Land of Capes, Springboks, Butternut, Trim Mayo and Sahara's?

My flatmate drew this picture in my honour. It depicts all that is known about South Africans :)

We have the ever important Springbok, helpfully  labelled, on the top right.
Then we have me, "W", and a couple of other South Africans in our capes...because we are from Cape Town - land where everyone runs around in capes (weird that I, probably along with millions of other Capetonians, have never made THAT connection).

I am holding aloft - in triumph - a giant jar of Trim mayo. There was a shortage, but thanks to an early morning phone call and a fleet-footed sister-in-law, I managed to obtain one of only six in NZ. I obviously talk about it alot, which is how it made the pic. As I must also talk a fair amount about how much I love butternuts... I buy giant ones and make soup - yum!

Of course we South African's talk in our own language that foreigners find difficult to understand. In this world our language consists of only two words, "Soouf Afwicaa" (that's our supposed accent) repeated in a variety of tones.
The cape wearers are also drinking my favourite South African drink...um, Sahara's?? close, but wrong desert :)

Someone's got a lot of time on their hands. Very funny : D

Soup Glorious Soup

Following the delicious bread and cheese, I had to find the winter equivalent bread accompaniment. Soup!

The fresh food market just across the road has every vegetable or fruit I could ever need at incredibly cheap prices. 

This is a picture of only one row of the many...taken during summer - it is not sunny or warm here anymore... (I sometimes pray for rain, because that means it will be warmer out... just glad I invested in a hot water bottle!)

One good thing came out of all that rain, frost and excessive layering though; glorious soup! in hundreds of varieties.

I was very lucky, then, to get an awesome stick mix blender for my Birthday! Just in time for winter...

So that this stunning fresh butternut can easily be turned into this...

...Soup! Note the freshly baked bread in the background...

Only problem is recipes and me generally don't get along. I tend to see them more as tentative suggestions rather than any kind of tried and trusted guide to a delicious meal. I also tend to just add random ingredients from the pantry and fridge all willy nilly. Usually works out.... ?

Next on the menu was a potato and spring onion soup garnished with cayenne pepper and spring onion...just because they were sitting in the kitchen looking at me...waiting to be used... 

...accompanied by rushed home baked tomato puff pastry. Yum! 

I seem to have a serious spicy food addiction too. I also made a kumara and carrot soup (didn't photo) and I was a bit heavy handed with the cayenne pepper...lets just say I was grateful to still have milk in the fridge. Was really a great winter warmer though!

I managed to polish off a second batch of butternut soup last night and tonight decided to try a spiced kumara soup. No bread or time to bake tonight so for extra sustenance I cooked up some thinly sliced chicken in garlic and Ina Paarmans Braai & Grill Spice. Perfect meal!

I got this recipe from Alison Holst's Soup Book (also a gift for my Birthday) and I actually followed the recipe! ... mostly... well, I only put in 1 and 1/2 t curry powder instead of going crazy (the recipe only says 1/2 t). It's progress... 

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Ingredients:

2 cloves garlic (I just used bottled to taste)

1/2 to 1 t curry powder

75g butter

600g kumara

1 1/2 C water

2 t instant chicken stock powder or 1 t salt (I used the stock)

3 C milk (this was waaaaay too much, would have completely eradicated the spiciness  and I like my soup thick. Just add to                  right consistency)

1/4 C cream optional (if the milk was too much, this would be extravagant - didn't even consider making a shop run for this)

Add finely chopped garlic and curry powder to the butter in a large pot (Oh, forgot I also added onion and spring onion, just for kicks).

Peel the kumara thinly and cut them in half lengthways. Slice 1cm thick, crossways.

Cook the vegetables gently in the butter without browning, for 1-2 minutes, then add the water. Cover and cook for 10 minutes or until the kumara is tender.

Stir in the instant chicken stock or salt, then puree the vegetables and cooking liquid, thinning the puree with milk until the soup is the thickness you like.

Add cream for a richer soup, and reheat without boiling.

This recipe can also be made with parsnip instead of kumara.

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Also, just for the record, I didn't suddenly go on a soup diet. I made these soups (and more) over the space of 3 months, froze some and gobbled the rest. I'll need to make another trip to the market on Sunday!!

Bread Lovely Bread!

So months ago I decided I needed bread. Fresh bread, still warm delicious fresh bread so I sucked up my inexplicable fear of baking large savoury loaves and found a no-knead recipe.

It all worked out rather marvellously! Mixed it up on a Saturday evening, let it rest overnight and in the morning finished up the prep and baked a delicious round.

I only have a small ceramic bowl so it just had to do. Lovely rested dough, doubled in size overnight.

Fold it a couple times, quick rest and then into the floured tea towel to sit for another 2 hours. 

It was an ice cold day - well below room temperature - so put it by the window to thaw out a little, just a bit... 

