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Friday, October 26, 2012

GUAVAS. SHAKING THE TREE.


Give it plenty of welly                             Mans


They say it’s guava season, although I’m not convinced. Well ok, it’s actually right at the end of the season (remember, I live in the southern hemisphere), so I had to make use of the fading window of opportunity and get me hands on some guavas. Via facebook, my friends Ez and Poley Moley, who have three or four guava trees in their garden, more than obliged by arranging a happy little gathering, where we all jovially chomped a fine Indian vegetarian meal with our hands. The highlights were Poly Moley’s delicious rotis, but this is hardly surprising, coz Poley is ‘The Undisputed Roti Champion of the World’.

Eat at least two while collecting them                     Mans

Anyway, before the happy chopping happened, I learnt the art of guava picking.

Guava Picking Technique
Put on crash helmet and place gum guard
Grab an appropriate branch and shake violently
Collect guavas off the deck, while eating at least two

Now, with a basket of guavas wot does one do? At our little gathering, Ez poached a few in a little water with a scoop of honey and served them up with a dollop of yoghurt with a little more honey drizzled over the top. Simple, but delicious. Coz I had a whole lot of them, I chose to try my hand at bottling them in a vanilla sugar syrup. After a little advice from my friend Anna, I blindly gave it a go. My method woz far from scientific. This is wot I did.


Rustic works for me                Mans
Wot you need
Guavas
Sugar
Vanilla pods
Water


Wot to do
Top and tail the guavas and chop them in half. I didn’t go with exact measurements, but rather felt my way with ratios. I put the guavas in a pot and memorized roughly the level. I then took the guavas out and filled the pot with water to about two thirds (I think  half would be better) of the previous guava level. I then measured the amount of water in the pot, tossed in an equal quantity of sugar, scraped the seeds out of a couple of vanilla pods, threw both the seeds and empty pods into the pot, bought the syrup to a boil, then gently placed the guavas in the hot syrup. When they returned to the boil again, I turned off the heat and bottled the little pink beauties in sterilized jars. My ratios were not quite right coz I ended up with a bottle of guava syrup as well. I mean, ‘how bad is that mistake?’. I know this method is far from an exact science; it’s all about guesswork and a lot of faith. I must say I was rather delighted how yummy they turned out, although the younger firmer guavas seemed to be better. I was not in a position to be fussy, coz at the end of the season you take wot you can.

Nothing fancy, but very homely and comforting                                                                                              Mans







Friday, October 19, 2012

'THE HEALTHY HEART', AN URBAN FEAST


No pressure when your guests arrive in Rolls        Mans
It just so happened that, ‘The 2 Peter’s’ (Peter Long and Peter Shepherd) kindly offered us the use of their beautiful Belair Manor House and it’s extended property, as a venue for our second ‘Urban Feast’, just when the avos were avoing, the waterbloemetjies were bloemetjieing (water flowers were flowering), the snails were purging, the nettles were stinging, the artichokes were choking and the hearts were loving. So a spontaneous decision was made, ‘LETZ GO FOR IT’.

The Nasturtium Pesto was flattened in no time           Mans
Avos from the estate needed to be picked in advance, so as to ripen in time for the feast, and once they were, there was no turning back. Together Stef, Harry and I planned a daring menu that featured mostly foraged food, but the main event was ‘The Healthy Heart’, which was stuffed lamb hearts and for the vegetarians, artichoke hearts. Lamb hearts basically chose themselves, coz Peter Long told me how he treated his beloved dog Chart who was suffering from an advanced stage of cancer, by only feeding him free-range lamb hearts. Today Chart has no trace of cancer and still enjoys a lamb heart everyday. It seemed obvious, that the hearts should be the main feature; Stef the genius came up with the idea of artichoke hearts as the vegetarian option. Harry our wine guru, selected all the wines from Constantia Glen, whose vineyards virtually neighbour the Two Peter’s Estate, once again the obvious choice.

