No. 27 - Botswana lick the plate!

Botswana, another country that’s fun to say in a Sligo accent.

Another day, another stew. This time potjiekos, which is a Botswanian stew, cooked on a three-legged cast iron pot over an outdoor fire. Literally translated ‘pojiekos’ means ‘pot food’ and is pronounced poy-key-cos. Luckily enough, there happened to be one of these pots lying around the house that my Granny P. picked up somewhere. It’s rarely used and so this seemed like the perfect opportunity to get back to our African roots, light a fire and cook some good old-fashioned ‘pot food’.

I can imagine the women in Botswana, hunched and sweating over their potjiekos, the sun blazing down on their backs. Being in Ireland, it was of course raining. Being Irish, we didn’t let a little rain stop us and got a little turf fire lit (not very African) and the potjiekos on the go. The African Gods were obviously impressed by our potjiekos making perseverance because the rain stopped, and low and behold - the perfect African sunset.

Groundnut Potjiekos

I’m getting the feeling they have a thing for peanuts in Africa, which is fine by me because I love peanut butter. This stew quite obviously tastes of peanuts if you know they’re in there. If not, you might not be able to put your finger on it or wouldn’t know unless someone told you - and then after you’d be kicking yourself for not figuring it out.

The first mutterings over the dinner table were proclamations that it was “unusual”, which we all know is generally a bad sign. However everyone agreed that it improved with every mouthful and in the end it was so incredibly moreish, it was difficult to stop and we nearly licked the plates.

Serves 4 – 6

6 chicken legs

a little oil for frying

1 red pepper, diced

3 cups of water

2/3 jar of peanut butter

a piece of ginger, grated

2 tbsp brown sugar

120g tomato puree

1 tsp cayenne pepper

(Get a fire started outside. Anything will do, coal, wood, turf, whatever)

Prepare the sauce first. Whisk together the peanut butter, tomato puree, ginger, brown sugar, cayenne pepper and the water. Set aside.

 

Put your pot above the fire, heat your oil and fry the peppers and onion for a few minutes. Then add the chicken and brown on all sides. Cover with the peanut sauce and let simmer for roughly an hour. Serve with rice balls and some hot sauce (this time hot sauce is legitimate because the particular one we used was from South Africa (not that we ever need an excuse). Rice balls are just mashed rice rolled into balls. Careful not to burn your hands, although I can’t really see any way around it.

No. 26 – Bo-snia-il!

 I do try.

I know what it looks like - more beef wrapped in yet more pastry. But this is sheer coincidence and I had to cook this pita because the last burek (which this essentially is) failed due to my terrible filo making skills. This time the pastry came readymade in the form of jus-rol and was, as you’d expect – perfectly thin. With the pastry made there was nothing to worry about.

Well not exactly. (Minor) panic ensued. I had to work extremely fast, so the pastry wouldn’t dry out and become completely useless, yet not too fast so that I’d rip the delicate sheets. This lead to what I can only describe as a slow fluster. The sheer amount of butter needed to brush and glue sheets together, to make the mile of pastry was quite alarming. I therefore underestimated the amount to melt and I was left shouting “I need more butter! Get me more butter!” Pity then, that there was no one around.

Rolling a mile long sausage without tearing it was no mean feat either, but after a little self-assured pep talk, the only thing left to do was go for it. Recalling a lesson from my playschool days, I managed, with minimal tears, to roll the sausage and transform it into quite a beautiful snail, even if I do say so myself. I had great fun making this. It was after all, the food equivalent of play-doh, glue and paper, and who says you shouldn’t play with your food?

Bosnian Pita

Oh, and it didn’t taste half bad either.

Serves 4 – 6

oil for frying

500 g minced beef

1 large onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, chopped

1 tbsp paprika

1 tsp all spice

salt and pepper

grated cheddar cheese, optional

1 packet of jus-rol filo pastry (6 sheets)

½ cup of butter

Fry the chopped onion in a little oil with the garlic, until softened. Add the mince and spices and cook until browned and crumbly, but not dry. Allow to cool completely.

