Archive for May, 2011

Bravo!

 
Everyone’s favorite cuisine is coming to COOK and now is your chance to experience the magic of La Bella Vista.
Join me for a flavorful evening of Italian inspiration and discover how easy it is to produce Tuscan fare so authentic that you’ll have diners checking under the table to see where you’ve hidden the Italian mama.

Bellissimo!

Feast your eyes on these Mediterranean beauties.
They’re too DELIZIOSO for English!

Aperitivi
Campari Americano

Primi
Butternut soup with oregano pesto cream
Secondi
Creamy lemon, crab and ricotta cannelloni
Succulent baked lamb with coffee rub, aubergines, tomato and red wine tossed through pasta
Contorni
Festival salad
Dolci
Double cheese Italian dream dessert with a caramel coffee drizzle

Plus!

Fabulous food is your numero uno reason for booking for this winning workshop….
A sassy Girl’s Night Out ‘Handbags & Stilettos’ table setting makes it deux.

Make like the Mafia and move FAST to secure your seat in this popular class.
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I have a Lavazza coffee machine. Typically Italian, it’s feisty and erratic but on a good day, when it does comply it produces an espresso with a good crema, which is the only thing I will add to any recipe which calls for coffee.

I decided not to include Tiramisu as the dessert of choice for my Italian theme (boring) I find it more of a family style dessert-very casual and nice but certainly not worth making you pay me to teach you.

Mmmmm, I am not a sponge finger kind of girl but, dipped in a good Lavazza espresso and topped with Frangelico infused mascarpone, I’ll relent.

Besides my feisty little Italian coffee machine, the other ingredient that knocked my socks off was grating some of Willy’s 100% cacao on top.

 I am not sure if it was Venezuelan or Peruvian, it was not very Italian but I grabbed a block at Woolies and I think I may have paid equivalent of a new tyre for my Mini. Just use a good 70% chocolate instead.

This is a very simple version, in that it’s egg free and super- fast (just like my Mini, which only has 3 new tyres now)

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So the new Lovoka chocolate and caramel vodka is da bomb, or should I say the “new” Jager bomb.
It’s like having an alcoholic shot of crème brûlée or chocolate cake. So why not use it in a cake I thought?

I used the Mississippi Mud Cake recipe from CAKES and exchanged the bourbon for chocolate vodka.

The cake was so good, I then exchanged the vodka for Frangelico and hoped to feature it on my upcoming Italian course, but it was not half as good. The vodka is like an essence and just enhances the chocolate flavour.

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The only sensible explanation as to how a mediocre baker like me could come up with such a fabulous recipe is that it was just pure luck.

I kept tweaking a basic mud pie recipe and while all this testing and tweaking was going on, I ran out of chocolate. Swearing furiously (I was on my fourth batch and really making progress), I went to the “sweet” shelf in my kitchen and grabbed some Top Deck, thinking that the flavour would never work.

Let’s face it. Who would melt Top Deck?

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Brrrrrrrrr

Curry weather is here, and this is my take on a winter warming lamb curry.

I use deboned shoulder of lamb, which is more succulent and tender than leg.

I also serve my curries with non traditional salsa’s and this curry benefits from the addition of Greek yoghurt when cooked. Just blob some on top or swirl it through.

Otherwise make the cooling cucumber and hot tomato sambal to accompany. Recipes below.

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There are certain food smells which, when I smell them, take me back to my childhood with a jolt..

It was not the smell of this cake that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, but the smell of the mixer. You really need to beat and beat and beat the butter and sugar and while bending down to get to get something out the cupboard, my nose brushed past the base of the machine, which was working overtime and I suddenly remembered the most vivid smell of all-my mom’s hand held mixer, the hot smell of the motor almost burning while it worked overtime.

I knew then it was going to be a great cake.

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Fresh fig salad

I have been working on my Italian. By this I’m referring, of course, to food. I had a rather short-lived adventure into the language and made a decision to keep my upcoming menu in English only!

Figs are abundant. This very Mediterranean delicacy is catching on in South Africa and I am delighted to find that the availability increases every year.

So the Italian word for fig is FIGA, or so I thought. It’s actually FICA derived from Figa and while Figa sounds exotic and strong (Feeeega!), I found out soon enough that it’s it is also very offensive.

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