Thursday, April 24, 2014

140424 Main Ingredient's MENU - Chenin Winter Showcase, A weekend at Britannia Bay, Paternoster & St Helena Bay restaurants

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Britannia Bay’s cormorant Fleet Air Arm squadron coming in to land
In this week’s MENU:
* Chenin Blanc Association Winter Showcase    
* Easter weekend at Britannia Bay
* Paternoster & St Helena Bay restaurants
* Chicken with green olives and artichokes
This week’s Product menu – Cooler weather is on the way, which means more one-pot meals, including soups and casseroles. An essential ingredient for any of these disshes is good stock. Most stock cubes in the supermarkets are made of MSG with a suggestion of the flavour on the label. We have a great range of stock cubes, imported from Italy and Portugal and made with real ingredients. Have a look at them here and place an order.
If you can find it in the supermarket, we don't usually stock it, just the products you would struggle to find.... Check our online shop to see more details and prices.
CHENIN BLANC ASSOCIATION WINTER It is no secret that we are big fans of Chenin Blanc, South Africa’s best white wine ambassador. The Winter Showcase was held last week at Delaire Graff and we tasted some really interesting, quaffable, exotic and some really remarkable Chenins. Presented by Jeff Grier, past president of the Association, we tasted through six flights of wine (22 in all) and then paired many of them with an excellent lunch at Indochine restaurant.
The Association is delighted to have been awarded a Sponsorship from Standard Bank and their CEO, Ben Kruger, explained how the sponsorship works. It is a very worthy prize. He announced the signing of a three-year sponsorship agreement between the Chenin Blanc Association of South Africa and Standard Bank, in support of a new competition to be known as the Standard Bank Chenin Blanc Top Ten Challenge. The competition will be open to all the ±100 Chenin Blanc Association members. Entries open on 1st July 2014. An awards ceremony announcing the winners will take place at Delaire Graff Estate in Stellenbosch on Wednesday 27th August. Winners will receive R20 000 each and the money must be used for the economic and social upliftment of the workforce.
What did we taste that we would love to drink, buy or put away? In flight one, the KWV Mentors 2013 and the Beaumont 2013 Hope Marguerite both shone and show huge future potential, as usual. In Flight 2, Delaire Graff 2013, Jordan Barrel Fermented 2013 and the De Morgenzon 2013 all lit our fires – we do drink these regularly. Flight three was a great flight – we’d buy them all - but Jean Daneel’s Signature 2012 rose just above Raats Old Vine 2012, Opstal Carl Everson 2012 (no longer available) and Stellenrust “48” barrel fermented. All had gentle but present wooding. Flight 4 was taken by our highest scoring wine of the session, Ken Forrester’s The FMC (F...ing Marvellous Chenin, according to a respected British critic) 2012, which has such depth and richness and it lights up the palate with fruit and sophistication. At R359 it’s a luxury purchase for us. In flight 5, it was Simonsig’s Chenin Avec Chène 2010 that nudged the rest out of the way with its long deep and complex flavours. Flight 6 were the two dessert wines and it was a close call with both these beauties with the Kanu Kia Ora 2012 just taking the lead by a whisker from the Nederburg Edelkeur 2010 for Lynne, while John marked them the other way round. As usual a stunning tasting of excellent wines.
This was then followed by a really exceptional lunch. Lynne  is guessing that the talented chef, Virgil Kahn, someone to watch, might have been a little influenced by sensational cooking at El Celler de Can Roca in Gerona, Spain, voted the second best restaurant in the world last year. If you have been watching Masterchef Professional UK, you will know the standard of food we are talking about. Pictures here
RULE BRITANNIA     This was a short working week, but a long holiday weekend, so we decided that we deserved a small holiday ENTIRELY away from work before the summer was over. We haven’t been back to one of our favourite West Coast places, Britannia Bay for several years and that was Lynne’s pick. The fact that there was not a wine farm anywhere near was a big factor, as she thought we just needed to rest, sleep, walk on a beach, read books and yes, eat some interesting food but not rush around as we normally do.
On our way to the long Easter weekend at Britannia Bay, we side-tracked to Paternoster to pick up some crayfish we had ordered and decided to have something for lunch while we were there. Lynne had done all the research for Britannia Bay, but not for Paternoster and where we ended up was surprisingly good. MORE
We found our comfortable Bed and Breakfast, Djuna, on Bookings.com. We normally prefer Self-catering, but there was none available in the area when we booked. It is on Golden Mile and currently has a good sea view, but there is a house being built in front of it now . Read on about our stay and our very funny crayfish braai in the dark on Friday night.
John wanted to watch the Stormers vs Lions rugby match on Saturday evening and, sadly, our B&B didn’t have television, so we had to seek out a place where he could watch and then, later, we could have supper together. Sunfish turned out to be the place, just about 5 minutes drive from our B&B. MORE
In our extensive hunt for restaurants in the Britannia Bay/Stompneus/St Helena Bay area, as we had to eat out, we found there were approximately five. We thought we might like a good Sunday Lunch on Easter Day and, having secured a reservation – with a bit of nice talking, headed for Beira Mar, which is the first restaurant you come to as you enter St Helena Bay from Vredenburg. MORE
This week’s recipe     As we are following the Banting life-style, you might wonder if life without carbohydrates in all their complex forms is satisfying? We can honestly say we are a) not hungry and b) enjoying what we eat and c) slowly losing weight. Do we miss things? Probably more texture than carbs. If you have a great gammon, you do have to think gammon and salad rather than gammon sandwich. Our diet is balanced and enjoyable. We certainly do not miss bread.