Clear yourself a large work surface and dust with flour. Melt the butter and begin to assemble your filo strip. Lay three of the six sheets side by side (longways) and brush butter where they overlap to glue them together. Brush the entire surface of the now long sheet and lay the other 3 sheets on top. You now have the finished sheet.

Place the mince mixture down the middle of the sheet, sprinkle with cheese and brush either side with a little butter. Proceed to roll it up so you have a giant sausage. Now roll it up into a snail shape, transfer it to a suitable greased dish and brush with the remaining butter. Bake in a 220 degree oven for 20 minutes or until golden brown. Serve in slices, hot or cold with cucumber and yogurt.

No. 25 - Bolivia’s Saucy Soggy-Bottomed Saltenas!

Saltenas are perfect snack for those complete write-off days, when you’re too hung-over to leave and would rather stay home ‘crawling’ the couch. They’re loaded with carbs and meat, salty, spicy and of course sumptuously fatty - a hangover cure in a mouthful. This was of course no use to us, as once again we discovered too late that saltenas take a little longer to prepare than we were willing to wait. A whole lot longer, in fact.  Turns out the mixture needed a quiet night in (the fridge) to quite literally, chill - much like ourselves. Instead, we had them the next day for lunch before embarking on our next hangover.

Saltenas

Choosing to make saltenas, was really just another excuse to eat empanadas (see Argentina), under another name and another country. They are pretty much exactly the same, but the filling is much saucier. You can get away with dodgy pastry sealing and greedily overstuffing empanadas, but when it comes to saltenas you’re better off taking your time and doing it right. Needless to say, I ended up with a baking tray full of burnt filling and some seriously soggy-bottomed saltenas. Not to worry, like I’ve said before, in my eye’s there is absolutely nothing you can do to ruin puff pastry. And the puff pastry is a total cheat, by the way (see Albania) so if you want the authentic recipe for saltena pastry I suggest you google it.

Serves 4 – 6 (really 6 – 8)

a little oil for frying

1 onion, chopped

4 cloves of garlic, chopped

2 potatoes, peeled and diced quite small

1 cup of peas

225g minced beef

1 cup of stock (I used a stock cube)

½ envelope of gelatin

1 tbsp black pepper

1 tbsp cumin

1 tsp cayenne

ready made puff pastry, rolled out as thin as possible

1 egg, for brushing

Fry the onion and garlic in a little oil until softened. Add the meat, spices and fry until browned. Add the stock and simmer for roughly 30 minutes.

In another pan of salted boiling water, cook the potatoes and peas until tender.

Add the potatoes and peas to the meat mixture, along with the gelatin dissolved in a little water. Stir very well to ensure everything is thoroughly incorporated. Allow to cool and let chill in the fridge over night.

The next day…

Roll out the puff pastry and cut out as many circle as you can (I cut around a little saucer). Dollop a tablespoon or so of the cold filling onto the centre of each pastry circle. Brush around the edges with beaten egg and (attempt to) seal the edges using your thumb and fingers, making an empanada half moon shape. Lay on a baking tray, brush with more beaten egg and cook in a preheated oven at 200 degrees celsius for roughly 15 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown. Say a prayer the filling doesn’t leak! Scoff hot.

No. 24 - Bhutan - It's a Pork Fing!

After a long day of flat hunting, smelly van endurance, missed viewings and late estate agents, the first fing I needed when I got in was a glass of wine. And the last fing? A pork fing. I was too tired to cook, yet too hungry to contemplate not eating. We’ve all been there and it’s this situation precisely, that make’s dodgy takeaways an absolute fortune. And no Jamie, sometimes we don’t even have 30 minutes to make a meal, let alone a two course one, like that’s possible for mortals anyway. Upon learning that pork fing potentially takes an hour and half to (there’s that word again) stew, I hate to say it but a wok in a box was looking like our best bet.  I was under the impression that all Asian food was fast, another extremely wrong generalisation on my part. Oh Culinisation, how you enlighten me.

