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Caveman Bake & Corn Salad

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So you might be wondering, ‘what the heck is a caveman bake?!’…

It’s my version of a bobotie-inspired, meaty type of tart slash bake – and here it is:

You will need:

500g venison mince (you can use beef too)

footlong piece of cabanossi

3 eggs

half a cup of milk

salt & pepper to taste

1 punnet of pattipans (cut into quarters)

6/7 mushrooms (cut into quarters)

6 cherry tomatoes or 2 whole regular tomatoes

peppadew spice

1/2 a tsp of cumin

1/2 a tsp of cayenne pepper

1/2 a tsp of paprika

Woolworths fried onion sprinkles

olive oil

Start by heating olive oil in a skillet and cooking the pattipans, sprinkle with peppadew spice. Cook until al dente, you don’t want soggy pattipans – so gross!  Set cooked pattipans aside and use the same skillet to cook the mushrooms.  Same story, sprinkle with peppadew spice and add tomatoes and another glug of olive oil.  Set aside cooked mushrooms & tomatoes. In same skillet, cook the mince.  Add peppadew spice, cumin, cayenne pepper, cabanossi and paprika. Cook the mince until just done, you don’t want dry mince!  Next, layer all your ingredients in a baking dish:  mince and cabanossi at the bottom, then sprinkle with the fried onion sprinkles, next layer is the mushrooms & tomatoes and finally the pattipans. Pour egg and milk mixture (season with salt) over entire dish and place 3 bay leaves on top.  Bake at 180C for 30 minutes until set.

Caveman Bake

To make the corn salad, grill whole corn until cooked and golden.  Cut corn off the cob and toss with cherry tomatoes, sweet basil and mixed salad leaves. Serve with olive oil and a splash of balsamic vinegar.

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Oh yum – I LOVE eating! What would life be without food?! To finish off our delicious meal, we had some ‘homemade’ peanut butter ice cream.  Now I say homemade, because, yes I made it at home, but not from scratch… {yes yes… I NEED an ice cream maker!}

Anyways, so I just mixed plain vanilla ice cream with smooth peanut butter and golden syrup. Yummy yum yum!

Watch this space – soon I will be dazzling with my own homemade (proper homemade!) ice creams..!

Enjoy! X

Paleo burgers & polenta chips

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I’m such a huge Masterchef fan and I saw a great idea from SA finalist, Leandri – polenta chips (aka fries).

So I decided to try it out.  Tonight we had paleo burgers (no bun!) with these yummy fries:

grill patties (I used venison) and stack with cheese slices, tomato, lettuce and basil. I also used a bit of mayonnaise and whole grain mustard on the patty after grilling.

serve with polenta chips:

cook polenta and pour into a buttered dish to set.  Once set, turn out from dish and cut into thick chips.  Dust with raw polenta and deep fry in sunflower oil until golden & crisp. Serve with tobasco mayonnaise.

We had real 80’s style retro dessert tonight – I made lemon ‘snow’ puddings from the South African classic ‘Kook en Geniet’ cookbook.

1.5 tbs gelatine

1/4 cup cold water

1 cup boiling water

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup lemon juice and grated rind of half a lemon

2 egg whites

Pour gelatine powder into cold water and dissolve this in the hot water.  Add sugar, lemon juice & rind.  Let the sugar dissolve and pass through a sieve.  Let mixture cool and start to set.  Once it has started to get firm, whisk until it has a fluffy and frothy consistency. Whisk egg whites until stiff and fold into gelatine mixture.  Place in a mold or glasses and set in fridge.

Enjoy! X

Paleo burger & polenta chips

 

Snow pudding

 

Confessions of a blogaholic

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{shopaholic / cookaholic / momaholic}

A lot of friends and blog followers have asked me recently where I find time to do all of this… I presume by ‘this’ they’re referring to my cooking & blogging?

So I’ve been giving it some thought and I realized – hey – this is my job! Ok, I didn’t just now realise, but still… Yes, this is my job – I’m a mom {here I can list a whole page of job descriptions} and I run our household {again – insert any number of tasks!}.  I cook everyday – yes I do love cooking – and then I tell you guys about what I’ve made! So it’s really just the blogging bit that takes up more time, and quite frankly I’m really enjoying that too.

People often think that being a stay-at-home mom is so glamorous, that I sit around and paint my nails / catch up with the girls / do lunch /etc everyday… Well, I usually roll out of bed every morning just before my husband goes off to work (to earn us some bacon!) to get the kids sorted and pack him some lunch. Bless him, he makes me coffee in the mornings, although I suspect he’s only doing it so I will actually get up… Hmmm…

You see, I’m up quite a lot at night, with one breastfed baby and another toddler who gets night terrors from time to time… {I still love my job!}

Once I’m up and going, I stroll around in a pair of tatty cut-off shorts and an old manky t-shirt and flops: doing washing, tidying the house, soothing and feeding the baby, separating toddler and dog, etc!  I only take a shower once the boys are both napping!  I might then also get in a bit of me-time (no, no my friends, not to read a book or watch some TV – no, by me-time, I mean I get to dry my hair or paint my nails or plan dinner etc!) and enjoy some leftovers for lunch.

