Bad behaviour and a Moroccan affair (pea puree with a twist)

There's nothing quite like waking up in the morning and everything is peaceful and calm in the comfort of your bed and then BAM, it hits you. Whatever you thought was a good idea at the time the previous evening comes flooding back to you and all you want to do is rewind to the part when you just opened your eyes to a Friday morning and everything was ok. Mistake number 1) do not accept tequilas offered to you before a meal and mistake number 2) eat the bread that the waitress put on the table. Lastly, 3) realise that 3 sardines and a bit of salad is not going to absorb that tequila you had so you may as well kiss your good judgement and sobriety goodbye.

It was a hard week this week, much pressure from work and previously mentioned 'wall' so I did not hold back when it came to drinks offered on Thursday night and my deadline-packed Friday did not allow me the luxury of indulging my hangover and every time I thought about popping to the pharmacy across the road for some industrial strength painkillers, something came up. I pushed through.

Friday night came and went with the girls and I taking a couple of creatives out for dinner who were up from Cape Town to shoot an ad and they went out after for a night of debauchery. I bailed, climbed on top of my bed in my stilettos and fully glammed regalia and I woke up this morning fully clothed and in the same position. I need a holiday. I have buggered up arrangements, forgot about dinner invitations and cancelled dinner invitations this weekend to just catch my breath. So here I sit on a Saturday night in the same spot I am in day in and day out with a full day of work to look forward to tomorrow.

I'm having a full-blown dinner party on the 20th and have gone through the recesses of my brain as to what I am going to cook. I can't tell you how excited I am. I can spend the entire day cooking without worrying about work and really make it a meal to remember. The theme for the evening will be Moroccan and I will be making a lamb tagine, pea puree with a Moroccan twist, apricot and pomegranate raita (not really Moroccan) and a warm bulgar wheat salad. I am going to give you the recipes in stages and have no doubt I will give details about the evening afterwards which will most probably be my last insert for the year. I am really looking forward to it, the guest list is abundant in humour and talent and great conversation.

Below is a recipe for pea puree which is traditionally served with lamb and usually contains mint but as this is taking on a Moroccan flavour, I am going to amend the traditional combination for a more exotic taste. Should you want to go the classic route, substitute all the herbs and spices other than the garlic for plain old mint. Just an FYI - I have not included turmeric in the recipe as I don't want the yellow of the spice to take away from the bright green of the peas.

Moroccan Pea Puree (Serves 6)

500 gram packet of frozen peas
2 gloves of garlic
1/3 teaspoon ground ginger
1/3 teaspoon ground coriander
1 handfull of chopped coriander
2 chicken stock cubes
Salt and pepper to taste
Paprika for garnishing

Method

Bring a pot of water to the boil and add the stock cubes and garlic and peas. Boil for about 4 minutes

Drain the peas and garlic but keep a cup of the stock for blending

Add the ground ginger, ground coriander and fresh coriander to the peas and throw into a blender with some of the leftover stock for easy blending. You do not want soup but rather a puree so watch how much stock you add

Remove from the blender and add salt and pepper to taste

Decant into a serving dish

Garnish with a smattering of paprika and some chopped coriander

Sorry, is that my ring I just dropped in your cream? Sage butter sauce for ravioli

Oops. I have managed to squander today away and I REALLY should be working seeing I will be cramming 30 days into 15 during December with shop shutting on the 15th. I have well and truly hit a wall. However, as a fellow PR colleague put it 'you can't be expected to be a machine 365 days a year'. And as I have discovered over 14 years of being in PR, I am just a glorified sales woman and I am over it at the moment.

If I were to be completely honest with you, I have not been cooking all that much of late and have been eating out way too often. This being said, I work on my own ALL day unless I have to pop into a publishing stable, a radio or telly interview and seeing people in the evening and getting out of the house is essential for my sanity and general well-being of my clients and their respective portfolios.

As it has been a couple of weeks since I cooked, I am going to take you back to a rather fun dinner party I went to a few Sundays ago. I will gloss over the fact that I dropped R1000 on a beautiful ring called '3rd time lucky' (I had to have it) on this particular evening as I chatted to the jewelry designer who lived in the cottage and get to the point of the story which is of course, food.

As I arrived, my host called me to the kitchen and said he needed my help. He showed me the fresh butternut and sage ravioli he bought and asked if he should add marinated artichokes, asparagus and pesto to the sauce. Ummmm NO!!!! When it comes to delicate flavours like sage with pasta, my motto is simple: KISS (keep it simple, stupid). He was so proud of his freshly bought pesto, bless him, all decanted and looking hand-made in a clay ramekin that I had to dig deep to tell him it wasn't really the right combination. The only sauce for this pasta that is appropriate and fitting is sage and butter, for which you will find the recipe for below.

And then came dessert. I caught Greg whipping cream for strawberries with 2 forks as I walked into the kitchen and thought it rather curious. In my slightly merry state, I told him his technique was all wrong and I would take over. Mistake. As I motioned to remove my ring to whip, I dropped it right into the middle of the bowl of cream. His face was a picture and I was a laughing hysterical mess on the kitchen floor, needless to say that the cream did not get the intended whipping it needed. I suppose you had to be there to fully appreciate the moment but I have not laughed that hard in a very long time.

So Greg, a little later than it should be, this is the sage butter sauce you should grace all over your butternut ravioli.

Sage and Butter Sauce (perfect marriage for butternut ravioli - serves 4)

3 tablespoons of salted butter
2 good handfuls of roughly chopped sage
1/3 teaspoon nutmeg
Salt to taste

Method

Melt the butter on a medium heat till it sizzles

Add the nutmeg and chopped sage and saute until the sage is slightly brown

Pour over the ravioli and add salt to taste

Serve immediately before butter cools

Finish off with parmesan cheese

Voila - couldn't be more simple

Too hot to handle - Aubergine dip

Where to begin with this one . . . another weekend down and I feel as if I haven't had one. It's the end of the year and my inclination for working weekends and evenings is dissipating somewhat. I also feel just a little resentful that people are starting to knock off work earlier and are having fun. Without me.

Although there was much work in terms of events and releases to be done this weekend, it was not all a wash out (if you don't count my flatmate's / close friend's birthday party being rained out on Sunday). Them's the breaks with Joburg summers, much like the UK, you can plan a pretty picnic but you can't predict the weather - thank you OutKast.

So Friday night began with a rather large birthday dinner at Il Giardino at 44 Stanley. It was pretty epic, I don't think that there were less than 20 people there. Overwhelmed by the numbers, we landed in safe groups around the table as we were given military orders to eat up fast as we were going to go for a drink at one of the girl's houses before going out (unbeknown to the birthday girl there was a stripper arriving at 11). Although I contributed to the antics I had an event on Saturday morning and was unable to attend. C'est la vie, I guess. To be honest, I think I would be terrified!

Following my event on Saturday I attended the Joburg Food Wine Design fair at Hyde Park. It was the first of its kind in Jozy and very much like Cape Town's Biscuit Mill. I must concede that there is a greater variety in Cape Town in terms of fashion and decor design so it was great to see all the offerings on show in my home town. The food left me quite surprised as most of the produce was from Cape Town. We have some real gems in Joburg in terms of artisan cheese-makers, a lot of whom have farms in Muldersdrift and sausage makers and so on. I really wanted to see them there as I am desperate to get stuck into some real local produce but I can ill afford the time to take a drive out anywhere at this point. But to be fair, there was some great South African faire on offer such as oysters, game pates, charcuterie and divine wines. I am sure we will see more Joburg producers there next time. I must just give a shout out to Kath who was the project manager for the show, you did a STERLING job, really. What an achievement, the show was slick and sexy and well managed and you looked serene and gorgeous as if you had just organised a dinner for two. I'm bowled over, really.

The rest of the weekend was spent with some pretty awesome people, some familiar folk and some new folk. However I am totally peopled out now and am trying to use this respite to be productive as 2010 draws to a close.

It's hot and I can't really be bothered with big meals, especially as I am working a lot so I am opting for picky bits and I had an overwhelming craving today for crudités and aubergine dip. It's actually really easy to make, yet I find people are terrified of eggplant. Don't be.

Aubergine Dip (serves 4-ish)

4 aubergines
1 large onion (very finely chopped)
3 garlic cloves (very finely chopped)
2 heaped tablespoons of plain greek yoghurt
1 handful of chopped coriander
1 chopped deseeded chili
2 handfuls of toasted pine nuts (toast on a hot oil-free pan - but watch them, they burn VERY fast)
juice of 1 lemon
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
olive oil
salt and pepper

Method

Place your aubergines whole on a baking tray and bake in an oven of 180 degrees until the skin is soft and wrinkly. Remove and cool

Fry off your onion and garlic until soft and brown in a little olive oil

Once the aubergines have cooled, cut them in half and remove all the fleshy bits and place in a sieve or a colander and drain. It's the excess water that can make an eggplant dish taste a little bitter

Add the aubergine to the onion and garlic on the stove and mix in well

Salt well to taste

Add pepper

Add the yoghurt, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice, chili and pine nuts and mix in well

Remove from the heat and mix in the coriander

Place all ingredients in a food processor and give it a QUICK blitz (you still want some texture in there)

Serve in a dip bowl and garnish with coriander and toasted pine nuts

A great dip for crisps and vegetables . . . over and out. Weekend where are you?