While it was having this second rest, I ventured out to the fresh food market that graces Wellington every Sunday for some much needed blue cheese and french chicken liver pate. Can't beat buying cheese and pate from someone with a french accent...

Got back just in time to pop the round into the oven and then one hour later lunch was served. There is just something about bread that I can't resist. Deliciously browned thick crust with surprisingly light soft bready bits. It is heavier than your run of the mill white bread, but warm homemade bread trumps bought every time!

The bread recipe came from http://www.notquitenigella.com/2010/03/22/no-kneading-bread/

Other spoils from the market...

These lovely (and incredibly cheap) ingredients became a divine butternut soup, a kumara carrot soup and a potato onion soup. All fantastic, although I was a little (and when I say a little, I really mean a lot!) heavy handed with the cayenne pepper... ... it ended up a tad spicy, but nothing that I couldn't handle on a cold autumn evening.

Cookies and Cream Truffles

These were so yum! and by far the easiest to make ever!

I forgot to take photos of mine. I did manage to get a few looking much nicer and neater than these. Drizzling the white chocolate takes a bit of skill. You can really see which ones I did first - using a fork is just not possible, I used a zip lock bag with a tiny hole in the corner in the end. Melted chocolate is not particularly cooperative!


Delicious and easy-to-make treat perfect with some coffee on a cold afternoon!


Ingredients

• 500 g Oreo biscuits
• 250 g cream cheese, softened
• 400 g milk chocolate
• 100 g white chocolate
• 
  

Method

1. In a blender, crush cookies. 
2. Pour into a bowl, add cream chese and mix until there are no traces of white. 
3. Using a teaspoon, roll mixture into balls, place on a baking paper lined tray and refrigeratre for 45 minutes. 
4. Break milk chocolate into pieces and pop in a microwaveable container, melt gradually stirring every 20 seconds until smooth. 
5. Coat balls thoroughly with melted chocolate, place back into fridge to cool. 
6. Finally melt remaining white chocolate and using a fork drizzle melted white chocolate over balls.

I just used a rolling pin to crush cookies and made a half recipe,  300g box of cookies and half a tub of cream cheese. 

I will definitely be making this for my next work morning tea - will be just as fun watching people trying to get the black cookie dough off their front teeth as it will be to make and eat them! :)

Not just winners, MAJOR winners! :)

The Kiwi Way

Sorry, just found some more random photos - just have to post this... it is the kiwi way!

This is the camera shot of the Maori warriors doing their thing next to the winner's podium at the Rugby Sevens...can't help but notice how the Kiwis choose to hold up the screen...

The cameraman even went in for a close up of him...

And there's the podium - guy still doing his job.

For the win!

Alice in (or rather behind) Wonderland!

Don't you just want to go here?!

It is actually a bar in one of the back streets of Wellington...

"Well done, you curious thing, the journey's end is almost in sight,

Start at a place named Courtenay, where the neon's burning bright,

Face the old Queen's mountain and it's a simple turn to the right

onto a street  - the host of an English party. Political or dance? Tory might,

Now, can you see the lane for the trees? The forest comes alive at night,

Down the rabbit hole my curious friend and discover the capital's delight."

...and that is not tea!

Directions above are found on their web page. The bar is located behind a yellow door, under a neon white rabbit that dives into the hole of a doorway, on Forresters Lane found just off Tory Street at the foot of Mount Victoria. Interestingly it is also found behind an 80's club, complete with disco lit up dance floor and mirror balls, called Boogie Wonderland.

I haven't been to Alice yet, but is on my 'have-to-do list'! Cocktails in a teapot!

Description from http://www.aa.co.nz/aadirections/features/Pages/Alice-Bar.aspx:

"The alleyway is Wellington's Forrester's Lane and it's dark and wet, with rain-filled pot holes that gape like open mouths. At the far end of the darkness we see, tucked in against the back entrance to Boogie Wonderland, a white rabbit. It flashes on and off, jumps, jumps, and disappears. This is Alice.

The rabbit hole, in this instance, is a bright yellow door and a corridor that winds and then dips down into a cocktail bar where you can drink Bill the Lizard's Lagermeister Tea poured out of a tea pot into bone china cups. Friday is cupcake day at $3 a pop, to be eaten with the drink of your choice - perhaps The Cheshire Cat, although the barman says you'd be hard pressed to go past a tipple of Curiouser and Curiouser (a concoction of Ti-Toki berry liqueur, kiwifruit and amaretto). The drinks list comes bound as a hardcover book, which has proven so popular as a souvenir that 20 have been stolen. They're considering chaining copies to the bar.

On the wall a framed portrait of the Queen of Hearts stares down a hookah-smoking caterpillar. And there is the porthole mirror at the end of the room, which looks like a door that ought to lead somewhere, if only you could fold up like a telescope to fit through.

Alice is open until 5am on weekends, making it all the more likely that you'll lose track of time and emerge at dawn, fumbling for your pocket watch and saying, "Oh my ears and whiskers, how late it's getting!" "