A FEW FINE SPOTS

Sharing a moment with a local on the way to Atlas Trading in the Bokaap                                                                      Mans

Part of being an urban hunter-gatherer, is hunting down jolly fine outlets from which to buy your chow. Supermarkets are not my favourite places. I do acknowledge that they are annoyingly convenient and that I do frequent them - boooo, for me. When I walk out of supermarket, there usually isn’t a spring in my step, however there are other more charming options out there, where you can get quality produce for a good price and leave all bouncy and smiley, wotz more; you don’t end up with a mound of horrible, ugly, ugly packaging. Wherever you live these spots are out there, you just have to hunt them down.

Lucy filming in Atlas, with 'The Dood' lurking            Mans

There is massive range of spices at Atlas                       Mans

In Cape Town two of my favourite spots are Atlas Trading and Fargo Trading; I buy all my spices, pulses, grains, nuts, dried fruit and a whole bunch of other stuff from these two places. I first came across Atlas Trading when I was living in the Bokaap. It’s on Wale Str above Buitengracht Str, on the right, as you head up the hill. It’s a beautiful and nostalgic experience when you visit Atlas. You order at one window, pay at the next and then collect at the dispatch counter. Your goodies are usually scooped from wooden tea chests and poured into brown paper bags, which in the blink of an eye are folded skilfully and snugly by some dude. After a sneaky snack on the way home, never have I quite managed to reseal the packet of dried mangos/pistachios as neatly and tightly as ‘The Dood’ does, so I always get bust. Sometimes the goodies you buy can take on a generic incense smell, which is all charming and romantic, but there are times it would be better if it weren’t there. It’s worthwhile to ask for a little taste of what you are going to buy, just to check, that it hasn’t been lying at the bottom of a tea chest for too long. This place, I love.

On Malta Road in Salt River is Fargo Trading, this is the spot I go to most. Once you manage to wrestle past the thick plastic strips that cover the entrance you’ll find an authentic shop with a huge variety of quality products at very good prices. Just remember to ignore the white packets of MSG and go for the other stuff, like their thick rolled oats, the ones I just can’t seem to get anywhere else, coz these days every damn thing has to be instant, so only ‘thinly rolled’ are what’s on supermarket selves. Fargo’s chuncky oats are perfect for my ‘Damn Fine Granola’ recipe.

Yipppeee, Fargo has got oats that aren't instant                                                                                                                      Mans

For fresh produce, there is The Salt River Market’, which is pretty much off Salt River Circle, by the time you have driven a few times around the circle, you’d have figured it out. The regular fruit and veg, isn’t always a good deal though. It’s the stuff that’s just come into season, that I like to buy, like beautiful cress, rocket and asparagus and all for a good price. It’s also the spot to get unusual and exotic fruit and veg. ‘Fancy foodie stuff’ like, duck and quail eggs are also a volleyball, if it’s not here, you probably won’t find it in Cape Town. They are the same traders that have a stand at the Biscuit Mill on Saturday mornings. So remember they are just down the road from the Biscuit Mill and are open every weekday.  

A bit of banter at The Salt River Market                                                   Mans

It's gotta be autumn, coz there're pomegranates                                          Mans

After visiting any of these three spots, carrying you bags and boxes of goodies from the car to the kitchen won’t feel like the worst chore on the planet.

FRESH PASTA

'Old School Style Fettucini'                                                                                                                                                         Mans

For me, pasta is the definitive Italian chow. Only when I spent time with my Italian mate The  E-Man, did I start to check out the loving and simple approach Italians have towards food.

Here I go on another tangent...

My dad loved food more than just about anybody I know. He would love eating just about anything, anything but Italian food, which he would eat, but he didn’t love eating it, coz he didn’t like Italians. My Pop was the most kind natured and non-judgemental person ever, but I’m sure that was coz he saved all his horriblenss for the Italians. Maybe he was just grumpy that he didn’t win a medal for yachting at the Rome Olympics. He was the only person I knew, who would get a long face at the suggestion of a quick bite at a Pizzeria and this was, coz it was Italian (I mean, wotz not to love about Pizza). Anyhow, I think I have gone a long way to restoring a respectable relationship between the Standing’s and the Italian Nation. I love their simple and unpretentious food. From the way I’m going on you might think that I know an awful lot about all that is Italian, sadly this is not so. Most of what I know comes from Eugenio, aka The E-Man. Again, how he got his name, is a storey for another day.