Having it raw and naked - Celeriac coleslaw

As work has pretty much taken over my life and silly season approaches with it's unrelenting alcohol consumption, I thought it best I get a blog in. I realise my recipes have been slim on the net of late.

I drank myself into a stupour on Friday last week thus Saturday's blog didn't metarialise. Whilst everybody seems to be winding down with work, I am picking up momentum at a rate of knots and all I want to do is rearrange my bathroom cupboard and spend my days swooning over antiques and bits for the flat. As this takes time of which I have none, I thought it a spectacularly brilliant idea to get absolutely obliterated instead.

It was a funny kind of night, the kind where you don't think you're getting drunk and so you smash a few more tequilas down your throat and have a fine old boogie. Meanwhile back at the ranch, you come off the dance floor with wet hair and melting make-up and you hit a wall. A mighty hard brick wall. Take a cab home with some people and realise that your wallet is somewhere in the club or with someone in the club. Luckily, 4 tequilas have taken the edge off EVERYTHING, so you don't really worry and are certain that the wallet fairies will put it on your bedside table whilst you sleep the pain away.

My wallet fairy came in the form of a friend of mine. I woke up the next morning only to receive a text message from him saying he had picked it up off the floor in the bar - awesome. He lives in Joburg CBD - not so awesome but we will deal with that later and the GARMIN fairy will attend to that.

Not feeling so fresh, off we went to join some folk for breakfast at the new Parkhurst outdoor food spot. I threw on a strapless all-in-one number and a pair of Havana flip-flops and I think considering my antics the night before I didn't look half bad. We arrive at the market and God help me, my best friend is wearing the identical outfit and the identical sandals - synchronicity indeed. This is probably what prompted me having to lie down (euphemism maybe?) on the bathroom floor in the shop next door, not the copious amounts of alcohol the night before, of course.

The Super outdoor food market in Parkhurst really is quite lovely. Nestled between Georges on 4th and a clothes store (I think) I was still drunk at the time, it is a refreshing, village-like, food market with a very London feel. The astroturf, bright colours and wooden trestle tables make it the perfect breakfast outing on a Saturday. Kate - I had no idea you were part of this venture, it is spectacular!

Offerings include a juice stand which served watermelon and rose juices and orange to name a few (2 of these saved my life) and wonderful breakfast sandwich variants which were served on fresh crusty bread. However protein and carbohydrates seemed way too an advanced food group for me on this particular Saturday morning. Do check it out, their website address is www.thesuper.co.za.

On Saturday night there was more drinking and on Sunday too - this prompted me to accept that I may need an alcohol-free week and somewhat of a detox which would incorporate much raw food. As it's summer, this is really not too hard a task and there are so many great variations of salads, you'd be hard-pressed to eat the same vegetable in a week.

Raw or naked food is best for vitamin and mineral consumption as nutrients are not lost in the cooking process and natural flavourants mean that food needn't be bland or boring. The recipe below is for a coleslaw salad with a difference; no mayo and not your obligatory cabbage and carrot. Although there is a fair amount of chopping and peeling involved, it's deliciously refreshing and perfect for a snack on the go.

A quick note, celeriac is not all that popular in South Africa but you can find it at speciality fruit and vegetable stores. I found it at Dunkeld Fruit and Flower, they never let me down. I will however start asking them to sponsor this blog if I keep mentioning their shop repeatedly.

Celeriac, carrot and fennel coleslaw with a coriander and fennel seed vinaigrette (serves 5)

1 large peeled celeriac
5 large peeled carrots
5 fennel bulbs
1 red onion
a large head of chopped coriander

For the vinaigrette

4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar
juice of 2 lemons
2 teaspoons of wholegrain mustard
1 heaped teaspoon of fennel seeds

Method

Julienne your celeriac, carrots and fennel

Slice your onion into paper thin rounds

Add the coriander

Place all ingredients in a bowl and mix well

Salt well and add pepper to taste

For the vinaigrette:

Much the same, mix all the ingredients together

Throw the vinaigrette over the coleslaw ingredients and mix well. Place the salad in the fridge for an hour or two so the dressing can really marinade the vegetables and take the sting out of the onion.

Eat guilt free and as much as you like.






www.thesuper.co.za

What do you do with tofu? U2 can make coconut and sesame encrusted smoked tofu.

BUT I STILL HAVEN'T FOUND WHAT I'M LOOKING FOR -U2

I frequently get calls and messages from friends (and occasionally family) asking how something should be cooked or a serving suggestion and I find it pretty flattering. People obviously assume I know what I'm doing which most of the time, in the kitchen I have come to realise I do, or else this blog would be an exercise in futility.

Anyhow, a friend of mine called me a few weeks back and asked what he should do with a block of tofu and he must have caught me at a pretty uninspiring time of day as I don't remember reverting with anything groundbreaking, sorry James (Adey). So to make up for my unenthusiastic response, I gave it a bit of thought and came up with a bloody marvelous recipe.

A lot of people don't don't like tofu and I honestly think that is because they have not given it a fair chance. Not only is it really high in protein and low in fat, but it is mouthwateringly delicious if given a bit of culinary TLC and I wanted to do something a bit different with it as apposed to tossing it into a pasta or similar.

You can buy the blocks of tofu from health shops and they are mostly available in smoked or plain forms. I always go for the smoked option as it has a delicious sweet flavour and can be used as it comes in salads or pastas. However, even vegetarians have special occasions to cook for and this recipe turns tofu into something rather special. It has a distinctly oriental feel to it and is sweet and smokey and crunchy all at once. Serve with a salad of julienned carrots and cucumber, chopped spring onion and coriander and you are sorted (the dressing for this salad is a simple one of 1 teaspoon of soya sauce, 1 tablespoon of sweet chili sauce, juice of 2 limes. This dressing is also a great dip for the tofu).

Coconut and Sesame Encrusted Tofu (Serves 2)

1 packet of smoked tofu
1 packet of desiccated coconut
2 tablespoons of sesame seeds
1 carton of creamed coconut (you can use buttermilk as an alternative if you can't find creamed blocks of coconut)
Sesame oil for frying

Method

Melt your creamed coconut with some boiling water but ensure the consistency is gloopy and thick (not watery) as this will act as the binding agent for your sesame seeds and coconut. Pour the thick creamed coconut mixture onto a plate. Or pour the thick buttermilk onto a plate

Mix the desiccated coconut and the sesame seeds together and place on another plate

Make sure you dry the block of tofu off with some kitchen towel before slicing

Slice the smoked tofu into fingers about 2 cm thick

Set a third plate aside for the tofu once coated. Dip the tofu into the creamed coconut / buttermilk mixture and then dip into the sesame seed and desiccated coconut and place on a plate, ready to fry

Heat a pan on a LOW to MEDIUM heat with sesame oil. Now I say Low to medium as sesame oil has a very high burn point so you are going to have to work fast or you will crisp your coconut batter instead of lightly toasting it

Pour in enough oil to cover the pan. You will hear it sizzle within 30 seconds to a minute

Add your tofu fingers and allow for 15- 20 seconds for each side. Turn the tofu to cook the other side and hopefully your coconut will be lightly toasted and a delicious golden brown when turned. Please watch the pan closely as sesame oil is lethal when it is too hot.

Serve with said salad.

PS: To anyone who's reading this (James, Jack, Kesh) Bono does not suck and you are all secretly jealous of me. But it's ok, nobody is perfect and I will invite you for dinner and we will listen to U2 as I tell you how amazing the concert was, you bunch of haters.

Louise's Halloween Beetroot and Aubergine Curry

God created sex. Priests created marriage - Voltaire

So it has been a while again. Much laughter and wine and a few tears since the last post. Laughter with friends and tears for their losses. I am not going to get into it but pull yourself towards yourself cause you don't know what tomorrow may bring, who will be in your life and who will be taken away. But if you are lucky enough to have someone to share your life with you, love them as if each day was your last, respect them and cherish each day you spend with them. End of.

This recipe should have been blogged about ages ago. It was a surprise party on Halloween for Frances who just completed an art installation with a marriage theme and had been away in Europe for 3 months. Louise, by a sheer stroke of genius came up with the theme 'corpse bride' for the evening. And so it began, in a swirl of veils and tule and fabulous blood made with Maizena, food colouring and water, smeared all over our pretty white dresses.

