Chicken Curry with Butternut, Sweet potato and baby potatoes.

I cook this meal at least once a week, this is now my all time favorite winter “diet” curry.  Curry is such a wonderful thing, it fills you up and warms your heart. I’m always amazed at how all the spicy flavors come together to form something so magic and spectacular in your mouth.

Instead of having this with rice I rather choose healthier form of  starch such as starchy vegtables in the form of baby potatoes (lower GI than your ordinary potato) and Sweet potato that goes fantastic with the curry. The butternut gives body to the sauce without adding much of anything else to thicken it with.

You will simply not believe what a quick and filling meal this is. Please do yourself a favor and invest in spice tin. I can simply not make a decient curry without it.

I use Chicken breast and drumsticks but remove the skin and all visible fat before cooking, also important to stick to the portion sizes. Nowadays I only cook the portion we are suppose to have unless I cook double for lunch the next day. Beside the obvious benefits of not over indulging you also save a lot more money because there is no food going to waste.

Yip, because we don’t really ”give it to the dogs” we rather have second portions “because we are hungry and work was horrible today and it’s cold and blah blah blah lipstick”. Sometimes it’s too much effort to give that 1/2 cup of rice that’s left over to the dog anyway so you rather chuck it in the bin…been there done that! No more!

here is a simple quide to cooking the correct portion sizes.

Serves 4

200 g Baby pototoes,  with skin halved

200 g butternut, peeled, chucky cubes

200 g sweet potato, peeled, chuncky cubes

4 Chicken drumsticks

4 Chicken Breasts

5 ml Jeera seeds ( Cumin seeds )

1 Onion, finely chopped

5 ml grated ginger

1 Garlic glove finely chopped

1 Green Chilli, finely chopped

1 red Chilli, finely chopped

5 ml dhania Powder ( Coriander powder)

5 ml Turmeric spice

5 ml Chilli powder (optional and adjust to taste, I like it hot!)

5 ml Garam masala

3 tomatoes

5 ml brown sugar

1 piece of cinnamon bark / stick

Salt to taste

Olive oil

Whiz up the 3 tomatoes in a your food processor or finely chop and set aside.

Saute’ your chopped onions with the Jeera (cumin seeds)  in a little olive oil  in your pot until the onions are transculent and soft.

Add your chillies, garlic and ginger and fry for another minute.

Add all your spices to the onions and fry for 30 seconds while stirring. Add Chicken pieces and veggies to the pot with the chopped tomatoes, cinnamon and brown sugar. Keep stiring until the tomatoes has disolved, add just enough water to cover the veggies and chicken and simmer for +- 25 - 40 minutes on moderate heat with the lid on until the veggies are soft and the chicken are cooked through. Stir in between cooking time and adjust the quantity of the liquid accordingly. Don’t worry if the butternut becomes a bit mushy, this will ultimately form a lovely sweet sauce.

Remove cinnamon stick / bark and add salt to taste, serve hot.

Tips

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 If you want to thicken your sauce a bit use 2 tbs gram flour (chickpea flower) mixed with a little water and add during the last few minutes of cooking.

If you don’t have any of the above spices at hand use the following spice mix ( 15 ml curry powder, 2, 5 ml cinnamon powder, 2;5 ml ginger powder and 2,5 ml turmeric powder. You can also use dried chillies instead of fresh chillies.

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Whey Protein, Oats & Banana pancakes

Well as you can see I got stuck on the oats pancake recipes! This batch was super good and super yummy. I’ve added Whey protein for that extra protein punch and a banana plus fructose to sweeten things up a bit. As with any eating clean diet you can really only eat so much oats and egg whites for breakfast, this is a great alternative for that once in a while treat, quilt free off course! The Whey Protein powder is optional and won’t make any difference to your pancakes as per the previous blog entry. I’ve used Chocolate Whey Protein  powder but you could use Vanilla flavor too. The pancakes tend to brown very quick and because I’m no food expert I will guess that it could be from either the fructose or the Whey protein powder in the batter, simply cook them on a lower heat.  Add some healthy fat in the form of peanut butter and enjoy with a cup of coffee for a great breakfast after that power workout!

