Food

I like food.

Scratch that, I LOVE food. I’m a food junkie. Potatoes are my food of choice but they have not been kind to me. Fries are evil but yet so tasty! As you may have seen from a few posts ago, I’m trying to acquaint myself with exercise.  It’s been going well. I lost a few kilos… wait, losing implies that it is unfortunate that I no longer have those kilos. You know, say you lost your keys, that would be an unfortunate incident. If you lost your mind that will be really unfortunate. So let’s not say I lost some kilos. I shed them. I got rid of them. But this post isn’t about weight.

This post is about Beef Wraps

It’s Friday evening. My friends and I are hanging out at my house discussing apps and how to make and market them because that’s what we do. We’re geeks. Some of us are drinking whiskey (and by “some of us” I mean everyone but me because I quit alcohol) and spewing forth ideas about everything. We note these ideas down. Or did we? I don’t remember. The “business meeting” ends and the “gamers’ arena” opens. Games are brought forth. People race, people fight, people are hunted down by zombies and they also fight in wars. Puns are thrown around. We make fun of each other but I’m mostly the target this time and because I’m not drinking my comebacks are few and far apart. Damn you, alcohol.

But it’s getting late and the guys are hungry. As the host of this shin-dig, I’m the one responsible for feeding them. Luckily, like the responsible person that I am, I had bought some steak. The plan is to make Ugali-beef, but our resident ugali guru is quite inebriated so that isn’t going to happen. So I think to myself, “Beef wraps.” They’re so easy to make and quite filling. Off to the kitchen, I go.

Twenty or so minutes later, the people are losing their shit over the food like I made it with magic. Perhaps it was the whiskey talking, but I shall take praise where I find it.

I was asked to share the recipe and here we are.

Disclaimer: I have not studied the culinary arts and so do not expect some fine dining lingo here. This is a layman recipe written for laypeople.

 Beef wrap Recipe

Makes 4 wraps. Modify as needed.
Ingredients

1. Half a kilo of beef steak
2. 3 cloves of garlic
3. One medium to large onion
4. 3 medium sized tomatoes or 2 large ones.
5. One bell pepper (capsicum)
6. Some coriander
7. Vinegar or lemon juice
8. Salt
9. Assorted spices ( I used cayenne pepper, rosemary, Royco)
10. 2 tablespoons of oil
11. One egg
12. A cup of wheat flour

For the beef

Chop the beef into small cubes. Place the cubes in a mixing bowl or sufuria. Add a dash of salt and your assorted spices. Mix in well with your hands and leave for 30 to 40 Minutes.
Chop your onion and grate your garlic.

Put your beef in a hot sufuria or pan.  Stir, making sure that the meat is cooking evenly. Do this until the beef is dry. Take out a piece and test to see if properly cooked in the middle.
Add your oil and stir-fry for a few minutes before adding your onion. Once the onion is translucent add the garlic.
Take the beef off your stove top.

For the Kachumbari

Chop your tomatoes, bell pepper and coriander into small pieces. Add salt and vinegar or lemon juice to taste.

For the wrap

Mix your cup of flour with the egg and some water until you achieve a pancake batter consistency. Do this by hand or in a blender.

Place a nonstick pan on the stove. When hot, pour in your batter until it just covers the bottom of the pan to form a crepe (thin pancake).

Do not add oil.

Cook the crepe on both sides.

Remove from heat and repeat for the rest of the batter.

Bringing it together

Take a knife and cut the crepe once from the center. (One radius)

Take one of the cut ends and wrap it onto the rest of the pancake to make a cone.

Hold your cone from the bottom and open it up.

Fill it with some beef and top it with your kachumbari.

It is ready to serve.