Before the main event which was a bit of a crazy Halloween house party where I was thrown around the dance floor by a rather lovely young man covered in glitter (WHO MAKES JEWELRY - LOVE HIM!!) , we had a dinner cooked by the fast, nifty and capable hands of Louise. I am not sure if she intended for the curry to look red but it certainly fitted the evening. I thought I worked efficiently, this was the fastest put together curry I have ever seen out of a professional kitchen. Now, as with all my recipes, I am going to amend this one cause it is my blog, (sorry Louise, you were however the inspiration). I can't tell you about the rest of the evening because that would be giving away secrets and to be honest, the wine went straight to my head, very, very fast. Must have been a full moon.

Beetroot and Aubergine curry (serves 6)

1 packet of beetroot (6 large beets peeled and chopped)
2 large chopped aubergines
2 chopped onions
2 cloves of garlic
1 chopped chili
2 heaped teaspoons of green curry paste
1 large chopped head of coriander
2 cups of chicken stock (1 cube per cup)
3 tablespoons of chutney
1 teaspoon of coriander seeds
1 teaspoon of mustard seeds
4 cardamon pods
olive oil for frying
salt and paper to taste

Method

Fry off your cardamon pods, coriander and mustards seeds once toasted set aside and crush with a pestle and mortar

In a pot, fry off chopped onion and garlic till brown

Add beetroot and stir in well

Add curry paste, chopped chili, chutney, cardamon, coriander and mustard seeds and stir

Add chopped aubergine and stir

Add chicken stock and stir

Add salt and pepper to taste

Simmer on a low heat with the lid on for 40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes

Once soft, season to taste and serve with chopped coriander and basmati rice.

Keeping it tidy with Thai glass noodle salad and NEVER drinking again

This weekend just passed was EPIC and I mean that to be in capitals. I don't think I have ever spent a weekend with so many different pockets of people, making new friends, laughing, eating and drinking as much as I did in these few days gone. Although now it is all over, I feel a little short on thrills this week.

Let's start with Friday: your best mate's birthday with countless bottles of champagne and no dinner - so far not so good. I did however narrowly manage to avoid the part where they thought it was a good idea to neck champagne and red wine shooters; well done Kesh, you must be so proud. You broke her.

Then came Saturday which was an adventure to say the least, an epic day of eating and drinking all day at "The Big Day of Eating". This was a monumental achievement undertaken by a friend, whereby he prepared breakfast, lunch and dinner for 20 people at his flat and we are talking serious food. Arrival was 9am and unfortunately I missed breakfast but was privy to the masses waxing lyrical. I arrived shortly before lunch and eased into the crowds with a big glass of wine which probably accounted for much of my behaviour for the rest of the day. After lunch which was a pork belly sandwich on ciabatta with homemade roasted red pepper relish, a goats cheese and something bake (shit, I am really sorry I can't remember the rest of the contents of the bake but it was stupendously amazing) and potato wedges, I asked my host if I could go to sleep. And slept I did, with 20 people in the other room in a strange flat. I was then woken up hours later by a kindly stranger telling me that dinner was about to be served.

Dinner was nothing short of perfect; angel hair pasta with prawns in a saffron and tomato sauce and just the right serving size after such a monumental gastronomical day. I was so dazed and confused after my afternoon nap that I left pretty much as the plates were cleared, hardly the life and soul of the party. But what a feat: 60 meals essentially, out of a small kitchen and all dishes single handedly prepared and presented to perfection. Faultless and brave.

And if I had not had enough of food and people by Sunday, I thought it a stroke of genius to host a braai. I was exhausted after the weekend's antics but actually found peace in chopping and preparing the food quietly on my own in the kitchen. After a heavy weekend, I wanted something clean to accompany the meat and chose a glass noodle and mushroom salad. This is probably my favourite meal of all time when served on its own. It is fresh, clean, healthy and fragrant and there are many variations to it, in that you can add prawns, chicken pieces, beef or tofu. Here's how it's done:

INGREDIENTS (serves 4)

250 grams of prawns (cooked and peeled)
2 packets shitake mushrooms
I bunch of spring onions
3 carrots julienned
1/2 a medium cucumber peeled, deseeded and julienned **you can use a carrot peeler to shave slivers of carrot and cucumber if you can't be bothered with the finicky art of julienning vegetables
1 packet of mung bean noodles (glass noodles)
1 lemon grass pod, very finely chopped
1 small head of coriander finely chopped
1 large knob of ginger which has been peeled and finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1 tablespoon of fish sauce
3 tablespoons of sweet chili sauce
juice of 1 lime
1 tablespoon of soya sauce

METHOD

Place your mung bean noodles into a big bowl and cover with boiling water. Let them stand for 7 minutes, drain and place back in the bowl.

Roughly chop your shitake mushrooms and fry them off until soft in a little olive oil. Add them to the noodles and mix them in well.

Chop up your spring onions and mix these in with the noodles and mushrooms.

Halve your cooked and peeled prawns and add these to the noodle mixture. Mix in well.

Add your julienned carrots and cucumbers to the noodles and mix well.

Mix the fish sauce, lime juice, soya sauce and sweet chili sauce in a cup and add the chopped ginger, lemon grass and garlic to the dressing. Throw over the noodles and mix well.

Garnish with chopped coriander and I promise you will never look back. It is a party piece.

I feel the beginnings of a cold and will be hitting the hay. Serves me right.

Winging it with Skate and last minute shoots

It has been a fairly non-eventful week. I have not got myself into any pickles and have successfully managed to avoid any major dramas. That's if you don't count wrapping your car around a pole after dinner on a Tuesday night uneventful, it's all relative. I have wanted to keep it tidy this week as I have a pretty heavy, jam-packed weekend ahead, yet still got lead down the garden path on Tuesday night and last night and I am not entirely sure how it all happened. So tonight I am settling in with a great piece of fish (how many people can say that?) and hoping for a decent night's sleep before an early morning shoot tomorrow. With a client that has never been behind a camera. So much to look forward to.

Now, about this fish; I am lucky enough to live only down the road from a fabulous fishmongers, again in Dunkeld. The centre is a cook's dream. The fruit and veg shop stocks everything, the butchers is top notch and the fishmonger is one of the best in Joburg - you should visit on a Friday as that is when they get their main catch. I was surprised to see that they stock Skate Wing as I have only had this in the UK and probably one of my favourite fish choices, not to mention it is cheap as chips and you get a lot of meat for your money. It is shell-shaped with thick cartilaginous bones so it doesn't leave you spluttering and coughing as you fish out hair-fine bones from the back of your throat (which I find so sexy when on a date).

Traditionally, I have mostly seen Skate done with a nut brown caper butter sauce which does taste great but butter in that quantity doesn't really fly with me, I am not exactly a shining physical example of someone who loves cooking but that's because I do my best to find healthy, tasty alternatives that don't compromise on taste. The best variation I have come up with in my experimentation for Skate wing has been to steam it and then serve it with a soya, ginger, garlic and chili lime dressing. So easy and so tasty.

INGREDIENTS (serves 2)

2 Skate Wings
1 thumbnail of fresh ginger
2 cloves of garlic
1 birds eye chili
4 tablespoons of soya sauce
2 teaspoons of fish sauce
3 tablespoons of boiling water
juice of 2 limes
1 heaped teaspoon of treacle / brown sugar
4 spring onions


METHOD

Steam your skate wings for about 7-10 minutes depending on their size. Once cooked they will take on a white fleshy texture.

Finely chop your garlic, ginger and chili (deseeded for less of a kick) and set aside.

Mix your boiled water with the sugar so as to dissolve it. Add the soya sauce and fish sauce and lime juice to the sugar mixture and mix well.

Add the chopped ginger, garlic and chili to the sauce.

Pour over the steamed fish and garnish with chopped spring onion.

Serve with steamed pak choi

Fragrant, simple, healthy. As Gordon would say: DONE.

Tarts, kittens and neat whiskey

Well, my reclusive period lasted till Sunday afternoon, I fought against the masses but they won. It began at an 'all you can eat' chinese buffet, for the princely sum of R69. Now chinese buffets at the best of times are scary, this one was positively overwhelming. Five heaving tables of glutenous, gelatinous food, I played it safe and stuck to cabbage, bean curd salad and seaweed salad; all these vegetarian delights were positioned dangerously close to the boiled pigs ears which Jack described as "cartilage is miff". And this is where the trouble began, with Jack, Lisa, Rob (whose birthday celebrations brought us together) and my new friend Skippy the lippy Australian who claims he managed Soho House in London. I do believe him but it's a miracle they retained any clientele with Skippy about. (This is payback time, Skippy).

Following our chinese extravaganza we went for a few lazy Sunday afternoon drinks where upon we decided to cook dinner at Lisa and Rob's house. So Jack and company gathered what they could find on a Sunday night at 6pm and off we went to Lisa and Rob's. What a magnificent house and a view of Joburg on top of a mountain to kill for. As we arrive, Lisa says she has a surprise for me. I knew immediately that her cat had just had kittens. On her bed. Four of them. Tiny little things, suckling as mum lay exhausted on a gory mess of sheets. If anyone wants one, please let me know, they are just beautiful.