Ingredients

1 Cup fat-free milk / water

3/4 cup Uncooked Oats

1 cup Oatmeal Flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 tbs Fructose

4 Large eggs whites

1 small banana mashed

2 scoops of Whey protein powder (Optional)

1/2 tsp cinnamon powder

Directions

Heat the milk or water until hot. Stir in the oats and set aside. Beat the egg whites until stiff. Mix the remaining dry ingredients together and stir into the oatmeal and milk mixture. Mix in the mashed banana and the egg whites until mixture is well blended. Spray a pan with nonstick spray and cook the pancakes until browned on both sides. If the batter is a bit thick simply add a little milk or water.

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Rugby and Braai – A typical Saturday in Sunny South Africa

I’ts Saturday afternoon, Autumn is in the air yet we still had a lovely 21 degrees in Sunny South Africa today. We stay in much colder region as our fellow South Africans but it still feels very much like summer in mid day’s.

It’s only the cold breeze early mornings and late afternoon that reminds us that winter is around the corner.

Off course It’s rugby time and rugby time means Braai (BBQ) time. I was not in the mood for making any special salads so we decided plain old traditional “pap and sous” will do the trick.

 Stywe pap Recipe (Stiff porridge Recipe)

Many traditional South African dishes include pap, such as smooth maize meal porridge, pap with a very thick consistency and a more dry crumbly pap.

Making pap is very similar to making polenta, sooner than later you don’t measure the water or the maize meal it comes as second nature, the same goes for the consistency. “Slap pap” (a smooth pap) is traditionally eaten as a breakfast porridge with melted butter with or without milk where as “Stywe pap” (stiff porridge) is mostly eaten with meats, stews and curries.

This dishes are mostly enjoyed by the black population and the Afrikaners, rather than those of English or Asian descent.

This is how to make a stiff porridge to go with your braai (BBQ). By adding less maize meal to the water your porridge will be smoother and by adding more maize meal you will be making “krummel pap” which resembles a crumbly consistency, this version is also very nice.

4 cups of water

1 tsp salt

 3 cups mealie meal (maize meal)

In a pot cook your water until boiling point, add the salt and remove the pot from the hot plate. (This step is important, the porridge will splatter all over the place if you leave it on the hot plate and you will end up burning yourself.)

Add the maize meal little by little to the boiling water mixing it with a whisk or a fork, mixing it well after every addition to ensure no clumps form.

Reduce the heat of your plate to the lowest setting, return your pot to the plate. Cover with a lid and simmer for 30-40 minutes.

For the Tomato and Onion Relish

1 Onion sliced

1 glove of garlic crushed

1 punnet of button mushrooms sliced

4 tomatoes diced

2 tbs Apricot jam

1 tbs Tomato puree

Salt and pepper to taste

Olive Oil for frying

Fry onions and garlic in the olive oil until soft. Add the mushrooms and fry for another 2 minutes. Add the tomatoes stirring the mixture with a wooden spoon until the tomatoes are cooked. Add just enough water to form a sauce, add the apricot jam and tomato puree. Cook for a few minutes on low heat, Season with salt and pepper.

The lamb chops…mmmmm

Eating my Steak from the grid, Juicy and pink just the way I like it!

And this my friends is “Bliksem Wors” (Bliksem sausage)

* Bliksem – strike, hit, punch; also used as an expression of surprise/emphasis (rude). It derives from the Dutch word for “lightning”, and often occurs in conjunction with donner. Used as a curse in Afrikaans: Jou bliksem!’ (You bastard!) *

Why is it called Bliksem wors…..look closely, can you spot the chillies!!! Do I need to say more. In this case the butcher must have been high, the amount of chillies this man have added to this sausage is way beyond enjoyment.

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Low GI Pancakes

 If you have time on hand this Easter Weekend than do yourself a favour and try this recipe.