Somehow, a few timing tweaks, a pot too small for the noodles (damn all you too-small-pots), a broken wine glass (empty at least) and a mini breakdown later, pork fing was on the table. Just.

Pork Fing

Bhutan is renowned for its love affair with chili’s, but we had a korma eater in our midst and so I halved the number of chili’s required by the recipe. The resulting pork fing was boring yet comforting after the day we’d had. There's not really that much to it. You really need those chili’s to spice up the otherwise bland noodle and pork combo, although really I put the bland factor down to my own impatience, tiredness, unwillingness to follow the authentic recipe (I barely glanced at it) and my I-just-do-not-give-a-shit-anymore attitude. Turns out a splash of soya sauce and a drizzle of sweet chili sauce was just the ticket anyway. I would definitely recommend making this, and I will again. Next time, however I’ll unleash the chili beast and won’t have to worry about dodgy areas, security deposits and landlord references.

A flat was secured the next day, by the way (although I don’t want to jinx anything) and the kitchen is amazing! I’m moving up in the world!

Serves 3

3 pork chops, cut into chunks

a nice knob of butter

rice or cellophane noodles

2 tomatoes, chopped

1 onions, chopped

1 ½ chili’s, seeds removed and cut into strips (add as many as you dare, 3 or 4 would do nicely)

about a cup of water

half a head of broccoli, cut into florets (optional)

salt and pepper

Fry up the onion, tomatoes and pork in the butter. Add the water, salt and pepper and simmer for about an hour and a half. (I however completely skipped this and lacking patience only just waited for the pork to be cooked through) Then add the florets or broccoli and when they are cooked but still crunchy, throw in the noodles and sliced chili. Give it all a toss and serve in bowls with soya sauce and sweet chili sauce, if like me you’re not afraid to waver from authenticity for authenticity’s sake. 

No. 23 - Bermuda Whyangle – Why So Much Yucca?

Thanks for the title Gretta. It’s inspired. But any yucca, is too much yucca.

If you hadn’t already gathered, the main ingredient for this Bermudian dinner was the unfortunately named and not so aesthetically pleasing yucca. Yucca and I didn’t hit it off so well to begin with. First of all, it was expensive, annoyingly heavy to carry home and then nearly impossible, with my physical attributes at least, to get a knife through it – a chainsaw would have been more effective. Once inside the almost impervious bark, there’s nothing you can do to a yucca that you can’t do to a potato. The difference of course being that yucca is fibrous and lumpy, and potatoes are fluffy and simply delicious. Yucca pretends to, wants to be a potato. It’s a potato impersonator. An imposter. A phony. A fake. But we’re Irish, come on now. We can’t be fooled. We’re a bit more spud savvy. And that’s all I have to say about that.

Yucca Pie

This recipe is really a form of baked spud bol or in this case yuc bol (apt or what?), but that’s an argument that’s already been had. Yuc bol is just one of the many sacrifices, we make so that you guys can laugh about how hilarious it is that we have to eat weird stuff for dinner. On the plus side, the filling is bolognese with the added bonus of sausages. There is nothing can’t be improved by adding pig in some form or another.

If I was doing this recipe again I would half the quantity of yucca/potato and double the quantity of meat, but that’s just me. And for the record, yucca is not that bad so don’t be put off. But it has squat on potato, so just use potato instead and you’ll be laughing. Best of yuc!

By the way, still no camera charger.

Serves 4 – 6

1 kg of yucca

a large knob of butter

a handful of grated cheddar

a generous splash of milk

2 eggs

more grated cheese for sprinkling

For the filling:

3 sausages, sliced into rounds

250g minced beef

1 onion, chopped

4 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 tin of chopped tomatoes

salt and pepper

Fry the onion and garlic in a little oil until soft. Add the mince, sausage and brown for a few minutes. Add the tin of tomatoes, salt and pepper and simmer for around 30 minutes.

