Everything-and-the-kitchen-sink minestrone
Easter is gone and May beckons. Yup folks, soup season is upon us. Not the stick-to-your-ribs kind packed with truckloads of meaty bones quite yet. That’s for June. The in-between evenings of May call for something altogether lighter I think. Lighter, yet still comforting. Minestrone is the answer. Now minestrone is one of those jolly fabulous recipes that can be [...]
Hot cross crumpets
I’m a bit stunned that a quarter of the year is gone and Easter is mere days away. My response to this freakishly quick passage of time is the same as my response to the scale on the infrequent occasions I bother to get on it – how the heck did it happen? But Easter it is and something Easter-themed [...]
5-spice pork spare ribs
Pork spare ribs – they have to be one of my ultimate braai time treats, but only if they are done right. That means they are melt-in-the-mouth, fall-off-the-bone soft, yet smokey and charred at the same time. The secret to getting it right? An initial cook followed by a super hot bit of braai love at the end. Now you [...]
Smoked salmon paté
Champagne taste on a beer budget… That’s pretty much my biggest culinary challenge. Take smoked salmon. I love it. Do I get to dig into the prime stuff often? Not often, no. Actually, more like not at all. It’s just too expensive. Instead I feed my smoked salmon inner beast with smoked salmon off-cuts. It’s not pretty to look at [...]
Pinotage and plum pavlova
So the Argus has come and gone. It may not have been much of an event this year, what with the South Easter howling at up to 100km an hour and the cycle race being cancelled about an hour in. Cancelled or not, for me the Argus is my line in the sand. My signal that the soul-destroyingly, pulse-slittingly endless [...]
Pork shank ragu with white wine and fennel
Heart palpitations are not foreign to me. I get them every time I go into a supermarket. Now I used to get them when I saw ingredients that excited me. Sadly these days the ever-increasing prices of those ingredients are the cause. I don’t like it one bit, but it is what it is. The only solution is coming up [...]