilled today was a Black Snapper. Our initial plan was to get the Black Pomfret (Bawal Hitam) but it was not available in the market today.

The King Prawns were washed,trimmed and skewered on pre-soaked sticks.

The chicken we used for the satay was breast meat. Next time around we will select chicken drumstick as this should result in a more succulent satay. The peanut sauce and the ketupat (Malay rice cakes) were both from packets; the peanut sauce got a mixed response however the ketupat was simple to prepare and was a great success.

You can never go wrong with a salad when eating BBQ. This simple, yet colourful salad was made up of aragula leaves, cherry tomatoes and sun dried tomatoes, with extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper to taste.

The fish was cooked to perfection in about 12-15 minutes, with a little bit of charring to the skin to remind us we were eating from the BBQ today.

The fish was accompanied by a homemade chili/lime dip.


Chicken Satay - DONE !!

Ketupat (Malay rice cakes) and cucumber to accompany the satay.

King Prawns on the grill.

Our daughter enjoying the afternoon sun, while we busily prepared dinner around her.

King Prawns served with garden salad - DONE !!

Chicken Satay with homemade marinade, Ketupat, Corn on the Cob, Grilled Fish, Grilled King Prawns, Garden Salad (Peanut Sauce and Homemade Chili/Lime Dip out of the picture)Yummy :-)

Dessert today was from Jell-O - No Bake Strawberry Cheesecake. We tried this before some months ago and it turned out pretty tasty. We made these last night as individual cakes and had them 2 nights in a row as dessert (1 pack makes 1 cheesecake or 12 bite-size cakes).

Homemade chicken satay
For the satay marinade:

1 tsp coriander seeds

1 tsp fennel seeds

1 tsp cumin seeds

1-2 shallots, sliced thinly

1 stalk lemongrass, root trimmed

1 tsp turmeric powder

1 tsp brown sugar

2 tsp honey

Salt to taste

1 piece chicken breast meat or 2-3 chicken drumstick, cut into small pieces

12 bamboo skewers, soaked in water for 1 hour

Ground the marinade ingredients with a pestle and mortar until you get a fine paste. Marinade chicken with the paste for at least 6 hours. Thread the chicken onto the skewers and grill until golden brown. Serve with ketupat, cucumber and onions.

Homemade chilli/lime dip

2 shallots, sliced thinly

2 shallots, diced *

1 garlic, diced *

5-6 cili padi, diced *

1 red chilli, diced *

6 lime

2 tsp brown sugar

Salt to taste

Place ingredients marked with * into a pestle and mortar and ground until you get a paste. Squeeze juices of lime into bowl, add brown sugar and mix until sugar has dissolved. Add the sliced shallots to the bowl and the paste and mix thoroughly. If the sauce is too spicy, you can add a little more sugar. Serve with seafood.