And so the preparation of dinner began. It was epic and I had nothing to do with this meal. I worked on my laptop at the kitchen table, Jack and Lisa cooked, Rob played some awesome tunes and Skippy played guitar loudly over my favourite songs.

What was scraped together for this impromptu best Sunday night for a long time was: Goats cheese and onion tarts, mascarpone cheese, parmesan, tomato and basil tarts, roasted nectarine salad and a courgette salad, all nimbly prepared by the hands of Jack. We had dessert too, banana and caramel crepes, made by Skippy.

The meal embodied what L'Oeuf is all about. Making something out of nothing, discussing work, music and life over a kitchen table and a tiny stove. Thank you all for a wonderful, wonderful evening.

Jack has made these tomato tarts before at an equally fun weekend away. They are so easy to prepare and a killer party piece. Serve with a simple salad and it is the perfect snack to enjoy with sundowners or any time for that matter. In this case at 9pm on a Sunday night with neat whiskey.

Jack's Tomato Tarts (Serves 6)

INGREDIENTS

6 tomatoes
2 sheets of puff pastry
marscarpone cheese
parmesan cheese
Basil
1 egg
Salt and pepper to taste

METHOD

Preheat your oven to 160 degrees

Blanch your tomatoes in boiling water and then plunge them into ice water after 5 minutes. Peel them, cut them in half, spoon the seeds out and then quarter them. Put these to one side.

Roll out the puff pastry to 3mm thickness and place the puff pastry on a greased baking sheet.

Brush the edges of the puff pastry circles with beaten egg. Press the edges with a fork.

Place the pastry in the oven and cook for about 15 minutes or until pastry is golden and fluffy.

Remove the pastry from the oven once cooked and gently spread over the marscapone cheese.

Arrange your tomatoes on top of the mascarpone and sprinkle parmesan, salt and pepper over the tomatoes.

Switch your grill on and place the pastry under it.

Watch the tart and remove just as the parmesan begins to sizzle.

Remove from oven, tear up basil and sprinkle over the tart.

Cut into pieces, dig in and get dirty.

Spaghetti Bolognese, a hermit's delight

Essentially, I am a Joburg girl through and through. When I moved to London, I ached to the core of my being for the temperate climate (I am big into stable weather patterns after 11 years in Blighty), the sub-tropical vegetation and the village-like familiarity; which right now is my biggest bugbear. At the moment what I crave more than anything is anonymity and wish I could slip out of my flat, throw some crappy clothes on and go for a walk without bumping into anyone I know. Not for any reason other than I am feeling a little claustrophobic and I can't so much as go to a petrol station without seeing someone I know. Perhaps I should change petrol stations, just a thought. Although I say this after going to a random petrol station this morning after the gym (for cigarettes), sweating profusely and naturally, bumped into someone.

The above being said, I remember I went to the dermatologist in London in my pajamas, a coat and a beanie shortly before I came back to South Africa. Anyhow, I had finished my treatment and was all red-faced and looking like a guttersnipe in the reception area as they prepared my bill. Naturally, their systems were down and they asked me to take a seat in one of three chairs in a waiting room the size of a shoebox as they attempted to manually process the payment. So I see there is another body in the chair next to me as I sit down and being naturally curious, I looked up to check out the sardine who was virtually sitting on my lap. To my horror, the sardine was Ewan McGregor.

With my claustrophobia having set in good and proper, I have managed to shun all invitations this weekend other than a quick dinner tonight and a birthday lunch tomorrow. I have spent most of the weekend on my own and if I hadn't had to work, it would have been perfect.

Last night I was exhausted, I got 2 DVD's and ingredients for a Spag Bol and prepared to settle in for the evening. Damn the video store guy to hell though, I managed to take out one of the worst DVD's I have ever seen in my life. I should have known I was in for trouble when every trailer was a rom-com.

Bolognese is the perfect comfort meal and everyone says theirs is best and this is a point I have learnt not to argue, I have come to blows with people debating this. This is how I do mine and I like it.

INGREDIENTS (serves 4)

Extra virgin olive oil for frying
2 onions finely chopped
2 garlic cloves finely chopped
1 bouquet garni (see past post)
4 sticks of celery finely chopped
4 large carrots finely chopped
500 grams of lean beef mince
1 tablespoon of fish sauce
1 heaped tablespoon of sugar (this regulates the acidity of the tomatoes)
2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon of ketchup (yes, ketchup, even some of the world's best restaurants have been known to use it from time to time)
1 small tin of tomato puree
1 tin of plum tomatoes
salt and pepper to taste

METHOD

Preheat your oven to 160 degrees.

Brown your mince in a little olive oil on a medium heat. Once brown and cooked through, set aside in a bowl. Do not salt the mince, it will lose all it's juice and flavour which you want in the sauce.

Fry off your onion till soft, add garlic and then your carrots and celery (this is traditionally called 'trinity'). Fry this off for about 10 minutes or so.

Transfer the onion, garlic, celery and carrots to an oven proof dish and add your browned mince and mix well.

Place the mixture back on the stove and add the tomato puree and mix in well.

Add the tin of plum tomatoes and squish them into the mince to break the tomatoes up and mix well.

Add fish sauce, sugar, balsamic vinegar, sugar and ketchup and again mix this altogether thoroughly.

Add salt and pepper to taste. Make sure the there is the right amount of salt to balance the sweet and sour of the sauce.

Add the bouquet garni.

Place the dish in the preheated oven and cook for 90 minutes but take it out halfway and give it a bit of a stir.

20 minutes before you are ready to take your Bolognese out the oven, get your pasta on the boil and DO NOT overcook it (pasta lesson to follow shortly).

Remove the dish from the oven and let it stand for 10 minutes before serving.

Serve with a generous glass of red wine, on a Friday night, on your own.

Best enjoyed the next day and apparently very healthy for you too, check this out: http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Health/Cancer-Tomatoes-spaghetti-bolognese-antioxidants/Article/200808315083647?chooseNews=videos)

Granny blood cupcakes and pea soup

Rightio then, so this is how my Thursday the 14th of October began; an 8:30 meeting during which the following topics were discussed: deep sea fishing, uranium mines, blood diamonds (no relation to the uranium mines) and Brett Kebble . Is it any wonder I felt a bit de-centred for the rest of the day? I had every intention of cracking on and being productive and seemed to have made a million phone calls but can't really recall getting anything done. Oh, and it will be beyond interesting to see how I am going to cope with the four new clients I have just picked up as I hurtle into end of year burn-out. Anyone who knows of a decent PR person with existing media contacts, a good eye for detail and can write themselves out of a paper bag, please let me know. Have I mentioned my recent bout of insomnia lately? It's just awesome.

So after returning from the twilight zone this afternoon, I get a diatribe posted on my Facebook wall from Jack who had a flash of genius and produced a piece of Facebook literature exclusively for me. It went something like this:

‎"Sammy, at this rate I am going to have to befriend the wolf-pack and spend my Thursday nights wearing skinny jeans, Wayfarers, with a random subversive V-neck t-shirt whilst drinking a Black Label, eating granny blood cupcakes and listening to a highly fashionable indie electro tekno outfit ( which was formed that afternoon at the Agency water cooler ) whose music is made with a gramophone, Speak & Spell and a colander". Now there will be some of you who will have a point of reference for this tirade and the rest of you will just have to appreciate the randomness of the post. Jack, this post will live on forever.

So tonight was catch up on work night. I sent some releases out and wrote some copy as a favour for a friend of mine who is opening a kid's pilates studio - Princess Pilates by Holly Hughes (apply within for further information). So something quick and simple but comforting was on the menu. Firstly cause of the weirdness of my day and secondly because it is a tad grey and mis outside. Pea soup it was.

Let me give you a very quick lesson in peas. When I was in PR in London, I did the PR for a certain brand of frozen peas (I am not giving you the name as my fingers are no longer bleeding from penning PR bullsh*t spin for pennies and my job is done). I did however learn a lot. And this is what I will impart: frozen peas are the peas to use. It takes roughly three hours for the peas to go from field to frozen which means they are fresh as you like when you pluck them out of your retailer's freezer. The longer the peas stand (shelled or unshelled) in a fridge, the blander they will taste. This is because the sugar in peas which makes them so sweet, transforms into starch the moment they are picked from the ground. Please take my word on this, I have been to enough pea fields, pea factories and done enough pea tastings to put me off peas for life. Lesson over. Now for the recipe and as with most of my recipes, it's quick and healthy. And as with all recipes, there are so many variations on this. Pea and mint / pea and ham; again play with your ingredients, this is just what I had to hand tonight.