John & Celeste doing The Rumba                                 Mans
So this is how the evening unfolded – When the guest arrived in the early evening, they were welcomed with, a pomegranate and lemon cosmopolitan. The pomegranates were foraged (with permission) from my neighbourhood and made into a reduction, while the lemons came from my beloved lemon tree. There was also homemade ginger beer and lemonade for those who wanted to take it easy. After their cocktails the guests were then taken up onto the magnificent upper terrace of the property, where they snacked picnic style on artisanal breads, with an avo dip and nasturtium pesto. From where the guests lounged they could not only see the amazing views of Table Mountain and the ranging city, but also the avocado trees and nasturtium patch from which the goodies they were chomping came from. Just as the snacks were coming to an end, one of the ‘guest’, Emilie Le Louche ushered the others away from under the ‘tripod gazebo’ unwrapped the stands fabric from the supports and performed a beautifully creative aerial act, spontaneously choreographed to the sound of a squawking Harde-dar. It was then down into the courtyard outside the kitchen where top Latin American Dancers Duo Celeste Botha and John Hammon performed a fiery and sensuous rumba, all in keeping with ‘The Heart Theme’. The dance piece was concluded with a serving of my lovingly purged garlic garden snails on crostinis with a sprinkling of parsley, all racked up on a rustic platter.



Lamb Hearts on the way                                                                  Mans

All on an Aga, wot a pleasure      Mans
It was then off to a three course sit down meal on the veranda with the sparkling reaches of the city below. The first course was stinging nettle ravioli, the mains were the hearts accompanied with Waterbloemetjies (indigenous seasonal Water Flowers) garnished with foraged Cape Sorrel, potato cakes and glazed carrots, and finally to finish off, was Harry’s Sour Fig (an indigenous succulent) ice cream served in a brandy snap basket and a drizzle of sour fig syrup.



Sour Fig Ice Cream                                                                          Mans

A monumental thanks needs to go to ‘The 2 Peters’, Celeste and John, Emilie and Eric and finally, thanks to our daring guest for stepping outside of today’s culinary norms and for their faith in our madness.



Emilie doing her stuff                 Mans

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

MAGIC MUSSELS - A VIDEO BLOG


Magic Mussels                                                                                                                             Lucy

The big moment has finally arrived for he first 'The Urban Hunter Gatherer' video blog. I think it's pretty cool, but then again I suppose I would.

I just want to say a monumental THANKS to Lucy from 'Southeaster Media' and Nic (Moose) Good from 'Fresh Air Crew'. These guys are ‘proper movie makers’. I can't believe how lucky I am to have these acclaimed professionals join me on this little project and all for no pay, apart from a few mussels, that is.



MAGIC MUSSELS

Wot you need.
- About 30 black mussels (cleaned and beard removed)
- A few cloves of garlic chopped (to your taste)
- 1 medium onion chopped
- 1 tomatoes chopped
- A glug of white wine
- A handful of chopped fennel (parsley will do)
- Some crusty bread for dunking
Wot to do
In a pot, soften the onions and garlic. Add the tomatoes and a glug of wine. Bring to the boil. Chuck in the mussels and pop the lid on. When the mussels open (a few minutes), mix in the fennel and get ready to chomp. My best part is dunking the bread in broth. YUMMY…


Wednesday, October 03, 2012

CIVICHE


Yellow Tail, a fine Civiche Fish thats not endangered.                                             Mans

Roundabout the mid nineties a bunch of climbing mates from South Africa and I spent a few months running around like ‘crazy men’ in the mountains of Peru. Luckily we all survived. After our Andes’ adventures I went surfing on the Pacific coast and this is when I tried civeche for the first time, (not to mention another Peruvian delicacy, but that’s a whole other storey and not for everybody).  Very soon civeche was my stock surfing lunch, perfect before an afternoon session. It’s summery, light and very moreish.
Adam and I in Peru during 'The Japanese Revolution'.  Adam
These adventures took place at about the time when ‘The Japanese Revolution’ of cell phones and sushi, was just starting to infiltrate into our western society. Very few middle class South Africans had cell phones, and they also weren’t all that keen on chomping raw fish.
Not long after my South American adventures, I returned to Cape Town, and I prepared my first civeche dish for my cellphone-less, and less trendy friends. This is one of those ‘crazy men’, my friend Adam’s account of ‘that infamous ceviche occasion.’


