Ready to cook meals from Daily Dish

“Daily Dish – South Africa's first internet start-up to offer a yummy, ready-to-prepare home meal kit delivery service – has partnered with Fairview to expand the company's foodie offering. “ We were asked to take part in an experiment by this company who deliver a hamper of food for four meals in a week with the recipe either for 2 people or four.

They offered to send us a box and we said great, we would then invite friends who are vegetarians and we would cook two of the dishes. We completely misunderstood what was in the boxes, we assumed we would be able to cook out of one box. What we actually got – and it was impressively delivered on Easter Monday - was two boxes, one for a Banting diet with four meals for two people and another Vegetarian box with another four meals for two. Which was extremely generous of them. We have cooked one vegetarian meal and three Banting meals so far. The last Banting meal of steak strips with Peppercorn sauce will be cooked for supper tonight, then we will move on to the other three vegetarian dishes. This was because we had to use up the fresh meat supplied by today.

“This is directed at people who are too busy to cook, or those who simply relish the convenience of having recipes with exact ingredients that they can quickly and easily prepare delivered to their home or office. With its ultra-fresh ingredients, tasty recipes, and outstanding service, Daily Dish has grown so popular that the company was recently prompted to expand its delivery base to include Johannesburg and Pretoria, as well as suburbs and towns outside the Cape Metropole.”

If you are interested in this concept, have a look at their website www.dailydish.co.za for more information, recipes, and to register if you like the idea of this service. We have taken pictures of what we got and what we made and written the full story.

They don’t send you eggs, butter, oil, salt and pepper and foil, these you use from your pantry. We were a bit confused at the onions. We received two very large red onions and two small. Which should you use when they say half an onion?

The recipe and the ingredients supplied. Enough to make a Bacon and Spinach Quiche for two people, you add 3 eggs, butter and olive oil and seasoning. This was our favourite dish so far. The cheese supplied was interesting. When Lynne tasted it grated it had very little flavour indeed, but it was really present in a very good way in the quiche

The resulting dish. We like our bacon pieces big and crisp. We will be making this again, we liked it so much. No accompanying vegetables are supplied or suggested. We added steamed beans and broccoli, or you could do a mixed salad

Everything you need for Steak Strips and Peppercorn Sauce

The ingredients and recipe for the Green Curry Pork Stir Fry. We added more pork as we served three people with this dish as John’s daughter Clare also came for supper. There was plenty; enough for second helpings. We even enjoyed the cauli-rice, but perhaps that was because our steamer was not terribly efficient and the cauliflower was still a bit crisp. It works well in taking up the sauce. The recipe warns that the green curry paste is HOT, we didn’t agree. And we did need to add more fish sauce, as the dish lacked salt and depth of flavour. The pork was very tender and we enjoyed the dish. There is a lot of preparation on this dish (as there is in all stir fries) but it comes together very quickly in the wok

Our version of the Green Curry Pork stir fry

The recipe and ingredients for the Cajun Chicken and Avo. This was a good dish, quick to prepare and cook. The flavours and the textures were good and we really enjoyed it. BUT it is not a main course portion and you would want to add something else. We had cauli rice left over from the previous day, and Lynne also served some green beans. We don’t like eating raw onions, so Lynne blanches them in boiling water, cools them and then added them to the salsa so they don’t repeat so much. There was a temptation to add Nacho’s! But that wouldn't be Banting, would it? It doesn’t look very pretty, it's a little messy, so we didn’t photograph it

The Vegetarian Shepherd’s Pie. This is more of a wintery dish for us and the size of the ingredients were huge, especially those sweet potatoes. Still to try

Mushroom and Basil Linguine recipe. This was what we cooked for our vegetarian guests on Monday night. Lynne thought 200g of linguine was not enough so she added 50g of spaghetti but it was more than enough. John was banished from the kitchen while she cooked the mushrooms, as he truly hates the smell of the food he is allergic to. The dish was very bland, despite Lynne adding lots of seasoning all along the way. In fact, during cooking she added fresh thyme to the mushrooms and a grating of nutmeg as well. The sauce was rather thin too. Suspect that adding an egg might have helped. We did supply some white truffle oil and more parmesan cheese from our larder when we discovered the lack of taste. This recipe needs work

The cooked linguine with mushrooms

Corn Fritters with Bocconcini Salsa

Lynne was going to cook this on Monday as the starter, but simply ran out of time. Preparing two complete dishes and a dessert was enough. It looks absolutely delicious and we can’t wait to try it

Our dessert was a recipe Lynne saw Donna Hay make on TV this week, a lemon pudding made with one whole lemon, sugar, eggs and corn flour. A great success although ours didn’t look at all like hers! And one of our guests found it very sweet. We topped it with real vanilla ice cream. Puddings are meant to be for cheating once a week

Haloumi with Broccoli and Sesame. This sounds good and it’s a huge head of broccoli. But will this have enough flavour? We will let you know

We were really delighted at the quality of all the goods in the boxes and the attention to detail. You can subscribe and receive a box a week. And if you don’t want one on a particular week, you are able to skip that week but you need to give them notice. We wondered why there are only 4 nights catered for? 5 might be better. Perhaps is a cost issue. Perhaps they assume Monday is left over night and the weekend is for going OUT!

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© John & Lynne Ford, Adamastor & Bacchus 2015