INGREDIENTS (serves 4)

1 onion chopped
1 clove of garlic
1/2 packet of frozen peas
1 tablespoon of creme fraiche
2 cubes of veggie stock / chicken stock
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 tablespoon of fish sauce
salt and pepper to taste

Method

Fry your chopped onion off until soft
Add garlic and fry this off on a low heat with the onions till soft (FYI: you add the garlic after as there is no taste worse than burnt garlic)
Boil your peas in the stock cubes for 7 minutes maximum (you don't want grey soup)
Drain peas and decant into a bowl *(leave about 4 cups of the stock and add to the bowl of peas)
Add onion and garlic to bowl
Add fish sauce and sugar and mix all ingredients well
Blend the contents of the bowl well
Add salt and pepper to taste
Serve with a dollop of creme fraiche which will melt into the soup

I am now going to try my very best to get some sleep.

The take-away chronicles of a grumpy PR girl

There was as much chance of me cooking tonight as there was of Joburg getting a decent downpour. The idea threatened but it was not going to happen.

PR is not rocket science but there is a skill to it that can't be learnt; you have it or you don't and it makes the difference of an excellent PR officer or a god-awful, shocking one. In essence you have to be a master of manipulation, intuitive, a mind-reader and amenable at all times. Now anyone who knows me well will tell you I am not amenable by nature, so when I have deadlines coming out of my ears, TV interviews after 7pm and a sleep deficit, a day like today leaves me wanting to blow someone's head off. Which generally doesn't fly in my line of work.

In short, after a day of catching plates and using each last vessel of energy I had being 'nice', I could not face cooking. That and the fact that I had to be at ETV at 7:30pm which is generally prep time, I decided to get take-aways. My first port of call for quick and cheap is Kung Fu Kitchen in Parktown North. It does what it says on the tin: quick, fast, inoffensive sushi / Chinese which is what you want from a take-away joint. However, tonight they were engaged and I hadn't the patience to wait till I got through. So I called Ruby Grapefruit in Parkhurst. I have been there enough times to judge their sushi as passable. It's not great, a bit bland but it's close to home and convenient after a few drinks in 'the Hurst'. I placed my order over the phone and it was: 1 miso soup / 1 portion of salmon sashimi / 1 crab maki / 1 Grapetiser. Simple, no? You'd think it was.

I went to pick it up, I brought it home and found I had a portion of fashion sandwiches (who the f%^k thought it was a good idea to bastardise sushi by adding mayonnaise?), my salmon sashimi which was the one thing they got correct (well done guys) and no miso soup and a Coke Light. So I called them up and the waitress said that I had "ordered wrong". I am sorry, WHAT? I ordered wrong? I am not usually short of words but this had me well and truly dumbfounded. I tried in the nicest possible way to explain that I in fact had NOT ordered incorrectly but they had actually taken the order down incorrectly. To which she responded again, that I had ordered wrong. It was at this point, alas, where I 'lost my shit'. I then explained the 'customer is always right' adage. This is where she seemed to have caught herself a wake-up and told me the next time I came they would give me a free miso soup. I told her that there would be no next time. End of.

On a lighter note, for the best sushi in town, get yourself down to Yamoto in Illovo (http://www.yamato.co.za/). They are not cheap but you will be guaranteed top quality sushi and they have an extensive Japanese menu.

I don't know how to end this tonight as I am exhausted and drained of all resources, so I will leave you with the song I had on repeat today which got me through the day. Over and out. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLTPKKt-pMs

PS: I need a PR assistant.
PPS: For a good laugh Google image 'fashion sandwich'

Burn out and raw food - steak tatar

I am done for the year. Like seriously done for the year. Not much time off this year, break ups, moves and builds and work and work and work. I am wanton for motivation, inspiration and at least two days to sleep and potter and renew my license disc and my passport and my ID book. Right now, so far as tasks go, the admin seems monumental. I just want to play now. Play all day long. Surely it has to be December soon?

With all the above in mind, my best friend called me yesterday and said: I just want to tell you something. I am so proud of you. This year, you have been through a shitty break-up, bought a house, built a house and still did well with work and you didn't fall apart. You just did it. And I am so proud of you and you have a beautiful flat now. Thank you Jeana Theron, you are my rock and my mind-reader and now you have a flat too. I love you madly.

But with burn out comes lethargy and laziness, and today was no exception. It could also have something to do with going out to The Bohemian last night, albeit briefly. It was my first time there and certainly a cultural journey into something I can't really put into words. It was good fun though but going out on Sunday nights leaves me anxious and does not make for a zen Monday morning and has left me having to work till 10pm this evening.

It is getting really warm and cooking for one is a bit of a chore on a hot Monday night, but I made a pact with myself when I moved in by myself that I will sit at the table and have a meal in the evenings, even if it is on my own, which I really don't mind to be honest. As an only child, I enjoy my own company just a little too much (but revel in attention when it's offered). I knew I would feel this way tonight so I planned accordingly. I went to my local butchers today (Dunkeld butchers, they are truly the best, especially for biltong) and bought 250 grams of minced prime fillet for steak tatar. Now being raw meat means it is not to everyone's taste and being raw meat means that buying the highest quality, fresh meat is critical.

Typically steak tatar is marinated raw meat in wine or other spirits, spiced to taste, and eaten chilled. It is often served with onions, capers and seasonings (the latter incorporating fresh ground pepper and Worcestershire sauce), sometimes with a raw egg, and often on rye bread. The wine or spirits almost cook the meat but I usually buck this trend and marinate mine in lemon juice instead, the acidity of the lemon juice does the same thing as the alcohol essentially.

Served with a salad and some melba toast, it really is a treat and a healthy if not slightly alternative way of eating red meat. This is how it's done:

Ingredients; (serves 2)

250 grams of prime minced beef
2 tablespoons of chopped capers
2 chopped pickled cucumbers
2 tablespoons of finely chopped red onion
2 tablespoon of finely chopped parsley
1 teaspoon of Tobasco
1 tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce (I misspelt this is a previous blog)
juice of 1 large lemon
1 egg yolk
generous pinch of black pepper
ditto salt

Method:

Mix all ingredients together (love this, as this is all you do)!

Serving suggestion: Melba toast and a rocket salad.

Dancing in the Moonlight and chick pea salad

I remember very early on in Jamie Oliver's telly career when he was a geezer about London Town, cooking for his mates and his band members, there was one particular episode where he had a barbecue (it is a barbecue as it was British television). Anyhow, the episode culminated in his friends talking and relaxing in his garden (this must have been a studio cause nobody in Clerkenwell, London has a fecking garden nor are the evenings ever balmy in the UK unless there is a freak heatwave which kills people and there certainly wasn't one that year). I digress, so there his friends are looking cool and sexy with fairy lights and food and that song by Toploader came on, "Dancing in the Moonlight". And everybody wanted to be them or aspire to be like them. Well, saccharine sweet as it sounds, that was me last night. It was a balmy evening, my friends were in my garden looking cool and sexy and having a damn brilliant time with the promise of brilliant food. I thought about that Jamie Oliver episode as it really did capture the moment perfectly. You can now put your sick bags away.

Firstly a MASSIVE thank you to Patrick who brought me the most amazing braai set that serious braai-ers use (I will get there); I said it last night and I will say it again, you are a rockstar of note. And thank you to the braai master. It did not disappoint despite the moaning and whining that the steak was 'overcooked', it was like butter.

As Kesh said, you know if you are coming to chez Sam, there is always the promise of great food, and last night was no exception (if I do say so myself). Gazpacho for starters, and a host of different salads for mains to accompany the meats and bread. There was a chick pea and roasted pepper salad, a beetroot, sugar snap pea and feta salad and a cous cous, broccoli and marinated tomato salad.

The great thing about salads is that they do not have to be your wilted lettuce, soggy tomato type, there is so much scope for variation and creativity and they can ultimately be made from anything from your store cupboard as one of my salads was last night as I thought I would be a salad short so I had to whip something up in a hurry. And this was what it was:

Chick pea, roasted pepper and feta salad (serves 8)

Ingredients:

2 tins of chick peas
1 tin of roasted peppers (chopped)
large handful of chopped coriander
1 red onion finely chopped
250 grams of feta
1 packet of sugar snap peas
generous pinch of salt to taste

Dressing
2 tablespoons of olive oil
2 tablespoons of soya sauce
4 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar
1 heaped teaspoon of grain mustard
Juice of 1 lemon

Method:

Mix all the ingredients for your dressing

Throw your ingredients in a bowl

Add dressing

The end

Hard nights, helicopters, haute cabriere and healthy Gazpacho

If you don't mind I am going to continue with the morbidity of the last post another time. Today is a beautiful sunny day and I have had the most successful week of my career. I am in my flat which looks beyond beautiful (I say this as I type and look out my window onto my replanted garden) and the afternoon sun is dappled on the grass. It's Friday and all is good with the world.

