Big Green Egg Live Cooks with Meat Smoke Fire

Saturday 31st December 2022 - New Year Nibbles

We thought we better slip in one more live cook for 2022 and what better than a few nibbles ready for the big night.

We're going to be cooking:

• Poffertjes, small dutch bite sized pancakes. They're delicious and super quick and easy.
• Brazillian churrasco - grilled beef skirt skewers with a smoky tomato pepper salsa.
• Peruvian anticuchos - chicken thigh skewers with creamy aji verde sauce.

Saturday 3rd December 2022 - Mountain food

To celebrate Nic taking off for a weeks skiing, we cooked some of the dishes he loves while in the mountains.

We cooked:

• Celeriac and fennel gratin - two vegetables many people don't like. Try this though it may just change your mind. Andrea doesn't like either veg, she left with a portion to cook at home she enjoyed it so much.
• Pan-fried duck breast - I love duck. Keep it simple. It's cheaper than steak and can be just as good, if not better.
• Balsamic and honey griddled cabbage - some of the best cabbage I've eaten. I love it cooked like this.
• Indian cheese twists - we borrowed this recipe and to be honest, it wasn't that great. Go search out something better.

Saturday 26th November 2022 - Christmas on the Big Green Egg

Time to give you some Christmas ideas.

We cooked:

• Beef Wellington, the Meat Smoke Fire way.
• Smoked salmon blinis with homemade smoked salmon.
• Chocolate and raisin biscotti.
• Spit roast turkey on the LetzQ.
• Chicken wings on the MiniMax in the new basket for the LetzQ Spit rotisserie.

Saturday 12th November 2022 - Everything potato

We'd been out for dinner at the fabulous restaurant, Provenance Kitchen Brix and Mortar. I had a sardine starter with fennel served on sourdough toast. It was delicious and the dressing was just stunning. Therefore the first recipe is sort of a take on that. Then what would I do with the leftover potato? Well, make pancakes of course. That's how some of these cooks come together.

This week we cooked:

• Potato skins with shaved fennel, spinach and tamarind and poppy seed dressing.
• Potato pancake tacos with salsa, soured cream, avocado and herbs.
• A potato and spicy chorizo frittata.

Saturday 29th October 2022 - Dishes for Bonfire night

This week we continued the Indian theme from last week but cooked some dishes that could be enjoyed on bonfire night.

The three dishes (plus some extra) were:

• Gunpowder chicken with an Indian twist.
• Indian chip butties - Tumeric cooked potatoes with tomato chutney in a roti.
• Tamarind BBQ babybacks, cooked on the LetzQ spit and carousel.
• An Indian slaw.

Saturday 22nd October 2022 - Goatober

Everything about this week's cook is to celebrate #Goatober. Each October, #Goatober take place, where the goat industry is highlighted and the plight of billy goats. Most male goats are euthanised at birth as there is no demand for their meat, the females though go on to produce milk. Goatober was setup to get people eating goat.

We bought a mixed box of goat meat from James at Cabrito.co.uk (sadly no longer trading). I know James, having met him when we discussed his Big Green Egg cook book. You might recognise that the book mirrors our site when it comes to the setup of surfaces. I also got to meet James at Highgrange Devon following the release of the cookbook.

We chose to make the following dishes using recipes from our all-time favourite cookbook, Curry Compendium. What was even nicer was Misty Ricardo (aka Richard Sayce), joined us for the live cook. We'll hopefully get him to come and do some classes with us. Anyway to the dishes:

• Goat keema and peas - a great side dish or a main with naan.
• Goat keema naan
• Sweet and spicy goat chops - simply amazing flavours.
• Goat tikka - have it as either a dish on its own, or add it to a curry sauce.

Saturday 15th October 2022 - Vietnamese spring rolls, a Japanese rice bowl and Italian spiced meatballs

We made these meatballs a couple of weeks ago and they are some of the best I've come up with so we had to cook them. While out shopping I ended up being inspired by my local Asian store to do the other two dishes. They definitely don't all go together but in their own right, they're all stunning dishes.

This week's dishes were:

• Spiced Italian Meatballs - chipotle spice meatballs, in a spice tomato sauce. You can serve them with pasta, garlic bread or in a sub sandwich.
• Vietnamese Spring Rolls - crispy rice paper rolls with pork and vegetables.
• A Japanese pork rice bowl - a warming rice bowl with Japanese pickles.

Saturday 1st October 2022 - Three rotisserie dishes

Several of you have asked for rotisserie recipes so here we are with three. One is an idea we took from SizzleFest, another is because we had our superb butcher here cutting up a leg of lamb for us. The last is something I have wanted to try for a while.

