A cut above – various ways to cook the flesh
Choose your meat with the bone still in as the bone will render great flavour and nutrients when cooked slowly
Roasting
Put your meat in a hot oven (200°C) for the first 15 minutes and then lower the temperature to around 150°C for the rest of the cooking process – making sure to baste the meat from time to time.
Slow-roasting
Slow-roasting is basically the same method as roasting, but with the oven at 130-160°C, and for a longer period of time.
This method is very well suited for lamb, pork shoulder and pork belly.
Pot-roasting
You brown your meat in a pot on all sides (this helps keep the juices inside the meat) and then put the pot with the meat in the oven to roast and add a liquid like stock halfway through the cooking process.
Pan-roasting
Pan-roasting is tender cuts of meat that are too thick to simply fry like a steak.
You brown the meat on all sides in a pan and then put it in the oven for the rest of the cooking process.
Frying/stir-frying
The two methods are probably the most used methods and are well suited for all kinds of tender cuts of meat like chicken breasts, steaks, chops, ribs and tenderloins.
For frying, you heat up a pan to a medium-high heat and then put some kind of healthy fat (coconut oil, ghee or other animal saturated fat that won’t burn), and cook the meat while turning every now and then until cooked through.
For stir-frying, you cut your tender piece of meat in thin slices and put them in a sizzling hot wok, and then stir nonstop until your meat is cooked.
Grilling /Braaiing
Simply sear your meat on the hot part of the braai and then let the rest of the cooking process happen on a mediumhot part of the braai.
Make sure your piece of meat is well browned before turning so it doesn’t stick.
Poaching
A good way to cook tender meat like fish and chicken is poaching, as it will also produce a delicious stock that can be used for the sauce that will go with the final dish.
You can poach whole chickens and whole fish, but always have a tight lid that will cook even the parts that are outside the liquid with the steam it produces.
Keep the temperatures low and make sure that the liquid is no more than simmering.