This week has been a media frenzy, rushing between 702, Classic FM, Financial Mail, SABC and others has rendered me useless today. I managed to catch up with some contacts at SAFM yesterday at The Saxon for breakfast, what an incredible setting, truly. We dined on oysters for breakfast (unlimited) spoke about the perils of being single in your 30's and seafood markets in France. It was truly lovely, needless to say the rest of the day was a bit if a struggle. Oh, by the way, if you find yourself coming across Belon oysters in a restaurant, please, please do yourself a favour and order a half dozen. They are velvety, meaty and huge. I would even go so far as to say that I prefer them to Luderitz oysters.

Now a quick shout out for some restaurants. A journalist contact of mine from the Financial Mail lives in Franschhoek and his brother is the chef patron of a restaurant in the Haute Cabriere valley (http://www.hautecabriere.com/Chef.htmrestaurant) and of another called The Grill Room in Franchhoek (http://www.franschhoek.org.za/eat/view/726). I have been invited to spend the day eating and drinking and flying in helicopters when next I am in the Fairest Cape. Thank you, Greg and I hope you are not critiquing my writing too hard, it is all done off the cuff. Not to mention on a mild hangover today.

Anyhow as summer descends on us at a rapid pace, I thought it only fair and right that I had a braai / BBQ this weekend. I went and bought one today. It so happens I looked at this 'thing' and realised I know NOTHING about braaing or braai culture. Lord help me it looks like an alien in my garden, I hope to pick up some handy hints and tips tomorrow because although I may know a fair amount about cooking, this business of the braai has me stumped.

I will be serving gazpacho to the masses tomorrow evening as it is the perfect summer soup, not to mention healthy, filling and so easy to make it. Always delivering on the WOW factor, gazpacho is the closest thing to heaven if made correctly. It is a fine balance of fragrance, garlic and refreshing vegetables and you can get creative with herb and vegetable variants should you so wish to. Right, here goes . . . I hope to get this right after a rather hard night last night.

Just so you know, gazpacho is traditionally made with bread. I don't make mine this way but it does do wonders for the consistency. Should you want to put bread in yours, add 250 grams of homemade bread crumbs into the mix.

Gazpacho (serves 6-8)

Ingredients:

500 grams of tomatoes
2 large peeled cucumbers
1 large red onion
2 red peppers
2 green peppers
4 large garlic cloves
1 large handful of chopped coriander (optional)
7 tablespoons of good quality extra virgin olive oil
4 tablespoons of good quality balsamic vinegar
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Skin your tomatoes by placing them in a pot and pouring boiling hot water over them. Leave them for 5 minutes and then place them in a sink filled with ice water and peel with with your hands. Chop them roughly and place in a bowl

Chop your peppers roughly and place in the the same bowl. Ditto the cucumbers

Chop your onion fairly finely and add to the bowl

Mash your garlic cloves and coriander with a pestle and mortar (if you don't have one, just chop the garlic and the coriander as finely as you can) and add to the same bowl

Add olive oil and vinegar to the bowl and mix it all up well

Put your mixture into the blender and blend well and voila, all done. It is that simple. Some people like to strain the soup to rid it of bits, but I like mine rustic, it really is a personal thing.

Serve with croutons and a chilled glass of white wine. Not that I can even contemplate alcohol today. Over and out.

How to kill a lobster

I am going to make this post short and sweet. After purging my soul in the previous post or 'ranting' as some people called it, I won't make your eyes bleed for too long this time round.

How to kill a lobster, poignant and relevant for the following reasons:
1) I can't possibly tell you on a public forum
2)I am in Cape Town and last night ordered a lobster which weighed in at 1.2 kilograms. Yes, my friends, I said 1.2kg. Needless to say I have been snacking on lobster for about 24 hours now.

For an unforgettable seafood experience in Cape Town, get yourself down to Panama Jacks. Hardly a bastion of interior design but an expansive seafood menu. I could however do without seeing my food swimming happily about in a tank before it is presented all pink and pretty on my plate.

How to kill a lobster? Quickly. There are many theories on how to approach it humanely and it really is not as gory as you may think. Nor should it be something you are afraid of doing, it is so quick, simple to cook and an awesome dish to serve guests on special occasions.

OK. Firstly, you need to take your lobster and put it in the freezer, an hour should do the trick. The lobster's central nervous system shuts down and it pretty much goes into hibernation mode.

Take your sleepy lobster out the freezer, and do yourself and your unconscious lobster a favour and use a professional chefs knife. Using an ineffective knife is only going to frustrate you and is not fair on the lobster. Press the point of the knife into the head and make sure the point of the knife goes all the way through the lobster's shell and in to the cutting board, then bring the blade down between the eyes to finish the cut of the head. Job's a good un.

To cook the lobster could not be more simple. Bring a deep pot to the boil with a generous pinch of salt (a pot big enough to accommodate your lobster), throw the lobster in and put the lid on. Boil for 5 minutes following which you should check the outer shell is a beautiful, coral pink. Once the lobster has changed to this colour all over, your lobster is done.

Remove from the pot and serve on a plate with marie rose sauce which could not be simpler to make:

2 tablespoons of tomato sauce
2 tablespoons of mayonnaise
generous dash of Tobasco sauce (some like it hot)
1 teaspoon of Worcester Sauce
black pepper to taste

Mix the above ingredients together and serve on the side. I personally prefer my lobster cold as I find it is sweeter and more suited to the summer climate we are hurtling towards but serving hot is just as good.

I am now back from Cape Town, it was possibly the best weekend of my life (apart from Kesh's birthday weekend in the Magaliesburg, but a definitely close second). Thank you to everyone who made it so special. Really. Having found out my grandmother has pretty aggressive cancer put a damper on things yesterday but such is the cycle of life. I will dedicate my next recipe to her. She has 8 grand children and thought I was the only one with any cooking sense to inherit her personal hand written recipe book with pages from magazines which date back to 1940. I love you Ma Nancy and I am so sorry I have been so rubbish since I moved and built and generally recovered.

The Revolution will now be blogged about. And we're back with normal transmission resuming... Salm-on / Sam-off.

The only appropriate introduction to this post would be 'I am sorry but I am not not a quitter'. As most of you who follow this blog will know, circumstances became somewhat tricky since my last post. And since this is a cooking blog, I will recite my circumstances as a recipe.

INGREDIENTS:

A breakup

Pack up house

Buy a house

Gut said bought house and renovate

Manage building project

Keep clients happy

Don't take any time off to recoup, only time off to do stuff

Pack up house again so builders can reek havoc

Identify spare bedrooms to sleep in for a month (curfew essential)

Eliminate any sense of belonging and stability

Unpack house again

Lose 8kg and look like someone who wouldn't dare entertain the thought cooking, never mind blogging about it

Run on a treadmill like a lunatic

Reflect

METHOD:

Break up with someone you knew you never really should have dated in the first place, but make sure it hurts a lot anyways (not the loss) but because you are making the same mistakes you made in your early 20's but you are now 30 something. Take a long hard look at yourself and identify why warning signs were ignored. FREAK OUT.

To ensure maximum effect, time break-up with moving out of the first place you came to be happy in since moving back to South Africa. Pack up house whilst dealing with severe stress (stress manifesting in food poisoning symptoms and fatigue, for 2 weeks). Ensure you are down 4kg by this stage.

Ensure business is on the boil at all times during this process and you work from home with no internet and you are in the communications business. Add 7 builders to your private work space.

Move into flat whilst buying process is still underway. Even though flat will be renovated, unpack EVERYTHING cause you feel like a feral animal and you are desperate for a base and stability after said break-up, even though you know that everything will have to be repacked again.

Spend a fortune in a coffee shop whilst you try to work there with a number of distractions to avoid the added 7 strange men in your flat.

Camp in your bedroom with no bathroom or kitchen for 2 months.

Pack flat up AGAIN and move in with mum (ensure curfew of 11pm stands). Pack up stuff at mum AGAIN and send mum to Israel and realise you need to find someone else to stay with who you hope and pray you won't be intruding on.

Think 'fuck this' and stay at The Don with your plastic bag of clothes for 5 days.

Whilst staying at The Don, give builder an ultimatum and move back into unfinished flat with plastic bag.

For best results, run like a maniac at the gym and lose another 4kg because that is the only place that doesn't seem like a chaos pit and it levels your head.

THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART: Meet new people, (you know who you are and I can't thank you enough, I would love to throw some names out but I can't) and re-meet (JACK I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART) people who are the essence of human kindness who repair your spirit and your soul and make you realise that you don't actually know everyone and that circumstances have lead you on a path to cross journeys with some very, very special individuals who give of themselves without expecting anything at all in return. CATEGORICALLY THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON I WANT TO THANK IS MY WONDERFUL, WONDERFUL FATHER. DAD YOU AMAZE ME AND I LOVE YOU MORE THAN LIFE ITSELF. YOUR PATIENCE, INSIGHT, FORESIGHT, EMPATHY, SUPPORT, KINDNESS, GENEROSITY OF TIME, SPIRIT AND EVERYTHING ELSE. NOTHING I SAY WILL DO JUSTICE TO WHAT I FEEL FOR YOU IN TERMS OF GRATITUDE, LOVE AND ADMIRATION.

