Life is too short to Eat bland Food
Fish has become a regular meal option in our home and I have to say that I am very pleased by this. Its versatile, easy to whip up and let us not forget all those omega 3’s that is so good for us. Here I …
If you want pure soul food, biryani has got to be right on top of the list or at least for me it is. Even my seven and nine year old boys have grown to love it, well quite frankly I haven’t given them …
Heritage Day, a day created by South Africans for South Africans to celebrate our cultural diversity.
South Africa is one of the most culturally diverse countries in the world and in my house it is no different. I am a fourth generation South African Indian. One of my other projects that I am busy with at the moment is my ancestral history and have recently discovered that my paternal great, great, great grandfather arrived on the shores of South Africa in 1874 from Bihar, India. My maternal ancestors reign from Mauritius and then there is my husband who is born and brought up in Switzerland yet has an Austrian passport. So our boys are a mix bag of Indian, Austrian, South African and Mauritian.
The table setting for today was obviously going to be a colourful, robust one so I walked around and gathered all my colourful crockery and items that might be able to add the hype to the table.
Look I am Indian, so the love of colour is in my DNA.
I created a centre piece with typical South African rusks and koek sisters. There were small bowls of biltong to snack on. Also included were delicious chicken livers with a seeded health bread, fried eggs and borerwors (South African sausage). I really wanted to make a melktart but unfortunately that did not work out, so I sent my hubby to Krispy Kreme so that I could create a doughnut stack for my boys.
Setting a table can sometimes be intimidating but it really is such a fun way to brighten up your table and if you anything like me I don’t follow rules, I make my own (ask my hubby). Set a fun table and dont restrict it to your dining room, go al fresco if you can, set up in your garden on the lawn. Basically get creative and use what you have around your house to add to the deco.
Wishing my fellow South African a colourful Heritage day spent with the ones you love. Now I cant wait for our braai tonight.
Love and light, Pri
Wishing you a great 2019 filled with fantastic food! Happy 2019…. Growing up I never ate seafood. I love the ocean and the life that exists there, the unknown! I also had dreams of becoming a marine biologist, saving the ocean and by me not …
Don’t know about you but I when I was a kid, I was always excited about Christmas and I am happy to say that nothing has changed!
I loved waking up to a filled pillowcase left by Santa and I loved staying awake at the hope of meeting the fat guy. My mum will tell you that I gave her a tough time, insisting that I want to see the big man and have a chat with him.
Payback is a bitch, because my 2 boys have certainly taken a page out of my book in this regard. It was an all too familiar scene on Monday night (Christmas eve) in our home, except this time I was the mum, trying to get the boys to bed so we could get on with the wrapping of the gifts. Yes I love reading on how to be more organised but have I put that plan into action?… No!!!
I spent most of my day on Monday getting gifts for the boys while hubby entertained them at home. Over breakfast hubby and I discussed the menu for Christmas lunch and the plan for the day, which went like this…. I would go out shopping for the gifts and would give him a call when I’m almost done. He will go into the garage, open the boot (trunk) of his 1964 Chrysler Valiant so that I can hide the gifts in there. He loves old cars and the car is famous, it was used in the Madiba TV Mini series staring , Laurence Fishburne. We had to find a spot to hide the gifts because the boys have a way off sniffing out gifts, but ask them to find their swimming trunks, toys or the remote for their RC cars, suddenly the can’t see anything…. I call it ALOO eyes…. (Potato eyes…. Potatoes instead of eyes)
Whilst I was shopping at the mall, the boys and their dad washed and cleaned the Valiant, immaculately might I add, as it was going to be used for a friends wedding the after Christmas. So I get back from the mall and as planned I get the gifts out of my car and into the valiant boot.
Fast-forward a couple of hours. Dinner and bath time done and dusted, so I went to get on with some preps for our Christmas lunch and table. It’s approaching 10pm and the boys are asking to stay up and meet Santa…seems like dejavu!!!
Eventually we get them to bed. I get back to my table deco and hubby heads off to the garage to get the gifts. A minute later he is back empty handed. “Have you seen the Valiant keys?” he asks. Now … I have naturally big, bold eyes, so you can imagine the gremlin staring back at him. “What do you mean, have I seen the Valiant keys?” Huffs, puffs, F78k’s !!! , This was your plan, your key, your responsibility!!!
Is this another case of Aloo eyes????
So off we both go to the garage to look for the keys and half an hour later we still can’t find them. Could the keys be locked in the boot? We searched the garden, the house, under the beds, asked the kids in their sleep, asked the cats…. Nada!!!!
So that’s it…. Santa will not be stopping by at our house…oh no can you imagine their faces tomorrow?
It’s now past 11pm. I’m searching on Google how to unlock a 1964 Chrysler Valiant trunk (boot) without a key, hubby is looking for the 3 spare keys that he just told me he “had”. I even got a paper clip stuck in the boot keyhole. We can’t let this happen to the boys!!! As time is going and its now almost 12pm we decide to get the back seat out so that we could get into the boot to get the gifts. So after sweating and shouting and working together we did it!!!
But still no key and now we still have to wrap all these gifts.
We shouted a little and laughed a lot, opened a bottle of bubbly, wrapped the gifts, said Merry Christmas and eventually headed off to bed at around 2h30am. Sanity restored in our home. Hubby and I received the best gift on Christmas morning when the boys told us where “they” had kept the Valiant keys.
After the night I had, I was happy to head into the kitchen to get on with Christmas lunch.
Like everybody we eat loads on Christmas day but somehow I get bored with the side veggies. We had the regular meat and chicken but instead of the boring veg, I decided to pimp it up a bit, after all it was Christmas. We had mussels for starters. Recipe to be posted in the new year.
I am going to share my Roasted Cauliflower Salad with a pumpkin and butter bean hummus sprinkled with dukkah. Hands down this was the winning dish of the day!!! And oh so easy to make!
Roasted Cauliflower Salad with Pumpkin and Butter Bean Hummus sprinkled with Dukkah
800 grams cauliflower florets
Olive oil
500 grams pumpkin cubes
3 cloves crushed garlic
1 tin butter beans, rinsed and drained
1 teaspoon cumin (jeera) powder
Juice of 1 lemon
1 teaspoon sesame seed oil
Smoked Maldon salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Good sprinkling of dukkah spice
Dressing
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Glug of olive oil
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
handful freshly chopped Italian parsley
Combine cauliflower, salt, pepper and olive oil and spread on a lined baking tray
Spread pumpkin on another lined baking tray
Pop them both into the oven
The cauliflower takes about 20 minutes; it should be nicely browned, not charred
When the cauliflower is ready, allow it to cool
Roast the pumpkin until soft, about 40-50 minutes
Whilst the veggies are in the oven you can get on with your hummus
In a food processor, combine the butter beans, garlic, salt, pepper, cumin, sesame oil and lemon juice and have it ready for the roasted pumpkin
When pumpkin is roasted add to the processor and blend until smooth or as chunky as your prefer
Check for seasoning
Combine the dressing ingredients with the cooled roasted cauliflower
Spread humus onto your plate, top with roasted cauliflower, sprinkle with dukkah from a dizzy height and make sure this side dish is seated right next to you on the table!
Smells … Synonym – scents, aromas, fragrances, wafts, pongs, bouquets, whiffs I love and appreciate many things in life and smells are just one of them. I particularly love the way a smell can take me back to a nostalgic moment. Like when I smell …