I can’t actually tell anyone exactly what it is I do all day, I just know that I am super busy with all the things that need to get done.  I especially love it when my husband asks me what I plan to do today or what I have done today and my answer is something like ‘well I’m going grocery shopping’ or ‘I’m planning on washing the dog’, like that’s ALL I’m going to do / have done! Meanwhile, that’s over and above the daily stuff…

Anyways, this was by no means a moaning session, I just thought I’d put it out there. I know there must be millions of moms that know exactly what I mean and may even feel the same way.  I am very grateful and privileged to be able to be at home with my boys! And to have the time to cook and experiment in the kitchen.

I always say that in my next life, I’d like to be a dad! Hahaha! {just kidding though}

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Just saw this gem on Facebook – so appropriate!

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Rosemary & Yoghurt Roast Chicken

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Roast chicken

This heat is making me super lazy! So here’s another easy & super tasty recipe:

Rosemary & yoghurt roast chicken

a cup of plain yoghurt (you can use low-fat / Bulgarian or Greek)

sprig of fresh rosemary, chopped

2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

pinch of salt

pinch of freshly ground black pepper

2 tbs lemon juice

half a cup of sauvignon blanc

3 tbs olive oil

Mix all ingredients and marinade one whole chicken (with skin is best!) for about an hour.

Roast in the oven or your grill for an hour and 45mins at a low heat of 150C. The low heat makes the chicken more succulent and if you’re using a grill (like a Big Green Egg or Weber), it imparts a delicious smokey flavour to the chicken. I used a small dutch oven to roast chicken in – for an hour and 20mins and the last half hour I placed chicken directly onto the grill to brown and get crispy.

Delicious – we just kept it simple and had a tomato, basil & feta cheese salad with the chicken.

Enjoy! X

Nicoise Salad

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Nicoise Salad

Does anyone else feel lazy on a Monday night..? Sort of still in weekend mode, and to top it all, the fridge is kinda empty too and we seem to have just skipped spring altogether and gone straight into summer – so salad it is!

(I cannot wait for our veggies to finally start growing and to be able to just pick whatever I want straight from the garden!  Hubby has made a fabulous vegetable garden and is still busy planting… (The chickens keep digging up and eating all the seeds!)  Anyways, that’s about 3-4 months away from reality and until then I’ll have to make do with shop-bought veggies.

So this is what I rustled up tonight – my take on a Niçoise salad, using sardines:

2 tins of Portugese sardines in vegetable oil (remove bones from middle)

3 hard boiled eggs, halved

lettuce

small plum tomatoes, quartered

olives

danish feta cheese

capers

olive oil

Red wine vinegar

Toss together, season with freshly ground salt & black pepper and enjoy! X

Chef´s kitchen

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Chef´s kitchen

Ferm LIVING kitchen linen
$15 – madeindesign.co.uk

VIPP bread box
$200 – madeindesign.co.uk

Linea kitchen gadgets tool
$13 – houseoffraser.co.uk

Kitchenaid
$125 – connox.com

Crate and barrel
crateandbarrel.com

Stelton jug
$33 – connox.com

Muuto kitchen gadgets tool
$39 – connox.com

Majamoo black trivet
$21 – finnishdesignshop.com

Metaphys kitchen gadgets tool
$32 – connox.com

Stelton sugar bowl
$33 – connox.com

Bodum kitchen gadgets tool
$13 – connox.com

Warthog Roast

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Big Green Egg

What a fab day – sunny Joburg with good friends, good wine & good food!

We tried out a new recipe today for warthog (I’ve never made or eaten warthog before…) from Shiny Happy People by Neil Roake (I love this cookbook!).

1 leg of venison (bush pig – I used warthog)

5 onions peeled & quartered

2 thumb-sized pieces of fresh ginger, peeled & crushed

freshly ground salt & black pepper

olive oil

200ml sherry

225g quince cheese (quince jelly)

Rub meat with olive oil, salt & pepper.  In a large casserole, brown meat on all sides & set aside.  Add onions & ginger to the same casserole used to brown the meat and sauté.  Add sherry to deglaze.  Return the meat to the casserole and add random dollops of the quince jelly.  Cover and slow-roast in a pre-heated oven of 160C For 3-4 hours.

Now, I adapted this recipe slightly by doubling all the quantities (except the onions) because of the huge piece of meat I used.  Also, we roasted it in our Green Egg.