Finish flat and realise you are burnt out but live in a palace having picked up new clients along the way and not fallen apart.

Reflect, cook your first meal on YOUR stove, vowing to get yourself back to some sense of normality.

ENJOY . . .


OK, so that in a nutshell or recipe if you like has been my journey; it was the best of times and it was the worst of times and not a time I could have blogged without inciting some serious deformation of character across a few surfaces and coming across as mildly unstable / manic / psychotic / certifiable. But, I am back and I am happy, not 100% content but ok with what is. Which is what is the important part and I am a very, very, very lucky girl with wonderful friends and a wonderful family.

The above diatribe was a preamble to the first meal I cooked, today on my stove, my new stove, in my new flat. I can't begin to tell you how life-changing and how self discovering the journey to get here has been. Now, you may laugh and you may scoff at that last sentence but truthfully, I don't care. I feel as if I have grown in lifetimes since June 2010.

Enough of all that now, we are here to learn how to cook good food, engage with friends over meals and enjoy life to the maximum because it is so very short. Whilst you are enjoying your meals and your company before I impart the next recipe (the first recipe I cooked in my new flat), I want to leave you with a little something: Be honest, be truthful and live in the moment. Go get what you want without fear and with determination cause you only fucking live once and you don't know what tomorrow may bring.

Sam's Salm-on - first cooked meal on my stove. (Serves 1, I am single but double portions up for 2 people)
Serve with a simple salad of mixed leaves, spring onion and coriander. Use marinade for fish as dressing.

Ingredients:

A fillet of salmon (Norwegian is best, Scottish farmed salmon even better but not Chilean salmon as it is way endangered. Don't do it kids).

Fine chop a clove of garlic

Fine chop 3 spring onions

Fine chop a few heads of coriander

1 tsp sesame oil

1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

1 tbsp soya sauce

1 tsp sugar

Method:

Mix garlic, spring onion, coriander, sugar and wet ingredients to form a marinade for your salmon.
Leave salmon in marinade for an hour or two if possible, turning on the hour.

Preheat pan on a medium heat using a little olive oil, just enough to cover the pan (sesame oil's burn point is too low and you will ruin your salmon if you use sesame oil).

Fry your salmon off for 7 minutes on each side, if on a medium heat, your salmon will be moist inside and crispy on the outside if cooked to the mentioned heat and time specifications.

Mix your salad leaves, spring onion and coriander together and add the salmon marinade to your salad as a dressing.

Place salmon on the plate with the salad and you are Salm-on.

Till tomorrow . . .

Pearl barley risotto and my spelling errors make me unique

OK, so it's been a while since I blogged (oops, 6 days). BUT I have been ill, and doubly busy because NOBODY wants to hear ANYTHING from a PR unless it is football related. Good lord I am not happy, client expectations need to be reigned in BIG TIME!

So, the World Cup is upon us. Not for a second did I anticipate the electricity in the air that South Africa is currently experiencing.
And I was ill for the start. But I had to hold the tears back during the opening ceremony, I was bowled over. When Miriam Makheba's 'Click' song came on, I was a sodden mess. And so proud. And so sorry for my dad in the UK and my friend (pregnant and emotional) in France and all other ex pats who were unable to be in our beautiful country for this historic event.
And not sorry for my reporter friend who is covering the game for German TV and gets the best seats in the house and fraternises with the German team as she has to report on them. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE! But, all is not lost, I will be watching the Italy vs Slovakia game on the 24th. Whoot!

I am also feeling somewhat like a crappy, incompetent writer at the moment. Having met this guy who photographs his own food (his name is Jono) and puts much effort into his writing, I feel like this is a bit of hash job. The reality is, I write all day and this is a bit of respite when it comes to minding my grammar and whotnot. So forgive me if it appears lazy and rushed but I will make the utmost effort in cleaning it up when life has calmed down.

Moving on. I recently picked up a pearl barley and spinach risotto in Woolies. For a ready-made meal it is not bad. In addition, it uses barley instead of rice which I love as I am not the hugest rice fan. It is light, tasty and cheap enough for me to justify buying it for lunch and let me tell you, this is the first and only ready-made meal I will concede or admit to eating. I abhor them and find that there is no excuse for being lazy in the kitchen, but lunchtime I feel is different. In any case, my version is far tastier and healthier and it is really so easy to throw together. This is how it goes:

For the barley:
rinse 2 cups of pearl barley really well under a tap
place in a pot and cover with 6 cups of water
add a generous pinch of salt
2 cubes of vegetable stock
boil gently on a medium heat for 35 mins (keep watching the pot as the barley absorbs a lot of water)
after 35 minutes, taste one of the grains and and see if it is soft enough, if not add a little more water so the top is only just covered and keep watching and testing the barley
like rice, once the water has been boiled away, cover the pot with a cloth to catch the excess steam
put the barley to one side

Ingredients:
2 cloves of garlic
2 grated carrots
2 sticks of finely chopped celery
1 finely chopped onion
1 of shitake mushrooms (sliced coarsely)
1 punnet of chestnut mushrooms (sliced coarsely)
a generous handful of thyme (thrown in whole)
1 stock cube
1/2 cup of good white wine
1/2 cup of milk
Parmesan shavings to garnish (a generous amount)


Method
fry onion and garlic on a low heat till garlic is soft (remember be careful with garlic as it has a low burning point)
add grated carrots and celery
mix well and fry for a further 5 minutes
add sliced mushrooms
dissolve stock cube in the tiniest bit of water and add to the vegetables
add milk and wine and stir gently
add the thyme
cover and simmer on a low heat for 10 minutes
add to the barley and stir the barley and the sauce together
put in an oven proof dish and place into a preheated oven of 140 degrees for 15 minutes
remove from oven
remove thyme
garnish with parmesan

Kedgeree, the sisterhood and not messing with a Scotsman

Holy cow. I am really trying not to swear, but what a week and it is only Wednesday. I know I didn't bother with a post yesterday but with good reason.

I am not going to get into the logistics of yesterday but what I can tell you is that I am fortunate enough to know some pretty amazing people. This group of friends that I only towards the end of last year become familiar and comfortable with are unbelievable. What a group of strong, independent, protective, kind, selfless women, all of them. I don't think that I ever understood the power of the sisterhood until I met these girls. And let me tell you, don't mess with them or anyone they love, it just wouldn't be worth it.

What I can tell you about yesterday is that I came across another cooking blogger. Now I am usually sane of mine and rationale of head (Rory will contest this I am sure) but when I meet another cook, I go a just a leetle bit competitive crazy. And another cook that blogs? ALARM BELLS. Another cook that blogs that photographs his own food? I pity the fool! But on a more serious note, he's a really nice guy and obviously very talented. His blog is very different to this one. He doesn't skimp on calories or worry about dairy or carbs or any of the stuff I generally don't put on this blog. Check it out: http://allyoucaneatforfree.wordpress.com/

Anyhow, onto my blog! Kedgeree is the dish of the day. What the hell is kedgeree you may ask? Well, generally it is a mixture of smoked, flaked fish, rice, curry powder and whatever else you fancy. There are many variations of kedgeree but they all start with those basic ingredients.

Kedgeree is thought to have originated with an Indian rice-and-bean or rice-and-lentil dish traced back to 1340 or earlier. It is widely believed that the dish was brought to the United Kingdom by returning British colonials who had enjoyed it in India and introduced it to the UK as a breakfast dish in Victorian times as part of the then fashionable Anglo-Indian cuisine. It is one of many breakfast dishes that, in the days before refrigeration, converted yesterday's leftovers into hearty and appealing breakfast dishes.

According to some highly disputed sources, the dish originated from Scotland and was taken to India by Scottish troops during the British Raj, where it was adapted and adopted as part of Indian cuisine. According to this theory the dish travelled to India then returned to the wider UK. This is the explanation I am sticking to, because I live with a Scotsman, and you really, really don't want to be arguing with one!

Anyhow, it's healthy (obviously), it's quick and damn tasty. This is my version, but play around with your own tastes by adding capers, tomatoes or change the thyme for coriander as an example. Check it out:

Ingredients:
2 fillets of flaked smoked mackerel
2 boiled eggs (we have been through how to get the perfect egg in May's blog)
1/2 a finely chopped red onion
4 sprigs of thyme (run your fingers up and down the stalk as you only want the leaves in this case, not the stalks)
1 cup of raw brown boiled rice (again refer to May's blog for perfect rice)
2 heaped teaspoons of mild curry powder
1 generous tablespoon of grain mustard
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar

Method
Boil your rice. And remember brown rice takes significantly longer than white and absorbs a lot more water. So keep an eye on it
Flake your mackerel and make sure all the bones are removed (I mash mine up with a fork as this makes the bones more visible)
add the flaked fish to the cooked rice
add your finely chopped onion
mash your boiled eggs and add to the rice mixture
add curry powder, mustard and balsamic vinegar
stir all the ingredients well
add thyme leaves and stir well
garnish with thyme and serve with chutney

THIS DISH CAN BE SERVED HOT, WARM OR COLD.
(Any which way it is delicious)

Healthy curry in a hurry

It's late. It has been a long day of everything. By 10am I had organised a mover, sent off my FICA documents (no, I didn't know what those were either), spoke to a lawyer about crazy tenant, picked up my dry cleaning, spoken to my mortgage broker, been to the bank and taken in my torn clothes in for repair.

