Not going to lie here – winter is not my favourite season. Weeks and weeks of cloudy Cape skies and storms that threaten to tear off the new roof before I’ve finished paying for it leave me a tad blue. I turn to bread, pasta and anything fatty. At the end of three months the skinny jeans don’t fit so [...]
Well folks, it’s officially autumn. I couldn’t be happier, because early autumn is my absolutely favourite, favourite time of year. High summer stone fruits are still around, grapes are everywhere, so too figs and pomegranates. The days are still warmly languid, but there’s a decided crispness to be found on the early morning air. Just perfect. It’s a time of [...]
Scandinavians may be some of the happiest people in the world, but boy am I glad to be African. Because the cold and I are simply not pals. I loathe but absolutely loathe winter with a passion I normally reserve for minibus taxi drivers and dentists. About the only things that get me through it are warming traditional bredies and [...]
Easter is gone and May beckons. Yup folks, soup season is upon us. Not the stick-to-your-ribs kind packed with truckloads of meaty bones quite yet. That’s for June. The in-between evenings of May call for something altogether lighter I think. Lighter, yet still comforting. Minestrone is the answer. Now minestrone is one of those jolly fabulous recipes that can be [...]
Back when I was a kid (OK way, way back) veggies were fairly basic. You had your carrots, your peas, gems, potatoes, beans and cauliflower. That was pretty much it. Oh and beetroot, which was always bottled in vinegar. Asparagus and mushrooms were only available in a tin – hauled out strictly for very big occasions, like when the fancy church [...]
I know that calling this minted pea soup recipe ‘spring’ pea soup is optimistic – what with at least another six weeks of bitter cold weather waiting for us before spring is 'officially' here. But all around me I am starting to see signs that winter is on its way out. Jasmin shrubs spilling over fences in my neighbourhood are [...]