Stroganoff

I am absolutely in love with this Stroganoff recipe. We must have had this at least 10 times in the last month. We have had it so many times actually, I am sure we are half Russian by now.

This one uses pork fillet instead of the traditional beef, but you are welcome to use beef, it stays the same and tastes fantastic either way.

This will take you as long as it takes the rice to cook.    20-30 min. And it is a lot healthier than the original version.  The plain yogurt just gives it that hint of sour deliciousness.

This recipe will easily serve 4 people.

Ingredients:

500g pork fillet – cut into thin strips

2 punnets brown mushrooms – sliced roughly

2 heaped tablespoons paprika

½ teaspoon dried garlic

Lots of butter

5 heaped tablespoons of plain yogurt

250ml cream

Salt and pepper to taste

A good glug of brandy

Method:

1. Sprinkle all the paprika on your pork strips and rub it in well
2. Fry the mushrooms and the garlic in the butter until they are well fried and reduced by about 70% – set aside
3. In the same pan, without adding oil/butter, fry your pork strips that you have covered in the paprika, until done
4. Add your mushrooms back, and fry until it is all the same temperature again, and add your salt and pepper
5. Add your brandy and set it alight! (I love this part). Let it burn out by itself
6. Add your yogurt and cream, stir well, and let it simmer until the sauce is as thick as you want it

Voila! Done.

Flambéed Mixed Mushroom Pasta

This pasta dish started with the gift of a bottle of brandy. We aren’t really drinkers, so I started wondering what other uses I can have for the brandy. After reading up about the original recipe of Stroganoff, I decided that I would play around with it a bit and come up with a healthier, vegetarian version.

The first time I flambéed the mushrooms, I almost lost my fringe! But the taste that came out was worth the fright! I also made it on my birthday for lunch when my parents, brother and sister came over. While I was making the dish I could hear everybody laughing and talking behind me (we are a loud family), once I added the brandy and set it alight, all was suddenly very quiet behind me. After a couple of seconds my mom joked:

“Ok Jouré, we won’t be naughty any more…”

So here is it. The dish for those that behave themselves 😉

Ingredients:

Smoked salt – the clumpy ones

½ teaspoon whole coriander

½ teaspoon whole mustard seeds

1 clove fresh garlic – crushed

Butter

Pepper

4 heaped tablespoons of plain yogurt

125ml cream

50-75 ml of Brandy

1 punnet of small brown mushrooms – roughly chopped

1 punnet of mixed wild/exotic mushrooms (Enoki, Oyster, Porcini, etc) – roughly chopped

Method:

1. Dry fry your mustard seeds, coriander and salt for about 1 minute on high heat. Take out of the pan and put it aside
2. Fry your mushrooms and garlic on high heat in the butter. You will see how much they need. Mushrooms usually need quite a bit to make them extra creamy
3. Add you fried spices and pepper
4. Add the brandy and light it up! It will burn for as long as there is alcohol in it. Let it burn out by itself
5. Add the yogurt and cream and let it simmer – it will thicken by itself. It isn’t a very thick sauce but that is what makes it so great. It will cover your pasta and there will be sauce left that you can scoop up with some delicious home made bread

Mediterranean Pasta

This pasta dish is one of my all time favourites. It has a little bit of Spain, a little bit of Italy and a little bit of me. It is very easy to make, and the batch I made last night I didn’t even add salt or pepper to it. Just 4 ingredients, excluding meat and vegetables.

You really need to use the best Chorizo sausage you can afford. We have a butcher here that has his own smokehouse so he makes it all himself. And they are fantastic! This pasta also has some dried Paprika in it which goes extremely well with the Chorizo.

This is a happy, feel-good and satisfying meal. It is also quite healthy. You use so little cream that it almost doesn’t make a difference. You can also use low-fat/fat-free cream if you want. The ones here just suspiciously look like paint… I am pretty sure cream isn’t supposed to “shine” like that!

Regardless of what you decide, you will enjoy this meal.

Bon Appetit!

Ingredients:

2x cubed chicken breatst

2x Chorizo sausages, sliced (mine was approximately 10cm long each)

5x medium courgettes, sliced

1/2 cup (125ml) chicken stock (you can split this 50-50 with some white wine if you want)

1/2 cup (125ml) cream

1 teaspoon dried paprika

1/2 teaspoon dried garlic (the dried one tastes a lot better than fresh in this dish)

Some olive oil or butter for frying, I usually use a combination of the two.

Method:

1. Fry your courgettes in your oil/butter/both with the Paprika and garlic until the courgettes just start to brown

2. Add your chicken and fry it until there aren’t any more raw sides (chicken always needs to be cooked well!)

3. Add the Chorizo and fry it until the fat is rendered

4. Add you chicken stock, or whine/chicken stock mix, and let it reduce until at least 25% is evaporated.

5. Add your cream, reduce the heat, and simmer it until it just thickens.

You are done! Serve this on any pasta you want, I like the Penne Millerighe or the Fusilli. If you want to make it extra decadent add some Parmesan shavings.

