The search for a perfect brownie

Posted July 7, 2010 | | Leave a response

stops here.

And this is not it. Continue reading “The search for a perfect brownie”

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If I were a TV cook…

Posted July 3, 2010 | , , , | 3 Responses

(or a cookbook author for that matter), I could imagine myself delivering all number of clever little tips and tricks – as they do – to give people the idea that I sit around and think hard and long about what works and what doesn’t.

For my (to die for) “caramelized brussel sprouts with pecan nuts and blue cheese”, for instance, I would tell you that the secret is to add the garlic at the last minute of pan-time. That way you get a kick of fresh garlic to temper the sweetness of the sugar and nuts, but without the harshness of actual fresh garlic. (Because don’t you also find that if you add garlic too early, it loses its oomph?) You want garlic. But you want it just right. This is how, trust me.

(Excuse the photograph. My stylist is away watching Argentina getting thrashed by Germany).

If I were Jamie Oliver, I would tell you that this goes fantastically with small, crumbed pork cutlets (and a nice dollop of horseradish on the side), and then tell you how easy crumbed pork is to throw together. (Like this: bish bash bosh).

If I were Rachael Ray, I would tell you not to bother with the bish bash bosh, because I don’t have the time, and you don’t have the time or money to hop on your scooter, head down to your friendly (organic) butcher, have a chat about the missus, get some beautiful hand-reared, grass-fed, acupuncture-tenderised local pork, and neither do you have half a loaf of day-old sourdough lying around waiting to be whizzed into crumbs in the KitchenAid (which you don’t have either).

Continue reading “If I were a TV cook…”

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‘ʁøðgʁøːˀð mɛð ‘fløːðɛ

Posted June 23, 2010 | | Leave a response

So last night I had my Nigella moment. Some friends are exhibiting at an upcoming art event in Roskilde (that’s in Denmark, where the big annual rock festival happens), and the theme is “Localities”. Being the charming Doing it for Daddy girls, they decided to subvert the expected take on South Africa and instead make a film about me. How clever is that!

OK, it is a film about a Dane living outside of Denmark perhaps. (An extra-Dane?). Or about a “Dane” cooking a “Danish” meal in a kitchen in Cape Town. Whatever. We’ll let them do the analysis. But it did give me a chance to devise a funky menu, spend most of a day cooking (if we start counting at 9am when I put a 5kg leg of pork in the oven), and to be on camera.

Continue reading “‘ʁøðgʁøːˀð mɛð ‘fløːðɛ”

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Enough with the footie

Posted June 20, 2010 | | Leave a response

Really, no one wants to hear any more about Inglan’s miserable performance, or about how self-satisfied the Danes must be with themselves this morning (like we they really need another reason to be self-satisfied, but fair enough: we they are red, we they are white, we they are Danish dynamite). Nor is it anyone’s business that I have done approximately half a stitch of work since this whole debacle began, because if I’m not sitting in a stadium with 64 099 other people, I am glued to the telly watching a game which I don’t understand and which I really don’t care about. And I certainly wouldn’t share with you my private prediction that I may even continue to watch the occasional match after the WC. It’s a ridiculous waste of time and quite frankly I think the game should be banned. Maybe then those stupid plastic horns would finally rest in peace.

No, let’s rather talk pork. Continue reading “Enough with the footie”

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Foodball

Posted June 12, 2010 | | Leave a response

So yesterday the cork popped on the much anticipated goose-fest. It was a long, hard day which required careful planning and execution, all moving backward from the final, and BIG event, which was us in the stadium for the Cape Town kick-off at 8.30pm.

Resigned to the fact that there would be little parking, we carefully selected a good halfway house where we could rest on our long walk to the stadium. So we set off at 12.30pm, and a few moments later we were establishing ourselves at Caveau, getting ready for the big haul. Two bloody marys, a few beers (plus obligatory shots of gees tequila), a burger, skinny fries, a crispy spring roll (with sweet chilli sauce), plenty of biltong, and mild deafness from the fucken vuvus, we were ready to go. Continue reading “Foodball”

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Don’t touch me on my gees

Posted June 8, 2010 | | Leave a response

Yesterday I tweeted that ‘Cape Town looks like a bumper car track. Roads full of little cars with little flags. Beep Beep. Madness begins. I will survive.’ The darling (football-mad) Philosophe thought that wasn’t a very nice thing to say. Not in the gees.

Along with vuvuzela, gees is one of the words of the moment down here in the south, where players, fans, hooligans et al converge for the big football party (yawn). I haven’t been able to find a phonetic spelling for it, but just imagine the opening consonant like the gg in “dagga”: more of a soft, epiglottal hiss than a hard g. Gees means spirit, and the idea is that we should all be in its possession by now. Continue reading “Don’t touch me on my gees”

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The Little Mermaid

Posted May 31, 2010 | | Leave a response

In Peru, there is a little girl who was born with a mermaid’s tail. To you and I, that means she was born with a rare condition called sirenomelia (siren apparently being Latin for mermaid). When you have sirenomelia, you are born with your legs fused together. Like a mermaid. But also with the problem of having no external sex organs, and your entire urological system in your anus. (Then again, maybe mermaids have that too). Continue reading “The Little Mermaid”

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Foodwang

Posted May 16, 2010 | | Leave a response

In the immodest tradition of first camera, then fork, scenes from lunch at the splendid Waterkloof:

Continue reading “Foodwang”

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In my not so humble opinion

Posted May 13, 2010 | , | 6 Responses

Cape Town does like to think of itself as part of the big cosmopolitan world, so it’s no surprise that in recent years, there have cropped up a bunch of self-styled “foodie” blogs in the Mother City. Yes, this *could* be considered one too, but the bunch I’m thinking of are the ones who set themselves up as bona fide restaurant reviewers, with no apparent expertise apart from a) liking to eat, b) having enough disposable income to do so on a(n alarmingly) regular basis, and sometimes c) having eaten at restaurants in the actual Cosmopolitan world, which apparently gives them the authority of comparison.

Now, I like to read about other people’s experiences with food – who doesn’t? Continue reading “In my not so humble opinion”

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Wobble wobble toil and trouble

Posted May 2, 2010 | | 1 Response

It’s been a wobbly week. Continue reading “Wobble wobble toil and trouble”

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