Shabbos dinner compliments of Efi!

I believe I must be the luckiest girl alive! Have a look what Efi prepared for Shabbos to my surprise! He has got to be the sweetest man alive as he last minute with very little notice prepared this beautiful and delicious Shabbos dinner while I after a very very long day at work, tired and absolutely starving came home with not a fraction of energy. Thank you my love...

Roast Chicken

1 whole Chicken

Mixture of vegetables (like: carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes, baby onions etc)

Seasoning consisted of Salt, pepper and paprika.

Clean, chop and cut all ingredients. Drizzle with olive oil and season and roast in a pre-heated oven at 200C for approximately 35 mins depending on the size of your chicken.

This was served with an Israeli salad, pasta salad and hummus.

Good Shabbos and Shabat Shalom! 

Not another Turkey!

I find it hilarious that I of all people came up with the plan to cook Turkey for Shabbos dinner. Don’t get me wrong, I like turkey (I did not say love), but I was craving something else when all everyone was talking about and cooking was bloody turkey since it being Thanksgiving. Here in South Africa, I do not recall ever celebrating Thanksgiving, it’s not a traditional holiday for us. The only time we might of attempted cooking Turkey for any occasion, was for Christmas, however if I remember correctly, my mother only attempted this once in her life.

I cannot say that it is something I have ever craved, and since it is not the easiest to cook , in my opinion, to hopefully enjoy somewhat moist turkey meat.

There is not a chance I would come home with a whole turkey either, unless I wanted to eat turkey everyday for the next month by making every variation of the leftover turkey! Not really my thing... That is why I was happy to find a turkey drumstick, which I thought to be perfect for a meal for 2. My let me just put the record straight, I have never attempted to cook turkey, I also failed to see that it was a smoked turkey drumstick – not our favourite! But I was going to make the best out of it.

I figured that turkey cannot be that different from cooking a regular bird, since it being a drumstick only and not the entire bird I decided to have it in the oven for approximately 1 hour and a bit and wish for the best. Well I was lucky this time! Although I need to find a full proof method next time!

I added a few halved baby potatoes with the drumstick to the roasting dish. 

For the sides, Mediterranean roasting vegetables, Ptitim, and some of the usual salads. 

For those not sure what I am talking about, here is how Wikipedia describes it: Ptitim (Hebrew: ‫פתיתים‎) is an Israeli toasted pasta shaped like rice or little balls. Outside of Israel it is known as Israeli couscous or Jerusalem couscous.

We are very lucky to get our Ptitim from Efi’s parents in Israel, who sends us a couple of boxes of Isreali foods ever few months which e are unable to find in South African! I remember when we got our first pack of Ptitim, I found it to be the strangest thing ever, however I came to love it very quickly. I even tried the other evening, a Asian style fried Ptitim, similar to fried rice with the egg too! And it can be prepared the same as you would prepare fried rice!  It turned out to be great and something different.

My Shabbos dinner was a success, although I am going to admit that any kind of meat smoked is not really my thing. I find it made the turkey very rich and I could only eat a very little piece and it was more than enough for me. So next time, I am going to exam the fridges more carefully to ensure I do not pick up a smoked piece of meat again!

Good Shabbos and Shabat Shalom al’!

Sasha’s Ptitim

1 onion chopped, 2 cups of Ptitim, Tblsp olive oil, 1 carrot peeled and chopped, 2 cups chicken soup.

Fry the onion gently before adding the Ptitim. 

Stir around for approximately 2 minutes before adding the chicken soup and carrots and let it simmer for approximately 15 minutes.  Season with salt and pepper. All done! 

You can put whatever vegetables by the way. I enjoy it a lot with peas too, but really it's your choice. 

Enjoy! 

Tarragon Chicken

This is an easy one! The chicken prep itself will not be more than 5 minutes! Depending what you are serving with it will really be where you will spend time in the kitchen!

I made great spaghetti that I would like to share with you, I almost feel it deserves a blog on its own but here goes.

Firstly pre-heat your oven (200C) and start preparing the vegetables that you would like to roast with your chicken. I chose; carrots, sweet potato, new baby potatoes and celery all roughly chopped and added to the roasting dish. The chicken is just to be washed thoroughly and excess fats and skin cut and whatever other pieces you might not enjoy.

Rub the chicken with olive oil and rub in some Maldon sea salt and sprinkle of Tarragon. Once your oven is hot slip your baking tray inside and bake for 25minutes , finally turn your oven to grill for another 10 minutes and you see the juices run clear from the chicken.

For the spaghetti

Cut up a medium size aubergine into cubes and add to a colander with a sprinkling of salt and let stand to draw out the bitterness. Just before you are ready to add them to the pan, rinse under cold water and drain of any excess water.

Gently fry one chopped onion, add a chopped yellow pepper and a large handful of roughly chopped small button mushrooms and cook for a couple of minutes. Push all of this to one side of the pan so that you can fry the aubergine. I use a non stick pan by the way and use just a very little olive oil especially since I am cooking aubergine and do not like it when the aubergine soaks up any excess oils.

