easy chicken wings

One of the boys' favourite meals is chicken wings. Super delicious, I remember Mum making them from the Woman's Weekly Chinese Cookbook. The first time, I think was for 'Entertaining'. You know the sort of thing - they were done in a very posh way, too. All the flesh was pushed down to one end to make clean bone-handles to eat from!

These is my 'throw-it-all-together' version. Key ingredients are soy sauce, honey and garlic. In various meals, I have included any or all of these things too : fish sauce, sweet chilli sauce (this could be used alone! yum.), tomato sauce, brown sugar, grated ginger, Chinese or ordinary vinegar.

Take the wings from their tray and split into portions - I do this with my big kitchen knife and chop straight through the bones - leaving me with one mini-drum and a second boney bit. The third wing tip is just skin really so I ditch it. The kind butcher at Asda had already taken that bit away.

Put your marinade in a bowl - whatever combo you fancy. Toss in wing bits and mix well before marinading for a couple of hours or overnight. Cook for around 45 mins 175 degrees. Keep an eye on the wings and if they are burning on top, cover with foil - the sugar/ honey will colour too quickly if the oven is too hot.

Freddie's friend came over for tea... and here they are demolishing the bowl full. (You can see my sewing projects piled up at the end of the table! Ha. Waiting for that spare 20 minutes... and I don't think Harry is picking his nose??!!)

kebabs for the boys

The boys always love any sort of hamburger, and this time I borrowed Delia's Shami Kebab recipe for inspiration. I actually had a bit of get-up-and-go beofre dinner, enough to throw this together. (Usually I am so uninspired! Please don't think this is an everyday thing in our house.)

I was supposed to include 1 drained tin of lentils... but I didn't have them ... just 8 tins of red kidney beans, for some reason.

Anyway, I used

400 g minced lamb

1 red onion, chopped finely

1 generous tblsp curry powder

1 tsp each crushed cumin, coriander seeds, salt, fresh ground pepper

(should have added egg. none of those, either!)

Mix up well, mold into small patties and place in a frying pan with 2 tbsp hot oil.

We have a huge frying pan, bought cheaply from Nisbetts, a catering company, and I was able to do the whole lot in one batch.

Cook until well done and then drain on paper towel.

The boys enjoyed theirs with hummous, lettuce and cucumber. I snuck a couple with tzatziki. And toasted wholemeal pitta bread.