Rory came home for lunch which was a nice surprise and we had the left over chicken from last night - I love roasts on the second day, and it's great because he likes the dark meat and I like the breast, if you will. So no fighting over pieces.

Following this I went to my financial advisor in Sandton. GET THIS: On the corner of Grayston and West street where the Sandton Gautrain station is being built or is finished or whatever is a very busy intersection, especially during peak time. So the light is green and I am turning right thus in the middle of the intersection and a traffic cop shoots a red light, leaving me stranded in the middle of the road. I could not believe what happened and there was traffic coming at me from every which way. I say no more, I mean seriously!

I then spent two hours growing up fast and taking out life cover and a retirementanuity. Fun times indeed. We only got to the gym at 7:30pm but it was a great work out, the only trouble is that if I gym that late I land up wired when I get home till 1am. With this in mind, we needed a meal in a hurry. And nothing beats a great curry in a hurry in winter.

The problem with curries is that they are generally not healthy and are swimming in butter, oil and cream and are generally very fattening. So, I am going to give you a great curry recipe and again it is a cheat's curry but we will get onto a more complicated curry later on. In addition, you can swap the chicken for vegetables, prawns or beef. For your cheat's curry you will need:

SERVES 2

2 chopped onions
1 clove of chopped garlic
3 chicken breasts that have been cut into strips
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
2 teaspoons of tomato paste
3 cardamom pods (crush these with the back of a knife to let the flavour out)
1 heaped teaspoon of turmeric
1 heaped tablespoon of curry powder (mild, medium or hot, depending on your taste)
1 heaped teaspoon of sugar
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
a generous pinch of salt
1 tablespoon of soya sauce
a small head of broccoli with the stalks trimmed

Method
fry your onions in a little olive oil on a medium heat until soft
add your garlic and fry for a further minute
add your diced chicken breast and fry until the chicken is browned
add the tin of tomatoes and the tomato paste and stir in well
add the turmeric, curry powder, sugar, salt, soya sauce, balsamic vinegar and stir well
add the cardamom pods
throw in the broccoli, stir, cover and let simmer on a medium heat for 15-20 minutes.
Serve with rice (which I have given a fool proof method for in Rory's balsamic chicken recipe in May)

It is 11:20pm. Good night

Moules in an infused tomato reduction or Mussels in tomato sauce!

Sweet Lord. What a bloody hectic weekend. Forget the fact that I have a frightening work load ahead of me and further meetings with lawyers, accountants and mortgage brokers but we just blew 45K (with help from boyfriend and father) on a TV, a TV license, a washing machine, a lounge suite, a TV stand a bed, a headboard, 2 side tables, an iron, a kettle, a toaster and a kick-ass set of pots and pans. The pots and pans were essential, as you can imagine. Although we are yet to own a fork or a knife or a spoon, but slowly slowly. We will get there. It was seriously stressful and from not knowing Fourways from Fiveways, I now know the place like the back of my hand. I don't know if I should be proud, or not.

We ended the shopping spree with a weekly grocery shop. Now, we need to eat what is in our freezer and cupboard for the next few weeks so we don't have to shlep food as well as everything else (freaking out a little as I write). Anyhoo, we bought veggies and a chicken and dum dum dum... some mussel meat. I am cooking an awesome chicken pot roast for tonight which I will post later in the week as you already got your chicken installment on Friday.

The recipe I will give you tonight is a meal I will be cooking for guests on Wednesday. It is made with mussel meat which you can buy from any fishmongers or Pick n Pay. I am not sure about Woolies as I have only seen shelled New Zealand green-lipped mussels there. These are great and huge in size and meaty as you like but damn expensive and I can not under any circumstances justify eating mussels flown in from across the world when our country is surrounded by a coast teaming with wonderful fish and seafood.

They come frozen and are so cheap, I paid R44 for enough to feed 4 or 5 people and they really make a great meal. For some reason though I keep forgetting about this recipe. You can also cook mussels in white wine and cream which is classically referred to as moules marinière but as previously mentioned, cream is really not my bag and I prefer the healthier tomato option. It is so quick and so easy and a hearty meal for a winter's evening. It is also great for guests as it is cheap to prepare and goes so far.

Don't be scared to cook something you have never handled before in terms of meat or fish, especially with mussels as you really, really can't mess it up.

When you do cook this dish, make sure you have defrosted your mussels and have drained them of all excess water. Do not leave out once thawed though as this could be dangerous.

Ingredients:

1 large packet of shelled mussel meat
2 roughly chopped cloves of garlic
2 chopped onions
generous handful of thyme
olive oil
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
2 teaspoons of sugar
1 tablespoon of soya sauce
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
pinch of salt
black pepper

Method:

NB: YOU WILL NEED A LARGE POT FOR THIS

fry your chopped onion in a little olive oil on a medium heat
add garlic and fry for a further 2 minutes
add your mussels
add your tin of tomatoes
add your balsamic vinegar, soya sauce, sugar and salt to taste
stir well
throw in your time as whole sprigs
turn down heat to low, cover and simmer for 10 minutes
remove thyme
put into a serving dish and garnish with black pepper and a sprig of thyme
serve with a green salad and fresh, crusty bread.

Your guests will be beyond impressed. Just don't tell them how easy it was!

coq au vin made simple and healthy.

Now this is one of my facourite recipes. We used to go to this really cheap but good bistro in The Angel in London called Le Mercury. You could get a starter and a main course for under 20 quid which was a bargain in London. It was in a very old rickety Victorian house and was a double story building building. Tables and chairs were so close together that you could smell what the guy at the next table had for lunch. But it all made for part of the charm. The walls were crooked and the floors were creaky, the fire was constantly on the go and the lighting was ambient. The best restaurant in winter, ever! It was here that I first tasted coq au vin.

Coq au vin is French for chicken in wine. I am not the biggest 'cooking your food in wine' fan but dish really is sublime. There are different variations of coq au vin but the staple ingredients always remain the same (unless you are me and you are adapting the dish for 'the healthier eater'), they are chicken, wine, lardons (thick-cut cubed bacon) and garlic. The coq au vin recipe I am giving you has been adjusted for maximum flavour and health. I don't like bacon because it fatty, so in this case I have swapped the bacon for chopped anchovies. I know that sounds mad and there are loads of people who do not like anchovies...but, you can't taste them in the dish and they are a good salty substitute for the bacon. Italians frequently put anchovies in meet dishes to balance the flavour and salt the dish, anchovies work especially well in lamb casseroles. But feel free to use lardons if you like. If you can't find lardons in the store, chop up some thick cut, streaky bacon into cubes.

Another thing to no is that the slower and longer you cook this dish, the better it tastes and the longer it left after it has cooked, the better it tastes. So if you are having people over on Sunday, make it on Saturday and watch your guests polish off the lot! And for those of you who do not know what a bouquet garni is, please refer to the previous blog.

Ingredients

tablesoon of butter butter
150g/5½oz shallots, peeled but left whole (if you can't find shallots, use red onion that has been coarsely chopped)
5 garlic cloves, crushed
6 chopped anchovy fillets or 150g streaky bacon, cut thickly or
bouquet garni (4 sprigs of each herb)
I punnet button mushrooms
4 carrots, peeled and sliced into rounds
2 celery sticks which have been chopped
500ml good red wine (REMEMBER: IF YOU WON'T DRINK IT, DON'T COOK WITH IT)
500ml chicken stock (2 cubes)
2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 free range chicken, cut into 8 serving pieces, on the bone but skin removed
small bunch flatleaf parsley, chopped
salt and crushed black pepper
Preparation method

Heat a thick-bottomed casserole dish on the stove (a medium heat or you'll burn the butter)
Add the shallots. Cook until just browned; then stir in the garlic.
Add carrots and celery and stir everything together.
Add the bacon or anchovies and cook for 2-3 minutes.
Add the mushrooms, turn up the heat and add the red wine, chicken stock and vinegar.
Add the chicken pieces, bring the sauce to the boil and then simmer gently for about 25 minutes or until the chicken is tender and cooked through.
Add your bouquet garni
Put into a preheated oven of 140 degrees and slow cook for 2 hours.
Remove and eat or put in the fridge for 24 hours
Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper
Sprinkle over chopped parsley and serve with a dressed green salad and good bread.
Take your bouquet garni out before serving