BELLE'S FINGER-LICKING MEATBALLS

Spaghetti and meatballs sauce

Spaghetti could be prepared in so many ways. Whichever way I prepare it, my son loves it and eats very impressively. This recipe is very easy to prepare but could time consuming. Really, the end result is what matters. So, here we go!

Ingredients

Egg

Minced meat

Fresh or dry thyme

Knorr cubes

Tomatoes

Onions

Ginger

Garlic granules

Pepper

Salt

Sunflower or vegetable oil

Spring onions

Preparations:

For the tomatoes:

Blend the tomatoes, onions and pepper together

Pour the mix in a pot and boil till there is no water {while the tomatoes is boiling, start prepping the minced meat}

Add few fresh thyme for flavour

Slice in onions and pour in ½ cup of sunflower oil

Cook for about 5 minutes until the tomatoes sauce is completely dried

Turn the gas on low heat

 

For the minced meat:

In a bowl, put in the minced meat 

Add a cube of Knorr, thyme, garlic, ginger, an egg, onions, spring onions and pinch of salt. **use grater for the ginger and onions***

Mix everything together with your hands

In a frying pot, put in a tablespoon of sunflower oil

Allow heating and then start rolling the mince into balls

Fry in the pan until browned.

Put in a plate and set aside.

In the tomatoes pot, add a knorr cube, curry, salt and taste

Add ½cup of water and put in the meatballs

Cover the pot and allow boiling for about 5 minutes

Reduce the gas heat but not to the lowest

Allow cooking for another 10 minutes so the sauce simmers into the meatballs.

After 10 minutes, turn off the light.

**Please note, the amount of water used depends on how thick or watery you want your sauce**

Cook your spaghetti and serve as you desire.

 

 

GRILLED MACKEREL + BEANS

GRILLED FISH AND BEANS

This recipe is very attractive, tasty and easy to prepare. This is the best option for those lazy days.

INGREDIENTS

 

Mackerel fish (very healthy)

Sweet corn

Kidney beans

Butter beans

Tomatoes

Pepper

Onions

Fresh Garlic

Garlic granules

Fresh thyme

Knorr cube

Salt

Sunflower oil

A teaspoon of lemon

PREPARATION

FOR THE MACKEREL

• Properly clean the fish, taking all the internal organs
• Pat dry the skin with kitchen towel/paper
• Sprinkle pinch of salt all over the fish
• In a small bowl, pour in a tablespoon of sunflower oil, add ½ Knorr cube and garlic granules – turn properly with your finger
• Make 3 incisions as seen on the photo
• Rob the mix over the fish both on the inside and sprinkle the lemon on the fish
• Put into the oven, set gas on 200 degrees
• Grill for 25 minutes or to your satisfaction

FOR THE BEANS

Drain the water from the beans and corn; set aside

Cut the tomatoes into chunks and deseed them

Roughly cut the onions and garlic

In a pot, pour in 2 tablespoons and allow heating

Add the onions, garlic, pepper, fresh thyme; fry for a minute then add the tomatoes and half remaining knorr

Fry for approximately 5 minutes

Add the beans and corn; cook for 3 mins and on low gas heat for another 3 mins

Turn off the gas light and serve

AMAZING COUSCOUS!

couscous salad with pan-fried chicken

Often times we don’t know what to do with the leftover vegetables. I was about to throw the ones I had in my fridge and I remembered I had this small couscous remaining. I thought ok, let me make a couscous salad and see how it goes, to my greatest surprised, it turned out faultless. So here is a perfect way to put those veg in the stomach rather than throw ‘em away.

COUSCOUS SALAD WITH CHICKEN

THINGS NEEDED

Chicken fillets

1 cup of Couscous

Sugar snap

Green, yellow and red paprika (halve of each)

Peas

2 Knorr cubes

Curry

Thyme

Garlic

Carrots

Sunflower oil/vegetable oil

Onions

Spring onions

Olive oil

4 mushrooms

Prawns

1/2 lemon

Method

For the chicken:

Spice the chicken with 1 Knorr cube, garlic, thyme, lemon juice and 1 teaspoon of sunflower oil

Massage the seasons into the fillets

Cover with a cling film and put into the fridge and crack on with the veg preps.

seasoned chicken ready to go in the fridge 

**Once the vegetables are cut and ready to be fried, bring out the chicken from the fridge and pan fry them**

For couscous

 

Bring water to boiling

In a bowl, put in a cup of couscous

Pour in the water just a little

Add a pinch of salt, a tablespoon of olive oil

Cover with cling film

Leave for about 10 minutes

Then use a fork and scrape it up

Set aside

couscous soaked in boiled water

couscous covered with cling film

For the vegetable

1/2 lemon, peas, green and red paprika, carrot, spring onions and sugar snaps

Mushrooms

Prawns

Cut the vegetables into strings except the sugar snaps

Cut the mushroom into thin slices

In a frying pan, pour in a teaspoon of sunflower oil

Allow heating up, put in the mushroom, prawns and ½ Knorr, stir-fry for about 2 minutes

Add the onions, spring onions and the carrots

Stir-fry for another minute

Then add the rest of the vegetables with a tablespoon of curry and fry for another 2 minutes

Finally, add the couscous. Stir and taste for salt.