• Italian Style Rotisserie Beef Skirt
• Roasted Celeriac with Honey, Chilli and Lemon
• Rotisserie Lamb Rump

Saturday 17th September 2022 - Sea bass, more bass, and a little more bass

We're back from our holidays, and this week I got to go sea fishing with Martin and Steve, two customers and friends. We went to Brighton and were taken out by Robin from Brighton Inshore Fishing, I can't recommend him enough. We met at 6am and went out on the boat. My track record isn't good but this trip was incredible. In 3 hours we caught 18 and returned most of them to fight another day. However, we did bring a couple home for the cook.

Robin's blog of our trip is here.

We cooked:

• Tandoori bass with curried fried rice - simple but so delicious.
• Mexican Bass tacos
• Sea Bass burrito

Saturday 27th August 2022 - Around the world

It's been 3 weeks since our last cook due to classes and trip to Scotland to see some great friends. I thought I would cook two dishes that went down really well with those friends, and a new burger recipe.

The three dishes were:

• Baby octopus paella - you need to try this, don't be put off. The octopus are stunning.
• Bavette with an Argentinian chimichurri - a cheap cut with a delicious dressing.
• Korean Bulgogi smash burgers - spicy with kimchi as the salad, stunning.

Saturday 6th August 2022 -Eastern Mediterranean / North African cook 

We love spicy food and this week's cook was beautiful. Not only did we use the Big Green Eggs, but we also used the DeliVita wood-fired oven to make some garlic flatbreads for the kebabs. We cooked three main dishes:

• Lamb shoulder kebabs with red onion pickle, tzatziki, and garlic flatbreads.
• Baked feta with red onion, chilli, parsley and oregano.
• Charred hispi cabbage with a tahini dressing, and pomegranate seeds.

Saturday 30th July 2022 - Fish week

I was supposed to be fishing this week but the weather didn't play ball. No worries, Waitrose to the rescue. To be honest with my track record, I would have probably just gone to Waitrose anyway.

Instead of the 3 cooks we normally do, today we did 5:

• Rotisserie bream with an Asian dipping sauce.
• Lobster tails with herb butter melted with charcoal, this cook is theatre and delicious.
• Mackerel on a bed of fennel and tomato, cooked in the DeliVita pizza oven.
• Rainbow trout en papillote.
• Fried whitebait with spicy paprika flour, lemon and sea salt.

Saturday 23rd July 2022 - Asian BBQ Week

While away on holiday we found a few dishes we wanted to try:

• Thai chicken skewers - sweet, spicy, moist and full of flavour.
• Korean pancakes - vegetable pancakes with a dipping sauce.
• Asian roasted cauliflower - sticky and spicy, it's delicious.

Saturday 9th July 2022 - Corn ribs, lamb smash burgers and La Mams tomato salad

This was a great live cook. The food was hoovered. The corn ribs are an absolute winner.

Our cooks were:

• Lamb smash burgers with tzatziki and grilled halloumi. These were served in our homemade brioche rolls.
• Corn ribs - you have to try these. They are simply stunning. Be careful cutting the corn though.
• La Mams tomato salad - this is a taste of my youth. So simple but such a winner, especially with a lovely baguette.

Saturday 2nd July 2022 - Fruit on the Egg

We wanted to do a week themed around fruit but not all desserts.

We cooked:

• a grilled watermelon, avocado and red onion salad with feta and mint.
• a grilled pineapple salsa.
• a flat peach frangipane galette.

Saturday 18th June 2022 - Nibbles Week 2

After a 4 week break due to classes and holidays, we're back.

We cooked the following 3 nibbles dishes:

• Turkish Pizza - pizza boats with a lamb mince topping
• Bitterballen - Dutch mince roux balls
• Sweet potato wedges - crispy and spicy

Saturday 11th June 2022 - Nibbles Week

After a 4 week break due to classes and holidays, we're back.

We cooked the following 3 nibbles dishes:

• Red Thai Turkey Bites
• Puff Pastry Pizza Wheels
• Baby squid with chimichurri

Saturday 7th May 2022 - Beer-braised food

Fancy a dish cooked in beer? Well here are 3 of them, all cooked on the Big Green Egg with a bottle of beer or two in each.

We cook:

• Beer-braised, smoked paprika pulled pork belly tacos.
• Beer-braised spicy chicken burritos, with fried rice and beans.
• Beer-braised breakfast beans on toast.