Serve it with a salad of your choice!

Gourmet Beef Burger

Here is one of my favourite mince recipes. It is my homemade burger! We got tired of the rubber patties in restaurants and in shops, so we decided to make our own. It took a couple of tries, but this is now perfect! It is quite spicy, but full of flavour! Enjoy! ♥ Joure

Recipe: Beef Burger
Ingredients:
500g beef mince
2 large eggs
3/4 cup fresh bread crumbs
1 tablespoon dried, fine coriander
1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons mustard, preferably Dijon wholegrain
Salt and pepper to taste
Olive oil and butter for frying

Method:
1. In a large mixing bowl, mix the mince and the spices together.
2. Add the Worcestershire sauce and the mustard.
3. Add the eggs, and mix well.
4. Add the crumbs and really mix it well. If you can see that the mixture is dry, add another egg.
5. Let it rest for at least 30min in the fridge, then shape into patties and fry them in a mixture of olive oil and butter.

*Remember, they “rise” as you fry them, so make them nice and flat when you put them in your pan, they will lift and become nice “fatties”

Perfect Pasta

Hello! Here is an extra recipe for today! It is a truelly fantastic vegetarian pasta dish. Made this accidentally when I ran out of food and this was all that was in the fridge 😉
Enjoy ♥ Joure

Recipe: Perfect pasta
Ingredients
1 packet of pasta
6 big brown mushrooms, sliced
1/2 cup frozen peas
1 cup broccoli, sliced
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp dried origanum
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp garlic powder
Salt and pepper
Butter for frying
250ml cream

Method:
1. Cook the pasta to packet instructions – keep some pasta water
2. Fry the mushrooms well in the butter
3. Add the garlic powder
4. Add the broccoli, peas and dried herbs. Fry until the peas are defrosted. Add some of the pasta water to unstick the herbs and moisten the peas to help them defrost
5. Add the cream
6. Simmer the sauce until the mushrooms are “melted”
7. Serve on your pasta and enjoy! ♥

It’s a (chicken) wrap

Recipe of the day: Went for something sweet and healthy. Not the kind of sweet you’d find in a cake, but the kind of sweet that you find in a baked tomato… Enjoy!

Recipe: It’s a wrap
This recipe is one of my: I’m-actually-too-lazy-to-cook ones. It tastes great, is fantastic on the conscience and is so easy you can read a book while doing it.
“One cannot think well, love well sleep well, if one has not dined well.” Virginia Woolf, A room of one’s own

Ingredients:
4 deboned and de-skinned chicken breast
3 pieces of Parma ham or bacon
2 punnets of cherry tomatoes. Try to get 2 different ones. I like using the yellow and the red ones. More eye candy on your plate.
Balsamic vinegar
Olive oil
Dried origanum
Salt and pepper
1 packet of pasta

Method:
Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
Wrap the chicken in the Parma ham or bacon. Stick a toothpick through it if it keeps on rolling off.
Place the breasts in a baking tray.
Add the tomatoes to the tray letting them fall on and next to the chicken.
Sprinkle everything with some balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
Grind some salt and pepper over this and add the origanum. (About ½ teaspoon per chicken breast)
Bake in the oven for about 30-45 minutes, depending on how thick your breasts are.
Cook the pasta according to instructions.
When the chicken and the pasta is done, plate the pasta up, pour some of the juice that collected in the bottom of the tray over, and place a chicken breast on top.
You are ready to tuck in!

Bobotie

Here is a very yummy dish for you to make over the weekend for the whole family to enjoy! MY version of Bobotie, our National Dish.

Recipe: Bobotie

There is no better recipe than Bobotie to accompany this story. It is our national dish after all, and we do live in Africa. 

“Food for thought is no substitute for the real thing.” Walt Kelly

Ingredients:
1 kg beef mince
1 thick slice of white bread, crust removed. Old bread tastes better.
250ml milk
2 medium chopped onions
2 tablespoons of curry powder
2 tablespoons of turmeric
Juice of 1 large lemon
4 tablespoons of apricot jam. If you can get home made ones, fantastic!
1 teaspoon of brown sugar
1 tablespoon of fresh, minced ginger
2 eggs
1 packet of flaked almonds
Some bay leaves or lemon tree leaves if you have them
Butter and vegetable oil for frying
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Preheat your oven to 160 degrees Celsius.
Soak the bread in half of the milk until soft, and mash with a fork.
On the stove top, fry the 2 onions in a mixture of butter and vegetable oil.
Add the curry powder, turmeric and s&p and fry for a minute.
Add the lemon juice, brown sugar, half the apricot jam, ginger, soaked bread, flaked almonds and mince. Reduce heat.
Fry until the meat is browned and not clumpy anymore.
Pack the meat into an oven proof dish.
In a separate bowl, beat the eggs, remaining milk and remaining apricot jam together.
Pour this over the meat, stick in the bay or lemon leaves and bake for 30min or until done.

