Last night Timol left me at home all alone. I had prior knowledge of this so I visited a local store for some supplies before arriving home. I was out of Famous Grouse so had to make do with red wine. Here is what went down.
Tag Archives: cooking
Venison potjie
The “basic” recipe is here and my photos are shown below.
Visit Potjiekosworld and read about our South African culture “When the first Dutch settlers arrived in the Cape, they brought with them their ways of cooking food in heavy cast iron pots, which hung from the kitchen hearth above the fire.
Long before the arrival of the early settlers in the Cape, the Bantu people who were migrating into South Africa, learned the use of the cast iron cooking pot from Arab traders and later the Portuguese colonists.
These cast iron pots were able to retain heat well and only a few coals were needed to keep the food simmering for hours. They were used to cook tender roasts and stews, allowing steam to circulate inside instead of escaping through the lid.
The ingredients were relatively simple, a fatty piece of meat, a few potatoes and some vegetables were all that was needed to cook a delightful meal.” Read more here.
My step-by-step mutton curry potjie recipe is here.
Aqua Restaurant at Sibaya 2
Aqua inside Sibaya Casino north of Durban is set on three floors, with larger than life aquatic décor and a cylindrical fish tank with an upper level of Teppanyaki tables and a sushi bar, a middle section for a la carte diners and a sunken cocktail bar.
Timol and I were not impressed in a number of categories and much prefer Daruma.
Aqua Restaurant at Sibaya
Aqua inside Sibaya Casino north of Durban is set on three floors, with larger than life aquatic décor and a cylindrical fish tank with an upper level of Teppanyaki tables and a sushi bar, a middle section for a la carte diners and a sunken cocktail bar.
Timol and I were not impressed in a number of categories and much prefer Daruma.
Daruma Authentic Japanese Restaurant 4
Daruma Authentic Japanese Restaurant 3
We visited Daruma in Durban once again and had even more fun.
During our previous visit I only had my Blackberry available so the photos were of an inferior quality.
This time I took the Canon but left my big flash at home (silly-Billy).
Once again we sat around the teppanyaki sipping on sake and white wine until the food was ready, and then used chopsticks to eat.
Wikipedia reveals: “Teppanyaki (鉄板焼き teppan-yaki) is a style of Japanese cuisine that uses an iron griddle to cook food.
The word teppanyaki is derived from teppan (鉄板), which means iron plate, and yaki (焼き), which means grilled, broiled or pan-fried.
In Japan, teppanyaki refers to dishes cooked using an iron plate, including steak, shrimp, okonomiyaki, yakisoba, and monjayaki.
Modern teppanyaki grills are typically propane-heated flat surface grills, and are widely used to cook food in front of guests at restaurants.
Teppanyaki grills are commonly confused with the hibachi barbecue grill, which has a charcoal or gas flame and is made with an open grate design.
With a solid griddle type cook surface, the teppanyaki is more suitable for smaller ingredients, such as rice, egg, and finely chopped vegetables.
Sake (/ˈsɑːkeɪ/ or /ˈsɑːki/)[1][2] is an alcoholic beverage of Japanese origin that is made from fermented rice.
It may also be spelled saké. In the Japanese language, the word sake refers to Japanese liquor, while the beverage called sake in English is termed nihonshu (日本酒, “Japanese liquor”).
Sake is sometimes referred to in English-speaking countries as rice wine.
However, unlike wine, in which alcohol is produced by fermenting sugar that is naturally present in grapes and other fruits, sake is produced by means of a brewing process more like that of beer.
To make beer or sake, the sugar needed to produce alcohol must first be converted from starch.
The brewing process for sake differs from the process for beer, in that for beer, the conversion from starch to sugar and from sugar to alcohol occurs in two discrete steps. But when sake is brewed, these conversions occur simultaneously.
Furthermore, the alcohol content differs between sake, wine, and beer. Wine generally contains 9%–16% ABV,[3] while most beer contains 3%–9%, and undiluted sake contains 18%–20% (although this is often lowered to about 15% by diluting with water prior to bottling).”
Mutton & Vegetable potjie
I set about cooking a mutton & vegetable potjie this past weekend. The images below, in order of ingredients added, tell their own story.
This is value-for-money type cooking as the “tougher” type meats are ideal.
Cooking is slow and sociable as persons present can gather around the pot, which is usually outside, and tell stories / sip on a glass of wine / beer.
Visit Potjiekosworld and read about our South African culture.
Here is a taster from them: “When the first Dutch settlers arrived in the Cape, they brought with them their ways of cooking food in heavy cast iron pots, which hung from the kitchen hearth above the fire.
Long before the arrival of the early settlers in the Cape, the Bantu people who were migrating into South Africa, learned the use of the cast iron cooking pot from Arab traders and later the Portuguese colonists.
These cast iron pots were able to retain heat well and only a few coals were needed to keep the food simmering for hours.
They were used to cook tender roasts and stews, allowing steam to circulate inside instead of escaping through the lid.
The ingredients were relatively simple, a fatty piece of meat, a few potatoes and some vegetables were all that was needed to cook a delightful meal.”
Read more here.
Andy ate his way through Turkey 2
Andy eats his way through Turkey 1
The chef tastes Antalya, Turkey
Here are some more photos taken a few days ago with a Samsung s4 mobile phone.
Please give me some feedback as to how they appear on a big desktop screen as I can only presently view them on the mobile’s screen from where I am publishing this post.
Andrew Harvard Photography 