Beautiful bobotie

Recently I went to Shaka Zulu for a tasting evening.  I can't say I've ever had typical South African food, so was not really sure what to expect.

To be honest, I thought the starters were unimpressive.  Smoked salmon with a garnish, pickled fish and biltong - South African jerky which was tasty, but more of a bar snack than an actual dish.  The main courses were much more interesting.  We were initially presented with a selection of meats, including lamb, ostrich and springbok. Served with this was a curried cabbage side dish which was delicious.  The real winner for me though was the bobotie.  A traditional meat pie, it is a wonderful marriage of eggs and spiced mince beef cooked in a small casserole dish.  Often served in bread or with rice, this is warm comfort food at it's best!

So I've scoured the internet to find a recipe for this lovely dish.  As with many typical dishes, there are 100's of variants - some with raisins, some with chutney, some with tomato paste and some without any of these.  I wanted to replicate the dish as closely as possible, so I combined the ideas and came up with the recipe below.

Bobotie - South African spiced mince meat pie

Serves 4

Ingredients:

- 2 slices of old bread,

- vegetable oil

- 1 onion, chopped

- ½ teaspoon mixed spice

- 2 cloves garlic

- 2 teaspoons curry powder

- 1 teaspoon turmeric powder

- 500 g minced lean beef or Quorn veggie mince

- 2 eggs

- salt and black pepper

- 2 tablespoons water

- juice from one lime

- pinch of sugar

Topping:

- 1 egg

- 150 ml milk

- salt for seasoning

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 180C.
2. Put bread in a bowl, cover with warm water and leave to soak.
3. In a frying pan, heat the oil over a medium heat and fry the onion for approx 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and fry for another minute
4. Add the mixed spice, curry, turmeric and mince.  Fry until lightly browned.  Take off the heat.
5. Drain the bread of excess water, crumble and mix evenly into the mince.  Add the water, lime juice, sugar and salt and pepper to taste.
6. Beat the eggs and add to the mince.
7. Pour into an ovenproof dish and bake in the oven for 25 minutes, until the top is light brown.
8. For the topping, beat the egg and add the milk and salt. Pour over the mince and put back into the oven.  Turn the oven up to 200C.
9. Bake in the oven until the top has browned, approximately 15 mins.
10. Serve hot with rice or bread and vegetables.

Quick and simple - spicy vegetable tortelloni

As much as I would love to have enough time (and energy!) everyday to make amazing, fresh food, it does not always work out that way.  Last night was one of those evenings. Store bought  tortelloni is something we almost always have in the house.  It's quick (cooks in 2 mins!) and, with a little imagination, can be made quite interesting.  Make sure you always have freshly grated Parmesan cheese.  For the recipe below I used arrabiata filled tortelloni, but it would work just as well with most of the other flavours.

Spicy vegetable tortelloni
Serves 2, preparing and cooking time 20 mins

1 packet of tortelloni
3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
big pinch of dried oregano
big pinch of dried basil
1 clove garlic
1-2 dried chillies
1 courgette
4-5 mushrooms
2 handfuls of fresh baby spinach leaves
freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Mix the oil with the oregano, basil, garlic and dried chillies and set aside.

Bring a pot of water with salt to the boil.  Cook the tortelloni for one minute less than the packet recommends.  Reserve a couple of tablespoons of the cooking water then drain.

Grate the courgettes on the coarse side of your grater.  Repeat with the mushrooms.  In a non stick pot using 1/4 of the oil mixture, cook the mushrooms on medium high heat for 3-4 mins or until most of the liquid has been cooked out of the mushrooms.  Add the courgette and cook for another minute or two while continuously stirring.

Rinse the tortelloni quickly in cold water to stop them sticking together.  Add the tortelloni to the pot along with the rest of the oil mixture, cooking water and spinach.  Mix well and cook for a further 5 minutes or until most of the liquid has evaporated and everything is piping hot.  Serve with fresh Parmesan sprinkled over the top.

History of the humble burrito

I really love burritos.  I love them so much that a couple of years ago I went through a phase eating numerous burritos a week.  There were a few times I even had a couple of burritos a day.  So last week I was having lunch at Benito's Hat and I came across a story about the origin of burritos.