Peel and dice the yucca/potato, cook in salted water until tender (between 10 and 20 minutes) and drain. Return to the pan, add the milk, butter, cheese, eggs and mash.

In a baking dish, layer half the mash mixture, top with the bolognese, and then the last of the mash. Sprinkle with cheese and bake in a preheated oven at around 180 degrees, for half an hour or until the top is golden and crispy. Dig in but be careful not to burn yourself, as underneath the yucca lid lies molten bolognese.

No. 22 - Could Have Benin Another Country!

My ever-supportive boyfriend groaned (again), when he learned that we were having stew (again). When he heard coconut, he winced, then at the mention of peanut butter, he had a good rummage through the fridge. He was thinking more along the lines of steak with a mushroom and red wine sauce and a few spuds - his supposed specialty. Steak however, is a distant memory from the days before Culinisation ruled our culinary world. (Instead we’re spending four euro on a yucca, but that’s tomorrows story.) So yes, in name, it was a boring Beninese beef stew. In reality it was a whole lot different. A creamy coconut, peanut and spicy beef tagine slash curry, if you don’t mind. The best way to describe it? A cross between beef satay and Thai curry. In central Africa? Am I missing something here?

Oh. But. It. Was. Yum.

Creamy, peanuty, spicy and oh so filling - this was one of the better, more indulgent Culinisations, and it definitely won Luke over. Not that I ever had any doubts. Nor did he have a choice. For all intents and purposes, however, I have renamed this dish, because whoever translated from Benin French to English did a woeful job. I call it, Creamy Coconut, Peanut and Beef Benin Curry Tagine. It just sort of rolls off the tongue.

Note: I left my camera charger in Sligo (I hope), so I have been very stingy on the photos because I need the battery to last all week. 

Creamy Coconut, Peanut and Beef Benin Curry Tagine.

So it’s a bit Chinese, a bit Thai, a bit Indian and a bit African I guess (although call me ignorant, but African least I would say). Benin, it seems, is having a major identity crisis and to top it all off, I decided to serve this Benin dish with a side of broccoli. Not meaning to bring another country into it, but when in Rome.

Serves 2 with leftovers

1 potato, peeled and cut into cubes

400g beef, cut into chunks

a little oil for frying

2 onions, chopped

3-4 garlic cloves, finely chopped

2 tbsp of curry powder (African if you can get it, I couldn’t)

cayenne pepper to taste, a tsp or so

1 tbsp flour

salt to taste

3 tbsp crunchy peanut butter

half a tin of coconut milk

splash of water, to loosen

1 red chilli, whole

Rice and/or naan to serve

Heat up the oil in any pan, pot or tagine that has a tight fitting lid. Brown off the meat and set aside. In the remaining juices, fry the onions and garlic until softened. Add the flour, cayenne, curry powder, peanut butter and salt. Heat for a minute and then pour in the coconut milk. Loosen with half a cup or so of water and return the meat to the pan along with a whole red chilli. Simmer until the beef is tender. This may take up to 2 hours depending on the cut of beef. Stir regularly to ensure that it doesn’t stick.

While the “stew” is simmering away, cook the potatoes in some salted water and allow to cool. Once cooled, fry on all sides in a little olive oil until crispy. Stir the potatoes into the “stew” twenty minutes before end of cooking time.

Serve with rice and/or bread (and some broccoli, if like us (me), you want your five a day).

No. 21 - Belize - Here's Johnny Cakes!

This entry is dedicated to all the Johns out there, keeping it real.

