Blenders at the ready

  I got a very exciting communique from my South Africa connection this afternoon. He's one of the two wheeled fraternity and being from SA he knows a thing or two about BBQs. He got in touch to say he had found a little inspiration in one of my blogs. Imagine my pride.

  With the sunny weather providing a bit of motivation, he planned to put his BBQ skills to good use. It turned out that my simple recipe sounded sensible and he'd stuffed a huge pile of mushrooms with butter and garlic so they could get cooked up too. Fortunately, his BBQ has a lid. Actually, I don't know why I said that. It should be, of course his BBQ has a lid, he knows what he's doing. I had suggested that he would need to cover the mushrooms so the butter would melt and the lid provided the perfect solution.

  If that lot doesn't look tasty then you could be on the wrong planet. I just need to work out how to get myself invited to the next one. Actually I just thought of something that might help, I could offer to provide refreshment to the thirsty masses. As I was a bit parched today I threw a little thirst quencher together which would probably go down well.

  Years ago I landed a gig as a cocktail bartender in Monaco. The only hitch was I'd never made cocktails before. The first cocktail I learned, and probably the most popular drink in the house, was the Daiquiri. They come in many different flavours but they are all basically the same. The basic version is ice, rum and lime with a dash of sugar, all shaken and strained. However, add a bit of fruit and blend and your Daiquiri just got exotic. 

  Today's version was one I'd never tried, pear. For each drink put into a blender a handful of ice cubes, juice of half a lemon, dark rum, a dash of cointreau and a peeled, seeded pear. Blend it until the ice stops clanging about and enjoy in the sun with a portion of freshly BBQ'd whatever you fancy covered with lashings of chimichurri, a sauce of blended garlic, parsley, coriander, olive oil, chilli and wine vinegar. Highly recommended by the SA BBQ master himself.

Kirk out

Chefsebastian.com