Ian Ian, 'The Pasta Processing Unit'                                                           Mans

Making fresh pasta is not as big a mission as you may think. Nearly all kitchens have what you’ll need, and that is, flour, eggs and a pinch of salt. There are more complicated recipes around, but this one works just fine, for me. Ok, a pasta machine might be helpful, but lets face it, most middle class western kitchens have one proudly displayed somewhere on their shelves. My culinary mate Ian Ian, had one displayed in pride of place in his kitchen for about 2 years before he actually used it, but once he did, there has been no stopping him. He is now a pasta processing unit. Anyway, you don't even need a machine. If you are making it for only 2 people, I think it’s quicker to make it by hand and way more impressive. Usually when there are just 2 of you, being IMPRESSIVE is rather important.  All you need is a flat surface and a rolling pin, but a wine bottle will do just fine. 'Come on, go try make some right now. I DARE YOU."

Ingredients

- 1 egg per 2 people

- about 2 handfuls (more or less 100g of flour, duppio 00 is best, but white bread flour will do just fine)

- 1 pinch of salt.

How to make the dough

Break the eggs into a large mixing bowl and add the flour a bit at a time while stirring until you have loose dough. Now its time to get stuck with your hands. Sprinkle the work surface with flour and get kneading, this is my favourite part. You may want to add a bit more flour if it’s too sticky, or a bit of water if it is too dry. Give the dough a solid working over, until its soft, shiny and pliable. Cover it with a damp cloth or cling film and pop it in the fridge to rest for about 20 mins. Now it’s ready for rolling, or you can save it for another day. It’ll keep in the fridge for few days
Fettuccine, the ‘old school way

Making Fettuccine 'old School'.                               Mans

Chop about an inch thick slice off your dough, and cover the rest til you need it. This'll stop it from drying out. Dust the surface and your slice with flour to stop it sticking to everything - don't hold back with the dusting. Now, roll it out with your 'rolling pin', keep lifting and turning it, to stop the 'dreaded stick'. When you dough sheet is as thin as you patience allows, dust the top of it and fold in half, repeat this til your folded pasta is a manageable size to slice into 1/4 inch pieces. Give the little sliced pasta nuggets a joyful jiggle to separate them. Cook them straight away, or if you want to cook them later, hang them up, so they don't stick together. When it's time, chuck them into boiling water for about 5 mins, or til they are just tender.

'New School Style' getz it a lot thinner. Old school or New School? It'z your choice.                                                Mans

SNOEK

Come hell or high water, we are gonna have fun                                                                                                                Mans

For me a Snoek is the quintessential Cape Town meal, it embodies all that is Cape Town. Everyone who lives here, knows what a Snoek is, but for those of you who don’t, it is a ‘Barracuda like’ looking fish (with vicious finger removing teeth) It’s actually no relative, but they are referred to in NZ and OZ as Barracouta. I know it’s all a bit confusing, but that’s just the way it is, so lets move on.

A yummy no frills chomp                              Mans

Nobody likes a ‘pap (mushy) Snoek’, not even me. So to avoid any ‘papness’ don’t get any during the months that have an R in them (the hot months). Anyhow, it was during one of the months, without an R that Ian Ian and I decided, coz it was such an awesome day, we would go for a sail on Deep Magic, our friend, Mark Mark’s yacht. With excitement bubbling over, we fired up the engine, so we could motor out of the harbour before we set the sails. Our bubbling excitement turned to a simmering excitement, when we found that the throttle cable had snapped. So like all good engineers Ian Ian pointed and explained what had to be done, while I sardined myself into the engine compartment and covered myself with grease. Under instruction, I managed to jury rig the cable with some dental floss. Excitement was again bubbling over, only for it to soon to return to a simmer, coz now the motor would rev, but the boat was still not going anywhere. We were as ‘pap’ as a Snoek caught in February. Our excitement was stone cold, but hey, come hell or high water we were going to have fun.  So it was decided, coz we were at the harbour and the fishing boats were coming in, we would have a Snoek Braai (barbeque) on the mooring. It was a no frills affair, apart from the fish, everything was bought at the local café. Government issue white bread, iceberg lettuce, mayo, tomatoes, and, of course the classic apricot jam, butter and garlic baste. Soon our excitement returned to the boil and we were chomping down yummy Snoek sarmies, while listening to squawking gulls and the familiar sounds the yachts rigging tinkling in the breeze. Who needs a working vessel to enjoy a good chomp on the ocean anyway?