Ceviche with Charlo 1997
“Ja, he said leaning back in his chair (sounding like Oom Schalk Lourens himself), I remember that evening quite well. Of course, you have to understand some of the context for such an evening – it was the nineties and culinary adventure was still new to Cape Town. More importantly Charlo’s friends were just emerging from the penury of misspent youth and none of it had been spent on extravagances like sushi. In short neither his friends nor any of their less adventurous partners had ever contemplated eating fish in any state but cooked. 
So Charlo invited all his friends to his little 2 bed flat and we all stood around with nowhere to sit and there was one hell of a hullabaloo. You see Charlo’s friends are also Charlo’s friends’ friends, if you understand what I mean and we were having a grand old time and you could hardly hear the next man for the noise.
Now we were all here for this thing called Ceviche, but I think none of us knew what this was but Charlo was very excited to share with us this taste of his travels in South America. So at some point almost inaudible from the kitchen he shouted that we must now come to get a bowl and an equally excited jostling queue developed though there wasn’t really space to queue. We each were given a dish with perhaps three to five, in Afrikaans they would say stukke of raw white fish. On closer inspection these resolved themselves into chunks of coarsely hacked hake, drifting rather forlornly in a thin sea of lemon juice. We returned to where we’d been standing and a general air of ‘what do we do now’ settled upon the place. It was like that silence that typically follows the serving of food to a large and hungry crowd. The silence of content ruminants masticating. Only this silence was somehow deeper, more tangible as silence. And I soon realised that it was because there wasn’t the usual percussion of clattering cutlery. It was indeed. Silence. For myself I chased the raw gobs of fish quietly with my finger and wondered where I could put the bowl without being noticed. The silence lasted what can be described as an uncomfortably long time.
At last someone came to our rescue. ‘Mmmm delicious!’ they said in a voice so clear and loud and full of culinary authority that it made you almost want to try to eat the fish yourself. And at that we commenced to laugh and get back to our conversations from before the ceviche was served and we put down our bowls if we could find a space somewhere for them.
Ja, that was a really funny evening now I remember it, especially funny because that voice came from out of the kitchen.”
                                                                                                   Storey by Adam Roff (Shot Man)

Civiche, it's yummy, but not for everybody.                                                                                                    Mans
Wot You Need
- A generous chunk of firm fish, enough for 4-6 people (make sure it’s not endangered)
- 1½ cups of lime or lemon juice or both (limes are traditionally used, but I have a lemon tree, so lemons it is for me)
- A heaped tsp of finely chopped garlic
- A heaped tsp of finely chopped ginger (I use a bit more)
- About a tsp of finely chopped chillies (add less or more depending on their hotness)
- A heaped tsp of sugar
- A liberal glug of water
- A tsp of English mustard or wasabi
- About ½ a red onion, very finely sliced
- A handful of roughly chopped fresh coriander
- A sprinkle of olive oil
- Salt to taste
                                                                                  Wot To Do
'Ja, that one.'                                                              Mans
Into your serving platter, put all your ingredients expect the fish, coriander and red onions. Slice your fish into delicate bite sizes and place in the juice, the fish should be swimming in it, (coz thatz wot a fish likes to do). Now pop the platter in the fridge, so the fish can steep in that yummyness. The longer it steeps for, the more ‘cooked’ it’ll be. I like mine a little raw in the middle, but thatz not for everyone. To add the finishing touches scatter the red onions and coriander over the dish. Finally sprinkle with a little olive oil to create beautiful little golden pearls. Serve chilled with chunks of bread to    mop up the delish juice.