You won’t believe how good it taste considering the fact that this a low GI recipe. I love this recipe because it makes only 6 pancakes, although I normally get 10 out of the batter since I like my pancakes a bit thinner. Feel free to double the batter, personally I  just don’t like the temptation of having to face a mountain of pancakes when I was only supposed to eat 2!

They taste just as great with a savory filling for a light meal and it’s perfect for the kids lunch boxes.

For 6 Pancakes

1 egg

5 ml Macadamia or canola oil

1.25 ml white vinegar

190 ml Cake flour

1.25 ml salt

60 ml Oat bran

250 ml low-fat milk

5 ml baking powder

Mix the egg, oil and vinegar together.

Sift the Cake flour, baking powder and salt together, add the oatbran and mix through.

Mix together the dry ingredients with the egg mixture and the milk in 3 parts. Mix thoroughly after each addition.

The batter should be resting for 5 – 10 minutes to ensure that the oatbran rehydrated, add a little more milk if the batter is too thick.

Fry your pancakes in a hot pan with a little oil and sprinkle with Cinnamon sugar.

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“Braai tart” – Polenta, Mushroom and Bacon tart

Like every other Saturday my husband have the urge to “braai”. This ritual starts in Spring and continues well into the winter. Yip that’s my hubby! , facing the icy cold winters of the Highveld armed with his beanie, winter jacket and a scarf and his bottle of mixed spices turning ordinary lamb chops into succulent little dreams.

Unfortunately the side dishes is not his forte’, instead he likes to order me around. His favorite would be “pap tert” (a maize meal tart).

I decided it is about time that we jazz up the old maize tart a bit, you know, making it a bit more sophisticated, so instead of using ordinary maize meal in boring layers I used Polenta instead.

To all the vegetarians out there, feel free to remove the bacon from this recipe, I would’ve but my husband is a carnivore and he tends to get a bit grumpy if there is no extra meat in a savory tart!

 

Serves 8

Polenta crust

Polenta ( about 1 cup cooked in 4 cups of water, should be a spreadable consistancy)

2 tbs garlic butter

salt to taste

Filling

125 g white button mushrooms (1/2 punnet)

125 g Portobello mushrooms (+- 4 large)

1 Onion – sliced

Olive oil for frying

a pinch of dry thyme

100 g bacon bits

2 tbs tomato puree

1/2 tsp of sugar

100 ml milk

1 egg

2 heaped tbs of flour

2 ml salt

1/2 cup mozzarella cheese

1/2 cup Gouda Cheese

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Rub your pie dish with butter. Cook polenta, stir in the garlic butter and set aside keeping the lid on your pot to keep the polenta warm.

Fry the onions and mushrooms with the thyme in olive oil. Add the bacon bits and fry for another minute. Add the tomato puree and the sugar, fry for another minute.

In a measuring cup add the flour and salt to the milk and mix, add the egg mixing it again.

Use a the back of a metal tablespoon or a spatula to spread an even layer of polenta to the bottom of your pie dish covering the sides as well.

Add the mushroom filling on top of the polenta and pour the milk mixture over it.

Top with the cheese and bake for +- 15 -20 minutes.

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Too tired to cook Cous-Cous and beef salad

I love cooking but sometimes I’m just too tired and too lazy to cook.

On days like these I  make my cous-cous beef strip salad. Not only is it  packed with goodness it is also quick and easy to make, and by quick I mean 30 minutes.

So what is your “too tired to cook recipe”?

Serves 4

Ingredients

10 ml olive oil

400 g steak cut into thin strips

1 tsp Robertson’s steak and chop spices

1 punnet of mushrooms sliced

I red bell pepper cubed

1 onion sliced

1 green chilli chopped

1 tsp Roberson’s veggie spices (optional)

1 garlic glove chopped

1 cup Cous-Cous (cooked to instructions)

60 g of cheese (Cheddar or Gouda) cubed

50 g black olives (pitted and sliced)

1 tomato cubed

1 /2 cucumber cubed

2 gherkins sliced

1 tbs salad dressing of your choice.

Ground black pepper to taste

 

Cook the Cous-cous as per instruction on the box and allow to cool.