Once the aubergine has browned a bit you can mix all together and add one grated carrot, a can of roma tomatoes, and table spoon of tomato paste and half a cup of water.  Season with salt, pepper, paprika, tsp sugar and fresh herbs like parsley, rosemary etc. Turn the heat down a little to simmer all together. You can add some more water to adjust the consistency if needed.

Prepare your pasta as per packet instructions, drain and rinse and return to the pot. Add your tomato mixture and stir through and heat further if needed.

So that is it from me. The salads are all bought I am afraid as I am not too well at the moment, so thank you to my Efi for looking after me and hopefully next Friday I am back to my old self!

Good Shabbos and Shabbat Shalom! 

A Ginger Beer Beef Stew!

Yes, you read the title correctly. On leaving our apartment early Friday morning, I quickly shouted out to Efi asking what he would like for Shabbos that evening and he requested a juicy stew that he can soak up the juices with plain white rice. I really had no idea what to make as cooking a stew is really not my strong point! A ran out the house to head for work and promised to give it some thought during the course of the day. Well as things go it suddenly dawned on me at approximately 15h30 in the afternoon I had no idea what I was to prepare in just hours from then. Jumped on the phone to my Aunt Lilla (a real traditional Afrikaans lady whom I consult with whenever in need) asking her for one of her many stew dishes.

Out she started from the top of her head naming the ingredients, giving me a few preparation tips and then the method of putting it all together and there she mentioned the Ginger Beer. A little surprised which I was sure she could sense she re-assuring told me to pour it over all the final ingredients and just to let it boil and that a can of ginger ale would also do the trick which she has had to resort to a number of times in the past however as her great grandmother used to make, it is always better with a home made Ginger Beer.

Ingredients:

400g Chuck/brisket Beef (washed and chopped into cubes)

1 cup of all purpose flour

1 onion chopped

garlic clove chopped

1 tomato chopped

green pepper chopped

1 ½ cups of peas

2 large carrots

6-7 baby potatoes peeled and cut in half

Seasoning – salt, pepper, mixed roasting herbs

1 ½ cup of home made Ginger Beer or Ginger Ale.

Add the flour and seasoning together to a zip lock bag large enough to incorporate the meat too. Give the bag a good toss so that the flour mixture covers all meat cubes.

Coat a non-stick pan with butter or olive oil and brown the meat on a high heat in small batches. Set aside.

Use the same pan to gently fry the onions and garlic, adding the rest of the vegetables. Add the meat on top and pour of the Ginger Beer, cover and let boil for approximately 30 minutes.

The sauce will thicken which can be adjusted by adding a little water. Taste and season if needed and serve with plain white rice.

Good Shabbos and Shabat Shalom!

A Shabbos dinner for 2

There is nothing I love more in this world than to spend Shabbos with my Efi! We sit down for dinner and the dining room table every night but Shabbos is just different. I cannot put my finger on it, I guess it’s the thought that we can linger longer over the dining room table enjoying good food and conversation without the thought that we need to get finished so that we can get on with the midweek chores.

This Shabbos was just a simple dinner but I believe from next week I will be back on track as m studies are officially done for the year from Monday and I will have a lot more time on my hands.

3 large chicken breasts

a mix of our favorite vegetables (I used butternut, carrots, celery, sweet potato, baby potatoes, onion, sweet peppers)

I loaded all the vegetables in my Le Creuset casserole dish, added some seasoning and a sprinkle of olive oil and with the lid on put it in a hot oven for approximately 15 mins. After washing the chicken, seasoned it with salt, pepper and sweet paprika, added on top of the vegetables and returned the dish to the oven with the lid off this time and grilled for a further 20 minutes (or until the chicken is cooked through but without being dry).

This was served with our usual Israeli salad, Tahini dressing, aubergine salad and Challah bread.

Shabbat Shalom! 

Matboucha

Efi’s mom, Batya, shared this recipe with me. I can eat this salad by the spoonful’s so I am very pleased that it is an easy recipe. The cooking time is long but the preparation takes no time at all!

1 kg soft tomatoes

2 whole garlic

2 whole chillies

2 red peppers

1 tbls paprika

1 tbls olive oil

salt

After washing the tomatoes make a cross slit at the bottom and add to a bowl with boiling kettle water. This helps to peel the tomatoes skin. When you see the corners start curling you can remove and just simply rub the skin off.

Chop roughly and add to pot and start cooking at a very high temperature and then lower the heat right down to a simmer. Do not cover the pot with a lid at anytime during cooking. Let the tomatoes cook for 1,5 hours till it’s almost as thick as jam (do not add any liquid during the cooking process).

Grill the red peppers over a flame till the skin is black and transfer quickly to cling film to sweat. Should you not have a gas stove (like me), grill the peppers till blackened.

Peel the skin and seeds from the pepper, chop roughly and add to tomato. Mix the paprika, salt and olive oil in a cup and add to the pot.  Cook for a further 1 hour.  After the cooking time there should be no excess liquid, if there is then extend the cooking time till there is no liquid and you are left with a thick jam like substance.

Cool and store in the refrigerator, it will keep for approximately 3 days.

Eat it with anything you heart desires, you will be lucky to have anything left in your fridge after the 3^rd day!