Another one?? or maybe the same one again.

Eating fat is now being reconsidered as the main culprit in weight gain, although it can be one of the contributing factors.  I have a friend who recently lost over 30 kg in 3 months by deliberately eating a full fat diet.  Upon his doctors advice, he now eats mainly lamb fat (the curly bit on the end of loin chops) fried chicken skins and gives the meat to his family preferring to eat only the fattiest parts.  He makes special request to his butcher to sell him only the fattiest chops and keep the chicken skins for him.  Just the skin and fat of the chicken.  When cooking chicken dishes he always uses thigh and never breast.  He cut out all carbohydrates and where possible, sugar.

He only eats the fatty meats, dairy, especially cheese, and obviously some vegetables and fruit.  He did not change his exercise routine and actually has physical disability with his back that prevents most physical exercise.  Incidentally he is 6'8" tall and was carrying a fair bit of weight but 30 kg is significant. I know he has continued to lose weight but I'm not sure how much in total now as I haven't seen him in 3 months or so but it would have to be up around 40 kg in 6 months by now.

I don't and never have avoided fat and I am not greatly overweight, and what I do carry can easily be attributed to a few too many cold lagers. Well ok, quite a few.  Of all of my blood tests over many years my cholesterol levels are perfect and have never risen to a level that is even close to a concern.  What is a liver?

Contrary to popular belief, fat is not the enemy. However, not all fats are good and my mate swears right off any oil that may contain GM material.  He uses only olive oil, peanut oil and ghee and never processed vegetable or canola oils.  I'm not as fussy as you can't really deep fry in either O/O or Peanut.

Properly deep fried food should not be oily.  If the oil is the right temperature it will cook / seal the foods outside surface and then the cooking internally is from transferred heat, not oil penetration.  This is why the best fish to cook is not oily fish. Oily fish allows the cooking oil flavours to penetrate and this is never nice.

Les, obviously additional ingredients need to be added to the meat and mixed through adequately. I think the video cook was more so referring to the formation of the meatball and then the compaction of this into the pattie shape.  Too much attention here is the likely cause of the shrinkage.

I remember back to my youth and late nights at the pub, when drinks were over at 10.00 pm. Many patrons would cross over the road to the packed out burger shop, affectionately known as "Greasy Ray's" back then. If memory serves me, Ray's patties were actually large round meatballs and he didn't flatten them till they hit the grill plate and he adeptly spread them out using 2 large spatulas.  His charming wife, Lizzy was not to be crossed and she kept control of the often near riotous crowd by simply threatening to deny food to trouble makers.  This usually, but not always, worked.

Since watching that video and for uniformity of shape I use a double egg ring and simply push the meat in, run a knife around it to remove the ring and that's it.

Some tikka paste, fresh coriander, mix powder, salt and a mix of fresh garlic, green chillies, carrot.
I get this from the same Asian store where I get the chicken.
The garlic, chilli and carrot mix has gone through a fine mincing  process (that sounds wrong) and kept in the fridge for a few hours. During this time a lot of water collects in the bottom of the bowl. The butcher then uses a slotted spoon and drains it before adding some to a plastic bag.
I use about 4 tablespoons of this mix to a kilo of minced chicken.

Simple but delicious.
Cheers
Mick

So is it the carrot / chilli / garlic mix you get from the butcher? or more than that?  Do you have any idea of the ratios?  I've just made a batch but had to guess at quantity.  (1 x medium carrot, 1 x 4" chilli and 3 garlic cloves, all finely grated)

Approximately how much paste and mix powder do you use / kg of chicken mince ?  I won't use much coriander anyway.

Think I'll put some finely sliced shallot / green onion in as well though.

I started straight away. They just look so good.

I've found a place where I can obtain these pastes here in Oz by mail order.  I'm just wondering if anybody has any experience with using them.

http://www.bolstsindiancondiments.com/curry-paste.html