The engineer with a clean white shirt                                Mans

The finale garnish to our storey, 'the cherry on the top', one may say, happened a month or two later, when Mark Mark took Deep Magic out of the water for maintenance and discovered why we weren’t going anywhere. The naughty propeller had fallen off.

Just the way we like it                                                                                   Mans

SHROOMS MAN

How Brilliant & Organic is That ?                                                                                                                                      Charlie

There is nothing quite like a shroom, where else do you get such earthiness? Ok, maybe a truffle, but they’re generally not ‘a volleyball’ to an ordinary bloke like me. About a year ago my old mate Ross introduced me to mushroom foraging and as a result I have eaten heaps of the beauties. I’ve also tried a bunch of recipes, all of which have made me puff out my chest with pride and delight. ‘Then again you would have to try rather hard to make them anything but delicioso’, said I, with my chest deflating ever so slightly.

The King Of Shrooms Drying                                         Mans

Each mushy has it’s own character and needs to be treated slightly differently. The robust Pine Ring is one of my faves, you’ll need to cook them a bit longer than most, remember to chop the stalks up fine, coz they can be tough (or use them to make a mushy stock). Pickled Pine Rings preserved in olive oil make an impressive homemade antipasti. Then there’s ‘The King of All Mushrooms’, The Porcini/Cep/Penny Bun/Boletus Edulis, whatever you call them, they’re magnificent. I think they are best dried, coz that’s when that umami taste really intensifies (now look at what you all have made me do, I’m drooling, dammit). The Porcini’s are
easy to dry and will last right though til the next season. They are your kitchen’s trump card, ready to be rehydrated with white wine or water and popped into just about any dish, or you can simply try ‘mushing’ them up and use as seasoning. The mind boggles at the possibilities. Just make sure that you pick the right ones, coz the mind might boggle in a way you don’t want it to, or not… On a serious note, please take care coz, there are some real nasty’s lurking in the woods, so nasty that the tables could turn on you and YOU could end up as mushroom food. IF YOU DON’T KNOW WOT IT ITZ, DON’T EAT IT.

Thanks for the guidance Ross.

The Orignal Hunter Gatherer, The Ross Man                                       Charlie

THE MIGHTY SPRINGBOK

Stef cranking the machine                                                                                                                                       Charlie

I’m basically one huge fake. I go by the name of The Urban Hunter Gather, but I’m yet to hunt anything. I’m not a massive meat eater. On a day-to-day basis I hardly ever cook meat, but on an occasion, I enjoy cooking and eating it. “I know, I know”, this is gonna sound like a cliché, but I’m one of those ous (dudes), who believes if you chomp meat, you should be prepared to’ finish off’ the living thing. I’ve done a fair amount of fishing, plenty of crayfishing, mussel picking and sporadically, I harvest and cook snails, but never have I hunted with a gun. I have to say, anything to do with guns scares me; they just don’t sit well with me. My friend Alec, on the other hand, is the opposite of me. He is a vegetarian who loves guns and digs to hunt. A few weekends ago he arrived at my spot with two skinned and gutted springbok carcasses. I hung them up outside that night. I had gruesome dreams and when I opened the curtains in the morning, there the scene of violence was staring at me again, they had to be processed and soon. My mates Ian Ian (yes, two Ian’s) and Alec came to my rescue. I wanted to photograph the process and do some educational butchering, but by the time I could set up the camera, our resident vegetarian, with a faraway look in his eyes and a knife in his hands, had just about finished the job. Ian Ian was equally as enthusiastic in the butchering department and as unaccommodating in the patience department. So there we were on a rainy Sunday, butchering, mincing, and making a giant pot a venison stock on the wood-burning stove. Within a few hours this violent scene was packaged away in the freezer and there were a few more empty bottles of red wine in the recycling bin.

