Top class chef with the write stuff too
CHEF extraordinaire and award-winning food blogger Nina Timm likens the penning of her first cookbook to expecting her first child.
"As happens with a first pregnancy, you don't know what to expect, but when the swollen feet and discomfort start, you know that this is a reality you can't escape. And here it is now – the 'baby' I've been cherishing in my heart all these years."
For Timm, a former Port Elizabeth resident and teacher at Cape Recife, the foodie bug bit early in life and saw her, about six years ago, start the now hugely successful blog, my-easy-cooking.com
So successful was the blog that in 2012 Timm won top honours in SA's best local food blog in a DStv, Food Network and Eat Out magazine initiative. From there, there was no stopping the chef who believes nothing on earth is better than, "food made with love".
Now the author of Easy Cooking from Nina's Kitchen, released in March, Timm is well on her way to becoming a household name in cooking circles.
With the Eastern Cape firmly in winter's grip My Weekend asked Timm to suggest a three course meal that wards of the cold and is easy for readers to prepare themselves.
She came up with the delicious combination of tomato soup with gnocchi, drunken lamb shanks, and pan bread pudding. - Angela Daniels Tomato soup with potato dumplings (gnocchi) THIS is the most delicious tomato soup, and the gnocchi or dumplings give you that lovely satisfied feeling. The soup is no trouble to make, but the dumplings take some time and are worth the effort.
Gnocchi ingredients
800g floury potatoes
200g cake flour
5ml salt
1 egg
Tomato soup ingredients
30ml olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
2 x 410g cans chopped tomatoes
1 x 80g can tomato paste
100ml white wine
15ml sugar
Grated rind and juice of 1 lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
A large handful of fresh basil
500ml vegetable stock
Freshly grated parmesan cheese
Gnocchi
Preheat oven to 180°C and bake potatoes for 1 hour or until soft. Halve and scoop out the flesh. Press the potato through a sieve or mash. Allow to cool slightly. Add three-quarters of the flour, as well as the salt, and mix. Add the egg then decide whether you need more flour. Be careful not to handle the dough too much. Roll into 30cm-long thin sausages. Cut into bite-sized pieces and roll over the back of a fork to form ridges. The soup will stick to these ridges. Set aside.
Tomato soup
Heat the oil and add the onion and garlic. Sauté until soft and slightly browned. Add the remaining ingredients (except the Parmesan) and cook for about 30 minutes. If you want a smooth soup, pulse in a food processor. Otherwise keep it thick and full of texture. Place the gnocchi in the soup and cook slowly until they rise to the surface. Serve with parmesan cheese.
Enough for four people. Drunken lamb shanks THE dark colour of the beer gives the lamb shanks a warm intense flavour. This is a dish you can relinquish to the mercy of the oven. Served with samp, it is a meal fit for a king!
Samp ingredients
1kg samp, rinsed
water
10ml salt
125g butter
Lamb shanks ingredients
6 whole lamb shanks
6 sprigs fresh rosemary
6 sprigs fresh mint
salt and pepper
100ml olive oil
2–3 large red onions, finely chopped
2–3 cloves garlic, cut into strips
30 ml balsamic vinegar
50 ml honey
2 oranges, washed, halved and pips removed
1l lamb stock
340ml dark beer
200ml raisins or sultanas
Samp
Preheat oven to about 80°C. Place samp in a casserole and pour in enough water to about 2cm above samp. Add salt and butter, cover and cook in the oven overnight or in the oven drawer for at least eight hours.
Lamb shanks
Preheat oven to 160°C. Clean shanks and pat dry. Make a small slit near the bone of each shank and insert a sprig of rosemary and mint. Season. Preheat oil in an ovenproof pot and brown shanks. Mix remaining ingredients, add to the shanks and stir through. Cover and cook for 2½-3 hours or until the meat falls off the bones. Remove the shanks carefully from the pot, trying to keep them whole. Pour the pan juices and leftover bits of orange, garlic and onion into a smaller saucepan and blitz until smooth. Reduce sauce until thick. Season and serve with shanks and samp.
Enough for six people. Pan bread pudding BREAD pudding has always fascinated me. The fact that you can cobble together a feather-light pudding from stale bread, milk, eggs and sugar is nothing short of a miracle to me. The pudding can become fancy if you replace the milk with cream, and the sugar with vanilla-castor sugar, but the basic principles remain the same. The French put the proverbial cherry on top with their pain perdu, which is just a different incarnation of bread pudding. I like individual portions, so I prefer to make my bread pudding in a pan. I give this recipe a true South African flavour by using mosbolletjie (must-bun) bread.
Ingredients
4 eggs
500ml cream
5ml ground cinnamon
2.5ml freshly grated nutmeg
125ml castor sugar
1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped out
8 slices day-old "mosbolletjie" bread
125g butter
Cinnamon sugar or syrup for serving
fresh berries for serving
Beat the eggs, cream, cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar and vanilla seeds together. Arrange the slices of bread in a flat, rectangular, ovenproof dish and pour the egg mixture over the bread. Set aside for at least 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 180°C. Melt butter in a pan over medium heat. Remove bread from the egg mixture and shake off excess. Fry each slice until golden-brown. Keep fried bread hot in oven while you fry remaining slices. Serve with a sprinkling of cinnamon sugar or syrup and garnished with fresh berries.
Enough for 8 people.
If you have trouble finding "mosbolletjie" bread, you can use day-old raisin bread. Instead of fresh berries, preserved figs or ginger can be served with the pudding.
