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Slimming down the bill way

I have a friend who swears by Bill Granger's recipes when trying to lose weight. Not all of them are waistline-friendly, particularly not his cakes, but only my naivety would have me believe that anyway.
I recently caught Bill on my food channel, and I had a good browse in the three books by him that I own, and boy, do I wish I could live like he does : in the sun, near the beach, in his not-too-beige, not-too-bright décor without the crazy lady upstairs (and by that I really mean my neighbour). The kids never seem to make a fuss and there's time for friends...what friends anyway?

Ahhh, but then I'd have to live in Sydney... I'd so miss the rain and the never-ending autumn that begins in August and ends in June......................................................................not! Ha ha!

But back to the topic, yes he has a light hand when it comes to butter and oil, and he is into fresh flavours - lime, coriander, mint, chilli... his portions seem human-sized (as oppose to Nigella perhaps) so it may just be that cooking the Bill way will lighten up your plate, if you tape the sweets chapter together that is!

This Japan-influenced dish is quick to make and nearly fat-free, and you get the goodness of spinach leaves. Bill says it saw him through his first harsh Japanese winter...it's also great if you ended up buying a litre of mirin thanks to Nigella express and are at a loss to use it up.




Soy and mirin-simmered beef on rice
Serves four but easily halved-adapted from Holiday

150ml white wine
100ml soy sauce
100ml mirin
2cm piece of ginger, peeled and finely sliced
three tbsp sugar (I omitted it, I hate too much sweetness in my savoury food)
1 white onion, finely sliced
500g rump steak, finely sliced

Put the liquids, the sugar and ginger along with 100ml water in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Simmer for 2 mins.
Add the onion and simmer for about 5 mins until soft.
Add the beef and simmer for another couple of minutes or until cooked through.

Serve over plain rice and a handful of spinach leaves, with Japanese pickles if you have some (ginger).

And while I was on an Australian vibe, I found this special salt mix in the local Belgian supermarket, you can't see it on the photo, but it is slightly greenish blue and tastes, mmm, salty?
Stay tuned, for next time, we'll be slimming down the French way...

Comments

Paola said…
Hi Julie,

One of my Japanse cooking students gave me a cookbook recently with a recipe that caught my eye- gyudon. Looks very much like this and it called for 125ml of soy sauce which I found to be WAY to much! Haven't tried it yet but she assured me the end result wouldn't be that salty. This recipe calls for 100ml. Was the result very salty??

I was actually planning on giving it a go this weekend!

paola
julie said…
Paola, it wasn't too salty. I did halve the quantities, but the end result was quite balanced.
Have a nice weekend!
Sarah said…
Mmm... mirin!! Heaps of things you can do with that, Julie! :)

Heaps of Japanese recipes use mirin. Do you like Japanese noodle soups? To make them taste properly Japanese, you need dashi broth, soy sauce and mirin. And then you can put noodles, fish, meat, veggies, whatever in it. Very low fat too!

xox Sarah
Glossy said…
Looks delicious. I've no idea what Mirin is though, I'll have a search for it down at the shops.
I love Bill's recipes. I did the lamb shanks from Holiday last night, they were delicious. I'll definitely be repeating them.
Anna said…
Julie, that dish looks gorgeous! Truly.
xx
That looks really yummy Julie.

George xx

PS Sorry I've not commented here much recently, I really ought to catch up with blogs more.
Sandy said…
Julie, I love flipping through Bill's book also (I only have one). His recipes seem so simple and flavourful. What a way to watch what you're eating.

This dish looks delicious. And yay, I need to use up soem of that mirin.
vonsachsen said…
He-he, Julie, taping together the sweets chapter!! Good idea, but I could never bring up the effort it would take :D
I have only one Bill book...ummm...have to look...Bill´s Open Kitchen, but I only made one recipe and I wasn´t too thrilled... thanks for the inspiration, seeing your dish I think I might try some of his recipes again.

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