Today I thought I’d go wild and cook a typical breakfast instead of dinner for once. This morning the lucky country was Belize. I think that johnny cake is a great name for a flatbread/pancake that thinks its a cake, not to mention, there’s a Sopranos episode entitled Johnny Cakes (poor Vito).  As you can see, there were plenty of (ludacris) reasons for me to want to make them.

Johnny Cakes

A johnny cake, also known as journey cake (because they’re easily transported), is a cornmeal flatbread that originated with the native inhabitants of Northern America. The recipe I decided to follow (kind of) is a johnny cake in its simplest form - for all those johnny cake purists out there. It consists of only four ingredients; cornmeal, salt, sugar and water. None of this modern egg and milk milkarky (sorry, couldn’t help myself). I was planning on eating mine hot with butter and jam, or maybe some honey and sliced banana. Here’s what happened...

Serves 0

My quantities of cornmeal, salt, sugar and water are insignificant, well maybe not, but they’re certainly of no use to you.

There’s no way around it, the johnny cakes just did not work. I put it down to the fact that the cornmeal wasn’t the right kind? No? Truth is, I really don’t know why they failed. Well, ok, the first time I had a notion to add hot water to the cornmeal, for some unknown reason. It went all stiff and gloopy, so I added a few splashes of water (recommended), cold this time to loosen it up. I tried frying them and this is what happened.

Eh ah.

My second attempt, I was more confident would work. I added cold water to the salt, sugar and cornmeal in the specified quantities but it was ridiculously runny, practically like water. So, I kept whisking in cornmeal, a little at a time until it reached the consistency of pancake batter. Alas, when frying them, they cracked? Cracked? God knows.

Now, I’ve no cornmeal left.

For breakfast? A cheese omelette.

No. 20 - Pulling a Mussel in Belgium!

I was so excited about being able to eat chips and them being an actual national dish, meaning that I didn’t have to pretend or twist a countries national dish to suit myself! Rice and beans, beans and rice - I cannot deal with the disappointment of researching another country and finding out that their national dish is beans and rice anymore. Mussels and chips, I can deal with. Get in Europe!  Not to mention, I was able to continue on my hunter-gatherer buzz and go scavenging for the mussels on the beach. There were no Kodak moments due to fear of muddy hands mucking up the camera. It has had a rough time over the past couple of years, a few nasty falls and one particular dunk into a pint of Carlsberg.  Cautious me.  However despite my caution on the beach, in my hurried frenzy to dive into my bowl of mussels and chips, I ended up dunking it into the mayonnaise. I would have taken a photo of that too but, well, you know.

Moules et Frites

Not your average chip and by far the poshest, and most time consuming fish and chips I have ever, and will ever make.  Mussels and chips sound simple, but when you gather, scrub, debeard, soak and scrub again the mussels yourself, not to mention soak, dry, fry once, cool and then fry again the chips - it takes  all day. But these chips are unbelievable and definitely worth the effort. Wikipedia informs me that Belgium boasts having invented the chip in 1680 - when the rivers froze over and they couldn’t catch any fish they fried sticks of potato instead. Thus Belgium’s chips are supposedly the best in the world and I think  that these particular ones are definite contenders. They take chips very seriously  and rightly so. I was of the opinion that you should just leave chips to the professionals i.e. chippers  – they know chips. Not anymore, these chips far surpassed any takeaway I’ve ever had. Golden and crisp on the outside, soft and fluffy on the inside – they were absolute perfection. Oh, the joy of chips.

That brings me to the mussels and what can I about those? Mussels are mussels and I love them, especially with white wine and garlic. That lovely salty juice is a perfect accompaniment to the perfect chip. The chips really did steal the show. Don’t believe me? Then make them.

Serves 4

Moules

2 kg mussels, debearded , soaked and scrubbed.