Ready for laughing gear treatment                                  Mans

I think burgers are a fine way to deal with dry cuts of venison. So, Stef, my chef mate, from down the road and I hosted a burger evening, to celebrate the conclusion of Anna and my ‘worm race’ epic (that’s a storey for another day). The burgers turned out to be mighty fine. Now, it’s no secret that burgers enjoy the company of a pickle and that red meat loves bonding with hot mustard. It just so happened, that my friend Glenn kindly gave me a bottle of agave buds which he collected and pickled (awesomely yum). Seeing as the agave buds and the springbok came from the same part of the Karoo, there was no contest which pickle went into the burgers. There was also no contest which salad leaf made it into Mr. Burger, coz Alec gifted me a bunch of mustardy mustard lettuce.

THANKS DUDES, FOR ALL THE SUPPORT, GIFTS AND ENTHUSIASM.

LEMONADE

 

My Retro Juicer. It's brilliant.                                                                                                                                                     Mans

So the plan was, that I followed up my Limoncello blog with lemonade one, but I was ‘the opposite of rudely interrupted’, by a little outing to the Seychelles, which I felt I had to capitalise on blogwise, which brings me to this belated lemonade blog.  Now all 11 of you, who read the limoncello blog, know that only the peal of the lemons are used, so there are no prizes for guessing, that a good use for the rest of the lemons, is to make lemonade.

Ready for juicing                                                               mans

A simpler recipe, you’ll struggle to find. 

Pop a jug of homemade lemonade on your dinner party table and it’ll go down a treat, coz nowadays people love that kinda shit. In a pot, throw in the juice of your lemons, together with an equal amount water and sugar. Example - 1 cup lemon juice, 1cup water and 1 cup sugar. Heat the mixture up and stir until the sugar has dissolved, simmer for a minute or two and there you have your lemon cordial. Simple az zat…

I threw some of the concentrate into an ice cream machine and a rather good lemon sorbet was the result.

CREME CARAMEL

Mrs Vanilla Cow getting the good stuff out,  Island Style                                                                                Monique Mrazek

I recently spent a week in the Seychelles. Shoo man! All those hibiscuses, frangipanis and colourful plants that I don’t know the names of, make everything so vibrant and happy happy. The locals are friendly and the beaches are beyond amazing. But you know me, the first gap I got, I was off to local market, which was all about the fruit, fish and spices. Now, in your baggage, fruit gets squishy and fish gets smelly, so it was spices that made the trip back home with me. Those little reused airplane spirit bottles, on which vanilla essence was scribbled in cokey pen, were my favourite. I know, I know, ‘us snobs’ should use extract not essence, but let me tell you those bottles are a fifth of the price that Woolies charge for their extract and a zillion times more velvety, luxurious and intoxicating. Anyway, wotz the diffs between the two? All I know is that I had to do this essence justice, so I made the classic and most genius of desserts, a ‘crème caramel’. It’s classic, coz it’s looks so stylish and tastes so adult (with that touch of bitterness). It’s genius, coz it’s jolly clever how the caramelised lining of the dish dissolves and allows the pud to slide out when you do the flamboyant flip, but wot makes it most clever is it only needs four everyday ingredients.

MUM’S CLASSIC DINNER PARTY CRÈME CARAMEL

Market                                                            Charlie

Caramel
220g - white sugar
4 – tablespoon water
Heat sugar in the cold water over fairly low heat. Stir till sugar has dissolved. Allow to boil without stirring till golden brown. Remove from heat and stir well. Pour into mould, twisting mould to coat bottom and sides.
Custard 
4 - large eggs, 500ml – milk
225g – sugar 1 good dash – vanilla essence/extract


Lightly beat eggs and sugar. Warm milk, but don’t boil. Add vanilla essence and whisk into eggs. Pour into mould. Bake in a bain marie for about 40mins at 180°C. Leave to cool before doing your flamboyant flip onto a plate with a lip high enough to catch the scrummy golden syrup.

The Dessert Trolley Classic                                                                                                                                               Mans