I usually serve Bobotie with rice cooked in coconut milk, bananas cut up and sprinkled with coconut, a bowl of chopped tomatoes (with or without onion) and a bowl of chutney.

Fancy Mac and Cheese

Here is my ultimate comfort food recipe. My decadent mac and cheese! Can never get enough of this! It doesn’t matter how much I make, at the end of dinner, it is always finished.. 🙂

Recipe: Fancy Mac and cheese

This macaroni and cheese is a combination of my grandmother’s recipe, and the necessity to make a mac and cheese that Dominic would eat. So add more cheeses, mushrooms and voila! Fancy and delectable!

“Great food is like great sex: The more you have, the more you want.” – Gael Greene

Ingredients:
1 packet macaroni. I also use penne because I like the big noodles.
1 litre of milk – for the white sauce
1 packet of large brown mushrooms
Garlic powder
Some olive oil
Butter
Corn flour
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon mustard – Dijon if you want to be extra fancy
1-2 tomatoes, VERY thinly sliced
Salt and pepper to taste
½ cup of grated fresh parmesan
½ cup of grated cheddar – a mature one is always best, but not always in the budget
½ cup of grated mozzarella
A couple of slices of Edam

Method:
On a flat baking sheet, pack out your mushrooms, sprinkle them with olive oil and garlic powder and bake in a 180 degree Celsius oven until they have shrunk to half their size. (Don’t switch your oven off)
Make your pasta according to the packet’s instructions, making sure they are very al dente. You are going to bake it in a sauce again after all, and soggy noodles are yuck!
Make your white sauce using the butter, corn flour and milk.
Add the mustard, paprika and salt and pepper to your white sauce, and mix it in well.
Now in a deep dish, I use a 29cmx22cmx6cm oven dish; layer half of your pasta.
Spread half of your white sauce over it, and mix in the cheddar cheese.
On top of this, layer your mushrooms so that it covers the whole layer.
Cover them with the Edam slices.
Then layer the rest of your pasta on top of that, with the rest of the white sauce and mix in the mozzarella.
On top of this, layer your thinly sliced tomatoes, as many as you want, but they must cover the whole.
Sprinkle the parmesan onto this, and bake at 180 degrees Celsius for about 30minutes or until the dish is a golden brown.
Let the dish cool for about 10 minutes before you serve it. It gives the sauce a chance to set.

Alfredo (sort of)

Recipe: M’ Alfredo
This is my version of Alfredo. I realise that it isn’t the Italian meal anymore, but this meal is a winner. It never flops, (it has cream in it), and is done by the time the pasta is cooked. I’d happily eat this at least once a day.
“The problem with eating Italian food, is that five or six days later, you’re hungry again.” George Miller
Ingredients:
Olive oil and butter for frying
1 packet of bacon, cut into strips
1 packet mushrooms, sliced
250ml cream
1 packet mangetout or ½ cup of peas
1 tsp dried garlic flakes
2tsp Jouré’s Rustic Alfredo mix
Salt and pepper to taste
¾ – 1 packet penne pasta
Grated, fresh parmesan to serve

Method:
Cook the pasta according to instructions.
While the pasta is cooking, fry the garlic in the olive oil and butter mix in a very hot pan.
Add the bacon and mushrooms and fry until the bacon is done.
Add the dried herbs and s&p. Don’t worry if it looks like it’s burning onto the pan, that makes it extra delicious.
Add the cream, while the pan is still very hot, stir, and reduce the heat.
Add the mangetout or peas and simmer till the sauce is thickened.
Your pasta should just be about done, drain the penne, pour the sauce over, and enjoy!

*Note: instead of bacon, try kassler. Instead of cream, try Crème Fraiche or sour cream. And experiment with different types of mushrooms! Also, this is delicious on baked potatoes, especially if you use the sour cream.

Serves 2 gluttons, or up to 4 normal people, if you add a nice warm bread.

Chilli con Carne

 

Here is my thrifty recipe for left over mince. We all have some leftover mince in the fridge from time to time. Here is something else to do with besides put it on toast… Enjoy!

Recipe:Chilli con Carne
Ingredients:
15ml oil
1 large onion, chopped
300g leftover mince
1 can chopped tomatoes
125ml beef stock
30ml tomato paste
50ml sweet chilli sauce
1-2 red chillies, finely chopped
some fresh oregano
1 can red kidney beans
salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Saute the onion in the oil.
Add everything besides the beans, and cook for about 15 minutes.
Add the beans, and cook for a further 5 minutes.
I usually serve it on pasta.
Delish!