1 glass of white wine

2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

50g unsalted butter

bunch of parsley, chopped

black pepper

Put the mussels in a pot with the white wine. Cover and bring the wine to a boil and  then simmer for a view minutes until the mussels are all open. Remove the mussels and set aside. Strain the liquid through a sieve and return to the pan.  Throw in the garlic, pepper and whisk in the butte and half the parsley. Get yourself four bowls and fill them with mussels. Ladle on the juices  and sprinkle with the remaining parsley and serve with a wedge of lemon and the frites.

Frites

8 – 10 potatoes, peeled and cut into chips

oil for deep frying

salt

Soak the chips in cold water for half an hour to remove the starch. Dry them thoroughly on a tea towel.

Heat oil to 130 degrees (I didn’t have a deep fat fryer so had to heat the oil in a wok and just guessed the temperature) . Fry the chips in two batches until the potato is completely cooked through but not browned. Set to drain on kitchen paper and allow to cool.

Once the chips have cooled, heat the oil again, this time to the higher temperature of 190 degrees. Fry the chips in two batches like before. This time the chips will turn a golden brown colour.  Once golden and crispy, drain on kitchen paper and serve with a sprinkling of salt and mayonnaise. Un-believable!

No. 19 - Belarus-tic Beef Stew!

Belarus taught me that no matter how beautiful the kitchen, there is still no joy in peeling a potato (or figuring out how to use someone else’s oven). What was joyous, however was using Ide’s KitchenAid. For those of you who don’t know, KitchenAid is to mixers what Dyson is to vaccum cleaners. I have literally have never enjoyed anything so much, lowering the mixer and raising the mixer, lowering the mixer and raising the mixer. I had a total Nigella moment. Baking will never be the same again.

The KitchenAid may be the sole reason that Belarus was the first Culinisation country to incorporate a desert. That and the fact that I had plenty of time and space to swan around this borrowed kitchen, unlike at home where I can hardly find space to put a fork. Two course meals at home are therefore far and in-between. One can only dream of a glorious kitchen and a KitchenAid of my very own, don’t even get me started on a dishwasher. Truth is, I’m as close to getting a KitchenAid as I am flying to the moon.

Belarusian Beef Stew in a Pot.

Your bog standard stew really, beef topped with potatoes topped with mushrooms topped with sour cream. Ok, not technically bog standard, but the Belarusian answer to an Irish stew. Simple, yet effective and even better the next day. It also has the novelty factor because you get to eat it straight out of the pot.

Serves 2

400g decent quality beef, cut into chunks

3 garlic cloves, chopped

4 potatoes, peeled and diced

1 onion, chopped

a punnet of mushrooms, sliced

a small tub of sour cream or a few tablespoons

oil for frying

water to cover

Fry the beef with the garlic in a little oil until browned. In a separate pan fry the onion and mushrooms until soft. Now all you have to do is assemble everything.

Find a suitable sized pot with a lid and line the base with the beef making sure you have all the bits and juices. Season. Then layer on the diced potatoes and just about cover them with water.Season. Then layer on the mushroom and onions. Season. Finally top with sour cream, pop on the lid and bake in a 170 degree oven for 2 hours. Let rest for 30 minutes before serving. Eat straight out of the pot or serve on plates.

Belarusian Apple Pie

Like I already mentioned this was the most fun I’ve ever had baking although that has little to do with the recipe. This pie is really simple and has very few ingredients. It’s the kind if desert you can throw together without needing a trip to the shop. In name it’s a pie, but really its sponge-topped apples. The best bit is that the topping goes crispy and chewy like a meringue. I don’t know if that’s because I got a little to overexciting with the KitchenAid and over mixed/whisked everything but it really made this desert.

Serves 6

4 cooking apples

3 eggs

1 cup of sugar

1 cup of flour

butter for greasing the baking dish.

Peel, core and slice the apples. Whisk together the eggs and sugar until fluffy. Whisk in the flour a little at a time. Line a greased baking dish with the apples and then pour on the cake mixture. Bake in a preheated oven, at 170 degrees for 50 minutes or until the top is crunchy. Serve with ice cream or custard.