Very Lazy Jamaican Jerk Paste Review

Posted on August 1, 2012 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

We are great fans of Jamaican Jerk Chicken in our house, it is one of my husbands favourite meals. I was very pleased to learn that there is now a new Very Lazy product, Very Lazy Jamaican Jerk Paste. Very Lazy make a great range of cooking concentrates, rubs, pastes and chopped ingredients which aim to save you time in the kitchen and make your life easier. I have reviewed some of their products before and was very pleased with them. I always have some very lazy garlic in the fridge, it is so much handier than messing around with garlic cloves. I wondered if the Very Lazy Jamaican Jerk Paste would live up to my expectations.

I have a recipe for Jamaican Jerk Chicken which works very well and uses a mixture of jerk seasoning, lemon juice and olive oil. I am not entirely sure what spices make up jerk seasoning and I was interested to read that this paste blends Habenero chilli, brown sugar and all spice. I should have guessed that chilli was a main part of the ingredients as normally the seasoning is very hot.

I spread the paste onto the chicken breasts. I found the the paste spread easily but it was a bit difficult to get it to cover the chicken evenly.

The tube was just enough to cover both sides of three chicken breasts with a reasonably generous layer of Very Lazy Jamaican Jerk Paste. I placed the chicken under the grill and grilled them until they were cooked though, turning them regularly. This is what they looked like when they were cooked, served with savoury rice.

As you can see it looks good and smelt good as well. Taste wise it was nice but it was not as spicy as the Jamaican Jerk Chicken I usually make. This has a very subtle chilli flavour but the brown sugar works well giving it an almost smoky taste. I did like it but I would have preferred a little bit more fire and bite. This is a personal preference however, I always add a little bit extra jerk seasoning to make it more spicy.

Very Lazy Jamaican Jerk Paste gets full marks for ease of use though. If you want to make a meal in a hurry this is ideal to have in your cupboard. You just need to paste it on and grill, no messing about making marinades. Its a great addition to the Very Lazy range.

You will find Very Lazy Pastes in Tesco and can find more information on the website: http://www.verylazy.com/

Very Lazy Caribbean Chicken Cooking Sauce

Posted on August 17, 2011 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

I was recently sent a jar of Very Lazy Caribbean Chicken Cooking Sauce to try out. Anything that makes life easy in the kitchen gets my vote, when rushing around working all day and looking after the family anything that helps me be lazy is great. This is described as a mango, pineapple and chilli cooking concentrate.

Inside the outer wrapper is a small jar that contains the concentrate, all you need to add is some chicken, pineapple chunks in juice and some coconut milk. Apparently it is quite hard to obtain coconut milk in the supermarkets these days, but luckily I had a can in my cupboard.

This is what it looked like in the jar, its a rather brownish coloured paste. I got started, first I had to heat the oil in a frying pan and then I added chicken which I cooked for 2-3 minutes. I also added some onions, even though the recipe on the inside of the label did not specify this, because I like them. Once the chicken looked cooked I added the jar of Very Lazy Sauce and cooked it for a further two minutes until it was well stirred though.

At this stage I added the pineapple chunks in juice and half a can of coconut milk, brought it to a simmer and cooked for 10 minutes until the chicken was tender. All in all it took about five minutes to prepare, which consisted of chopping the chicken and onions and opening a couple of cans. Cooking time was around 15 minutes.

I served it with savoury rice

I have to say it was a very quick and tasty meal. The sauce is a little spicy, so if you are not keen on spicy food then you will probably not like this. Having said that it it not too spicy and has a definite fruity background taste which is rather nice. I liked it but my husband found it a little spicy for him, which is unusual as he usually likes very hot food. My son however loved it and totally cleared his plate.

This is a great meal if you want to add a little spice to your life and need a quick meal to cook at home.

RRP £1.99

For more information see: http://www.verylazy.com/

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Very Lazy Creamy Chicken

Posted on April 3, 2011 by Dragons and Fairy Dust

I have been a fan of very lazy food for a while. Anything that makes life easy when you work and look after a family gets my vote! I usually have a pot of their very lazy garlic and ginger in my fridge as its so much easier than having the fresh products. I normally find fresh garlic has started to grow before I get round to using it all!

I was delighted to find out that you can now get Very Lazy Cooking Concentrates as well. These are little jars that provide the basic cooking sauce for the recipe but you can then add liquid to change the taste as you wish. If you want simple you can follow the shopping list on the packet which tells you which liquid to buy. Alternatively you can just add the liquid you wish, wine, stock, whatever, your imagination is the limit.

I tried the Very Lazy Creamy chicken. As you can see from the picture it is a small glass jar with a label wrapped round it. The label told me to get 500g of chicken breast and 150ml of double cream to make the recipe. You need to check the label while you are in the supermarket to make sure you have everything you need.

When you remove the label to get the jar out you find that the recipe is inside. It is a very simple recipe, in this case there were three steps. These consisted of stir fry the chicken for five minutes, add the lazy concentrate and cook for two minutes then finally add water and cream and simmer for 15 minutes. As well as being very simple it is also very quick. The recipe also provides a serving suggestion which in this case was to server with rice and mangetout.

These two pictures show what it looked like while cooking after I added the cream and how it looked on the plate. I have to say that it was a nice simple meal to make and it tasted nice as well. I did notice a slight vinegary aftertaste and I think if I made this again I would add a little more cream. It did not put me off buying it again and I will definitely be trying other products in this range.

There are a number of different cooking concentrates available so there should be one to suit every taste. These are Very Lazy Beef Bourguignon, Very Lazy Carribean Chicken, Very Lazy Chilli Con Carne, Very Lazy Coq Au Vin, Very Lazy Thai Green Curry, Very Lazy Posh Sausage Casserole, Very Lazy Stroganoff and of course the Very Lazy Creamy Chicken. A good product to have in the store cupboard for those emergency meals!