There was once a guy traveling through Mexico who got lost.  After days of travelling without any food he came upon a kind Mexican woman. She offered him a range of Mexican foods such as refried beans, pork carnitas, guacamole and Mexican rice.  As the guy was not used to these foods, he was too scared to try them. So the woman took a big flour tortilla, wrapped up all the ingredients and the guy ate it.  Voila - a burrito!

Obviously this story is fictional - if you are starving, surely you'd eat anything, even if it's a bit new!!   The story did make me wonder where burritos came from.  With a bit of research I found that the real story is almost as sweet.  The burrito originated in northern Mexico, possibly around the early 1900's from a small place called Ciudad Juárez.  There was a young man who sold street food, transporting himself and the food with his little donkey.  He came up with the idea of keeping the food warm by wrapping it in a tortilla and then a napkin.  People came from far and wide to have this 'food from a little donkey', translating in Spanish to burrito.

So with all this talk of burritos, where's the best one in London?  Interesting question - there is even a whole website purely devoted to this subject - http://www.londonburrito.com/ .  While I don't claim to have tried all the burritos places in London, here is a quick a rundown of my current top favorites:

Chilango - My favorite!  I love the guacamole and fresh ingredients.  The vegetables here are especially good - crunchy as they are not overcooked and full of flavour.  The spicy sauce does not disappoint.
Tortilla - With 5 locations around London, it is the most accessible for a quick meal.  They can struggle with consistency, but the majority of my visits have been great.  The large is a good size and make sure to ask for extra sauce if you want it really hot.
Benito's Hat - Although I found that the guacamole is not quite as tasty as the other two, the chicken is really tender and there are a few more filling choices - the fresh coriander was a real treat!  They also have a range of cocktails and drinks, so you can make more of a night of it.

The cheese hangover

Now, being someone who loves cheese more than probably any other food in the world, it's hard to believe that I could ever get tired of it.  Or worse yet, have a cheese hangover.  But this festive season I think I truly overdid it.

My favorite cheese board was the first one of the season.  We kept it simple with a Brie de Meaux and a Montgomery's Cheddar, which I got from Paxton and Whitfield.  Now I must admit, this was my first time in this cheese shop.  My usual favorites are La Fromagerie and Neal's Yard Dairy, but as this was around the corner from work so I thought I'd give it a try.  It is an impressive shop, with an amazing array of mainly British cheeses. I was a bit disappointed that you had to ask to taste the cheese, but I'm guessing it was because it was the Christmas season.



Brie de Meaux



It always surprises me that Brie de Meaux, which is actually a French cheese, is usually available at most British cheese shops.  Don't get me wrong, I love this soft cheese with a subtle taste when young and an almost overpoweringly nutty, pungent taste when aged.  I guess there must be many other English people that share this love. I like mine aged,and eaten simple - on bread or water biscuits - with a large glass of wine!

Montgomery's Cheddar

I'm not usually a huge fan of cheddar.  I'd usually prefer something like a goats cheese or a continental hard cheese like Comte or pecorino.  Cheddar for me is a bit of an everyday cheese, probably because we always have a block in the fridge.  This cheddar though is very different to the mature blocks you get at Sainsbury's or Tesco's.  It's flavour is rich and deep, with an almost mouldy edge.  It is hard and somewhat crumbly.  It is best eaten with a large bit of brown, crusty bread, onion - pickled if you must!- and maybe some tomato chutney and olives on the side.  Amazing!

Get the Tayyebs smell!

You never think Tuesday night is going to be a busy night. Especially on a very cold evening a couple of weeks before Christmas. So imagine our surprise when we showed up at Tayyebs and had to wait almost an hour to get a table.

The menu has a large number of choices allowing you to order various meats in quite small portions. To make things simple, we opted for the mixed grill, sag alloo and the dhal, along with regular sides such as nanns and rice. Being Punjabi, the food is more spicy than what you may expect from your typical Indian restaurant. Even the poppadoms were spicy! The mixed grill included pieces of chicken (which I have to say were a little on the dry side), lamb kofta and the best bit, lamb chops to die for! Both the vegetarian dishes were also excellent - the dhal was thick and creamy while the sag alloo, although it did not look like much, was extremely well spiced and very tasty.

The only real complaint we hasd was the lack of ventilation in the restaurant. Many of the meat dishes are served on sizzling platters. Due to this, everything we were wearing or had with us smelt of cooking for the next two days. But this is a small price to pay to enjoy such tasty food at very reasonable prices. Also, if you want a beer or some wine, you'll need to bring it with you.