The result – delicious and slightly sweet meat!  Next time I would just add more liquid halfway through the cooking process and have the temperature even lower – maybe at 120C for 4 hours.  The sauce was just a tad bit too reduced for me… But still delicious nonetheless!

Warthog roast

Sides:

Mielies (corn on the cob) with butter – always a braai favourite!

Roast beets with balsamic vinegar, olive oil & feta cheese

Scrumptious salad with roasted tomato & Danish feta with avocado – made by my friend Karin

Dessert:

Summer Berry Pavlova

This might just be my all-time favourite dessert – and healthy too! (Just egg whites & fruit… Oh yes, and a bit of cream and sugar too… Just a bit ;))

Summer Berry Pavlova

6 egg whites

pinch of cream of tartar

1.5 cups of castor sugar

1.5 tsp corn starch

pinch of salt

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 tsp red wine vinegar

Whisk egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form.  Add sugar slowly, along with the corn starch & salt until glossy and stiff peaks form.  Fold in vanilla & vinegar.  Place on baking paper, in a round or oval shape.  Bake at 120C for 1.5 hours and let it cool in the oven.

Top with sweetened whipped cream (I use regular cream, whipped with castor sugar), fresh strawberries (cut and sprinkled with castor sugar), blueberries, gooseberries & pomegranate seeds.  Dust with icing sugar, serve & enjoy!

x

Friday – Green Egg Roast Chicken

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Roast chicken & caprese salad image

Can you say yum?!

The Big Green Egg – one of my favourite cooking tools! Yes, it’s a ‘braai’ of sorts, but you can do anything in it, I’ve even baked a cake! There is just no comparison to the taste it gives to your braai goodies, so yum.

Anyways, so enough punting of the Egg – here’s tonight’s recipe:

1 whole free range chicken

spicy Cajun rub

Robertsons portugese chicken spice

1 lemon

Olive oil

Rub chicken with olive oil, Cajun rub and Portuguese chicken spice.  Slice lemon in half and place both halves inside the chicken.  In a roasting dish, roast chicken in your Green Egg / Weber / braai for 40 minutes. After 40 minutes, place chicken directly onto the grill and grill for another 40 minutes until done. (You want it to be just juicy and cooked – not overcooked! I think we had the temperature at about 180C)

While the chicken was roasting, I also added a few slices of aubergine onto the grill, along with the chicken (aubergine was dipped into the olive oil and spice mixture in the roasting dish that the chicken was in).

My take on a caprese salad:

aubergine slices (grilled as explained above for about 20 minutes)

mozerella cheese

sweet basil

tomato slices

toasted pine nuts

olive oil

salt

Assemble by layering slices of aubergine, cheese, tomato and basil. Drizzle olive oil and add a sprinkle of sea salt. Sprinkle with toasted nuts.

We enjoyed this scrummy meal with a glass of Van Loveren Pinot Grigio.

Enjoy! X

Kids bunkbed – DIY

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Finished bunkbedStaining & varnishing of bed

I decided on a bunkbed for the boys – Seb is ready to sleep in a ‘big boy bed’, and by the time Francois is ready for a bed, Seb can move to the top bed, or the beds can be taken down and just be 2 single beds. Either way, I still love the bunkbed look, plus it’s a great space-saver! (Something we don’t have a lot of in our little country cottage!)

After shopping around a bit, I found a great Small Business that could make it just the way I want… But, and it’s a BIG but, it would’ve taken 3 months minimum to supply!

Eek – I don’t have the time or patience for that, so, I decided to Do It Myself… (Well, sort of – we bought a ready-made natural pine bed, which I then stained and varnished myself.)

It was really easy to do and didn’t take that long (ok, it took 3 weeks, as I could only really do it during the boys’ nap times, and I didn’t work on it every day…).

And here it is – thanks hubby for assembling! 😉

(Bunkbed & mattrasses from Lotter’s Pine, wood stain is a Woodoc gel stain {dawn red} and the varnish is a matt sealer, also from Woodoc.)

x

Thursday – Asian-style venison with butternut squash

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I don’t know how much venison they eat in Asia, but nevertheless, this is my Asian-inspired venison with butternut squash:

500g stewing meat (I used venison)

2 tbs soy sauce

1 tsp fish sauce

2 cloves of garlic

1 thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, roughly chopped

2 red chillies, sliced open length-wise

peppadew spice (one my faves!)

1 cup of chicken stock

1 tbs honey

Place all these ingredients in your slow-cooker (so easy!) and cook on high for 3 hours. After 3 hours, remove meat from cooker and chop into pieces and remove bones. Return to cooker and add another splash of soy sauce, a dash more water and 3 tbs of sweet chili sauce. (Venison loves something sweet!)

Cook for another hour and serve with roasted butternut squash.

Enjoy! X