Lynne has been using the cookbook, but has also been inventing things using the permitted ingredients. So, this week, we have had moussaka with no potatoes, just aubergine and a topping of egg and milk, no flour. She figured if it works for Bobotie, why not moussaka.... As long as you have lots of vegetables with the main course, you are perfectly satisfied and stop noticing that there are no carbs.
There is a recipe in the book for seed crackers which you can use with dips.. It needs a new ingredient to us, Psyllium husks, which seem to be some sort of culinary glue. We didn’t have any, didn’t know where to find any and needed crackers to take away on holiday for our French pâté. Egg is a binding agent, so Lynne slightly changed the recipe by adding a cup of almond flour and a cup of seed mix, seasoning, cayenne and added an egg. The crackers worked amazingly well, didn’t need as long to cook and stayed crisp throughout the week. Two top tips. Roll them out on baking paper and cover the mix in cling film while you roll, which you then remove. This helps to get them nice and thin and keeps you from getting too sticky. If you slice them into shape while still warm, you don’t have to deal with uneven shapes.
It does make you very creative. Lynne tries to vary our proteins throughout the week and we had a lovely courgette gratin on Monday night with lots of cream and cheese. Then it was the turn of chicken and the following recipe is what she came up with. You can use dried herbs, but fresh are always best.
Chicken with green olives and artichokes
8 chicken pieces, legs and thighs, skin on – 2 T extra virgin olive oil – 1 onion, sliced - 3 large cloves of crushed garlic - 1 stick of celery, sliced into 1 cm slices – 300 ml dry white wine – 300 ml good chicken stock – 2 T fresh thyme – 2 fresh bay leaves - freshly ground black pepper – sea salt - 20 green olives – half a tin of artichoke hearts, drained (freeze the rest or throw them all in)
Brown the chicken in the olive oil, then remove and set aside. Add the onion and fry till soft and just beginning to colour. Add the garlic and then the celery and stir fry for a minute or two; do not let the garlic burn. Pour in the white wine and let it reduce to half its volume. Put back the chicken and add the stock, thyme and bay leaves and season. Put into a casserole, cover with a lid and put into a 170°C oven for three quarters of an hour or until the chicken is cooked and falling off the bone. The wine, stock and olive oil will emulsify to make a nice sauce. Put in the olives and artichokes and reheat for five minutes then serve. Will feed 4 (or 2 or 3 twice)
Buying from us On Line    We have a lot of fun putting MENU together each week and, of course, doing the things we write about, but making it possible for you to enjoy rare and wonderful gourmet foods is what drives our business and drives the wheels that enable us to produce MENU possible. We stock a good range of ingredients and delicious ready-made gourmet foods. You can contact us by email or phone, or through our on line shop. We can send your requirements to you anywhere in South Africa. Please do not pay until we have confirmed availability and invoiced you, then you pay and then we deliver or post. When you make an eft payment, make sure that it says who you are. Use the form on the website to email us your order. Click here to see our OnLine Shop.
There is a huge and rapidly growing variety of interesting things to occupy your leisure time here in the Western Cape. There are so many interesting things to do in our world of food and wine that we have made separate list for each month for which we have information. To see what’s happening in our world of food and wine (and a few other cultural events), visit our Events Calendar. All the events are listed in date order and we already have a large number of exciting events to entertain you right through the year. Events outside the Western Cape are listed here.
Learn about wine and cooking We receive a lot of enquiries from people who want to learn more about wine. Cathy Marston and The Cape Wine Academy both run wine education courses, some very serious and others more geared to fun. You can see details of Cathy’s WSET and other courses here and here and the CWA courses here. Karen Glanfield has taken over the UnWined wine appreciation courses from Cathy. See the details here
Chez Gourmet in Claremont has a programme of cooking classes. A calendar of their classes can be seen here. Nadège Lepoittevin-Dasse has cooking classes in Fish Hoek and conducts cooking tours to Normandy. You can see more details here. Emma Freddi runs the Enrica Rocca cooking courses at her home in Constantia. Brett Nussey’s Stir Crazy courses are now being run from Dish Food and Social’s premises in Main Road Observatory (opposite Groote Schuur hospital). Lynn Angel runs the Kitchen Angel cooking school and does private dinners at her home. She holds hands-on cooking classes for small groups on Monday and Wednesday evenings. She trained with Raymond Blanc, and has been a professional chef for 25 years. More info here





24th April 2014
Remember - if you can’t find something, we’ll do our best to get it for you, and, if you’re in Cape Town or elsewhere in the country, we can send it to you! Check our online shop for details and prices.
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Phones: +27 21 439 3169 / 083 229 1172 / 083 656 4169
Postal address: 60 Arthurs Rd, Sea Point 8005
Our Adamastor & Bacchus© tailor-made Wine, Food and Photo tours take small groups (up to 6) to specialist wine producers who make the best of South Africa’s wines. Have fun while you learn more about wine and how it is made! Tours can be conducted in English, German, Norwegian and standard or Dutch-flavoured Afrikaans.
Recommendations of products and outside events are not solicited or charged for, and are made at the authors’ pleasure. All photographs, recipes and text used in these newsletters and our blogs are ©John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus. Our restaurant reviews are usually unsolicited. We prefer to pay for our meals and not be paid in any way by anyone. Whether we are invited or go independently, we don’t feel bad if we say we didn’t like it. Honesty is indeed our best policy. While every effort is made to avoid mistakes, we are human and they do creep in occasionally, for which we apologise. Our Avast! ® Anti-Virus software is updated at least daily and our system is scanned continually for viruses.

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