Turn off the gas.

Serve with the pan-fried chicken and hot pepper (optional).

BELLA RICE

There are various ways to prepare rice dishes. My siblings and I invented these recipes I would be sharing today. I don’t know if you ever tried this growing up, those days when parents go out for a very long time and the naughty one decide to cook something quick and easy for themselves – most often is rice, with palm oil, since vegetable oil was precious and always invisibly marked by Mama... This is something children do sometimes without authorization. Done in a hurry, fewer ingredients used but tastes exceptionally good. The feeling of this taste was recorded in my salivary gland. So I thought I should give my family a treat of something I discovered in infancy and my husband loved it. So here we go…

BELLA RICE

INGREDIENTS

2 cups of long grain Rice

Palm oil

Dry fish

2 tablespoons Vegetable oil

2 bulbs of Onions

Tomatoes

3 Knorr cubes

Meat - Beef

Pepper

Salt

Spinach

Curry

Thyme

METHOD

MEAT:

• Put the meats in a pot, season with curry, thyme, 2 Knorr cubes, pinch of salt and cut in ½onion.
• Cook until done, and then fry.
• Set aside for serving
• Leave the meat stock in the pot for later
• Wash the dry fish with warm water and salt. Set aside

Dry fish

fried meat

RICE:

• Blend the tomatoes, pepper and ½ onion together
• Pour the mix into a pot, put on the gas heat and allow cooking until there is no water left
• Add into the pot about ½cup of palm oil {depending on the quantity of the tomatoes}, 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and slice in ½ onion
• Add a cube of Knorr, the washed dry fish and allow cooking for about 12 minutes
• Add water about 1200 mls and the meat stock {you can add more water or less depending on the quantity of rice}
• Taste for salt if satisfied, if not add pinch of salt then cover the pot and allow boiling.
• After 2 minutes, add the rice; allow boiling for another 2 minutes {water level should be a little above the rice level}
• Turn the gas heat to the lowest, cover the pot and allow the rice to soak up the water
• Slice in the remaining onions after 5 mins
• In the next 5 minutes, stir the rice so it cooks evenly
• Once all the water is soaked up and the rice is done, turn off the gas
• Serve on a bed of spinach with meat.  

Bella rice served!

i hope you try this one day.

** More rice recipes in due course**

thanks for coming around.

Comments appreciated!

Cheers

Belle

PLANTAIN PORRIDGE - The alternative

Unripe plantain porridge I would say is one of my favorites. I craved for it, so I decided I was going to prepare them. I went to the market to buy but it was nowhere to be found, chei. I was so bent on eating it that day, but trust me I had to improvise. I ended up buying yam, ripped plantain and white potatoes. So here is the alternative to unripe plantain porridge.

Ingredients

Yam – skin peeled     

Ripped plantain

Irish/white potatoes

1 Knorr cube {depends on the quantity one is cooking}

Baby spinach

Crayfish

Dried fish

Pepper

Water

Onions

Salt

Red oil

 

Method

• Peel the skins and cut into small cubes
• In a pot, put in the cubed yam, potatoes and plantain {the potatoes help thicken the food and the plantain sweetens it}
• Add water {not much water, just a little below the yam level}
• Turn on the gas and cover the pot with its lid
• Blend the onions, pepper and crayfish together with little water; pour the blended mix into the pot
• Wash the dry fish with salt, remove the bones and then add into the pot
• Add a cube of Knorr and pinch of salt
• Pour in the red oil about 120mls or more depending on the quantity of the yam
• Then finally cut in the onions
• Allow cooking for about 10 mins
• Check if the yam cooked by piercing through with a knife
• Once done, constantly turn to porridge {this helps to kind of mash the potatoes thereby thickening the porridge}
• Allow cooking for a minute, then turn…
• Once you are satisfy with the thickness, turn off the gas
• Add the spinach
• And serve.

Yam porridge can be boring, this is just the best way to prepare and sweeten it a little bit. **smiles**

Thanks for visiting!

Be safe and stay blessed.

Belle

EASY BREEZY

God bless the person that invented wraps. I must say Ace is a pro when it comes to making wraps. He does them for me, to take to school for lunch. Most times I end up sharing with friends and they’ve been disturbing me for the recipe. But this morning, I made a different one from what he does * I will still blog his own recipe anyway*.

MACKEREL FILLET WRAP WITH VEGETABLES

INGREDIENTS NEEDED:

Wraps
Red and yellow paprika cored and sliced
2 tins of Mackerel fillets
Sunflower oil/vegetable oil/olive oil
Spring onions
1 tomato sliced
Young leaf salad
Mayonnaise

METHOD:

• In a frying pan, pour a teaspoon of oil and heat up
• Add the spring onion and the peppers
• Stir-fry for 2 mins
• Drain the oil in the mackerel and then add in the veg
• Fry for another 2 mins so the fillets heats up
• Set aside
• In a clean frying pan, put in the wraps and warm them (can be done in the microwave too for some seconds)
• Once warm, remove and place on a clean chopping board
• Place the leaves on the wrap, the sliced tomato and then the fried mixture.
• Top up with the mayonnaise, wrap and Serve.

Easy breezy beautiful!

Happy Sunday y’all

God bless

Belle