FITNESS ARTICLES

When a male walks in front of the barbecue, he is so proud that you would think that he has just invented fire, not that he is thinking of grilling some hunks of meat. But this is the wonderful thing about the barbecue: the technique is healthy, the food is sublime, and the praises are directly proportional with the coal’s heat. Maybe that is why each country has its own methods to take precious food out of the embers.

From the hot salsa of the South America to the smoked meats of the Middle East, our culinary tour is a delicious proof that nothing is better (and easier) than a barbecue session.

Grilled shrimps with parsley
Time: 20 minutes. 4 portions are obtained from these ingredients.

The easies element to prepare on the grill is the shrimp. Shrimp can be prepared easier then sausages. Shrimps do not contain any grease, so they never get burnt and they turn into a deep pink when they are ready (after approximately 5 minutes). Even if you forget them on the grill for too long, they will taste equally good. You can leave their skin on, or if you want to be polite to your guests, you can take it off before putting them on the grill. Don’t try to clean their veins as well, as you will lose some precious time.

Ingredients:

• 1 kilo of shrimps, with or without Salsa skin
• 1 mug of fresh hashed parsley leaves
• 2 cloves of peeled and crashed garlic
• 1 chili without tail and seeds, hashed
• 1/4 mug of olive oil (or corn or canola oil)
• Fresh lemon juice, salt and pepper

Cooking instructions:
Prepare the salsa sauce with parsley. Start the fire (and make sure that the fire isn’t too quick) and put the grill at minimum 10 centimeters away from the heat source.

Grill the shrimps on both sides, until their shells become very hot or until the meat becomes very pink, or even a little brown. It is served immediately with the salsa sauce.

Parsley salsa is a classical sauce of South America.
It is prepared with raw garlic, chili, green lemon and some oil. We like it with a little ginger in the mixture as well, for an extra spice. You must tear the leaves from the parsley stalk and wash them well before putting them in the blender. This sauce works wonderfully on almost any grilled steak – beef, pork, chicken or fish. It is good even on vegetables if you are a vegetarian or if you fast.

Salsa instructions:
Mix the parsley, the garlic, the ginger, the chili and the oil in the blender. Mix everything until you get a smooth piuree, adding the oil that is needed and cleaning the ingredients from the walls of the recipient if this is necessary.

Move the piuree in a bowl, add salt and pepper and thin everything with one or two spoons of lemon. Taste it, add salt and pepper if it needs more and invite everybody to dinner. Or put a lid on the sauce and keep it in the fridge, but not more than for a day. (It is only served at the temperature of the room). You get one mug of sauce.

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Grilled chicken with sesame
Time: 40 minutes plus marinating time, if you want this. 4 portions are obtained from these ingredients.

Korean food is full of flavor. It is like Japanese food with dozens of extra spices. A lot of garlic combined with sesame in large quantities (in various forms as well), and not to forget sugar and soy. Shortly, it is the suitable food for people who like to feel their taste buds dancing wildly.The most suitable example is given by grilled chicken.

Ingredients:

• 2 kilos of chicken meat with no fats
• 1/4 mug of sesame seeds
• 2 spoons of hashed garlic
• 1 spoon of hashed ginger
• 1/4 mug of soy sauce
• 2 spoons of sesame oil
• 2 spoons of sugar
• Salt, pepper
• Hashed mushrooms as garnish

Instructions:
Bake the sesame seeds in a pan with no oil, at a medium flame, shaking the pan until the seeds get colored on each side. Grind half of the seeds until you get a smooth flower and the rest put aside. Stir in a big bowl the sesame powder, the garlic, the ginger, the soy sauce, the oil, the sugar, the salt and pepper with half of mug of water.

Notch each piece of meat deeply, than place them in the marinated above. Leave them there for an hour until you prepare the grill, or even better for a day, turning them from time to time.

Girdle the grill. The fire should not be very big, with the grill placed at 10 cm away from the heat source. Grill the chicken carefully (the marinated sauce can burn easily), starting from the colder areas of the grill and moving it to the center as the sauce leaks from the meat. Turn the meat from one side to another until it gets a nice brown color. The chicken is ready when the meat is hard and elastic when you touch it.

The chicken should be served hot or at the temperature of the room, garnished with mushrooms and with the rest of the sesame seeds.

Moist the flavors
The multifunctional Korean marinated is good on top of anything from chicken to pork, fish, or vegetables. You can let the meat marinate for the night or even for 48 hours as long as it is in the fridge. Or you can put the meat in marinated sauce right before you prepare the grill. Actually, you don’t really need a grill, because an ordinary oven or an electric one is good too.

Some words about the ingredients: you can buy sesame seeds which are already baked or even sesame powder if you have a supermarket near. But baking them doesn’t require more than a couple of minutes, you’ll see!

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