Chop the tomatoes, cucumbers and gherkins and mix together. (put everything in a sieve that is over a bowl to allow the extra water and juices to drain while you are busy with the rest of the salad. This will prevent the salad from being soggy once mixed).

Heat your oil in a pan. Fry the onions until soft, add the mushrooms frying for another few minutes. Add the beef strips, garlic, chilli, red pepper and spices and fry until the beef are cooked through. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool down a bit.

Transfer the tomato mixture to a large salad bowl and add the salad dressing, the Cheese and Olives.  Add the beef mixture and the Cous-Cous and mix with a fork.

Season with ground black pepper.

 

Tips

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The salad can be made a day in advance and taste really good if left overnight giving the cous-cous the opportunity to just suck up all the lovely juices from the meat and mushrooms. However if you want to make it before hand don’t add the  tomatoes, cucumber and gherkins, rather mix this in just before serving.

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Banana muffin with Peanut Butter surprise

Who can remember the peanut butter scene in  Meet Joe black?

In our house I don’t buy any cookies, chocolates or chips, because I will develop a craving just because I know it’s in the cupboard.

Taking away all temptation certainly helps the hips, but sometimes I develop a genuine craving and that’s when I grab a teaspoon and the peanut butter jar. And then I eat it Joe Black style, slowly, savoring every lick of that spoon.

I have this lovely healthy low GI recipe for Banana bread that I most often use to make muffins. The peanut butter inside is a lovely surprise but you could bake it without the peanut butter if you choose to.

Serves 16

Ingredients

30 ml Canola oil

190 ml brown sugar

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract / essance

60 ml low fat milk

1 apple grated (with or without skin)

3 medium bananas

295 ml Cake flour

2,5 ml salt

125 ml oat bran

125 ml Wholewheat pronutro (Original or apple bake)

Peanut butter

1. Pre heat oven to 180 degrees.

2. Mix the oil and sugar together in a mixing bowl

3. Add the eggs, vanilla and the milk with the sugar mixture and mix well.

4. Add the grated apple and mashed bananas with the oil and sugar mixture.

5. Sift the flour the baking powder and the salt together. Add the oatbran and the pronutro with the  flour mixture and mix.

6. Add the dry ingredients with the oil and sugar mixture and mix thorougly but not too much.

7. Spoon one tablespoon of the mixture into the paper cups.

8. Spoon half a teaspoon of peanut butter into every paper cup and refil the rest of the papercup with the remaining mixture.

9. Bake 15 – 20 minutes or until tests skewer comes out clean.

Tips

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Bake a lovely banana bread with this recipe instead.

Each muffin or slice equals 1 x carbohydrate, 1/2 fruit, 1/2 fat.

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Sweetcorn Fritters – You are what you eat in the New Year

There is something about a the New Year that makes you feel refreshed and hopeful for the future, even if you haven’t been on holiday during December. Some people have New Years resolution, while other swear to never make them again, however said the New Year brings new expectations, new dreams and new hopes.

Off course my New Years resolution remains the same as every other year, to be fitter than the previous year, to eat more healthier and to have balance in my life.

A food tradition from South America is to eat Corn Bread to attract new-found wealth in the new year. This tradition stems from the golden color of corn bread resembling real gold!  So make sure you have enough corn, also try this healthy microwave corn bread from a previous post

Ingredients

1 x 410g tin Sweetcorn

80ml Flour

10 ml Baking powder

80 ml oatbran

1 Egg (beaten)

5ml Canola oil for frying / non -stick spray

Place Sweetcorn in a mixing bowl.

Sift the baking powder and flour over the sweetcorn, add the oatbran and egg and mix.

Heat the oil in the pan or spray with a non-stick spray.

Add spoonfulls of the batter in the pan and fry on both sides. 

Enjoy hot or cold.

Tips

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Note that you only use a little oil which makes this fritters really low in fat.

This fritters is moist enough to enjoy without butter, enjoy with a stingy spreading of jam or havet it as an alternative starch portion for lunch or supper.

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One fritter equals 1/2 a starch portion

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