Bridget McNulty

The best dinner EVER (aka Steak with three pepper butter)…

// August 31st, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Inspiration, food

… and salt baked potatoes.

Perfection on a plate! And yes, that is actually the steak I cooked up there. The very first steak I ever cooked! Doesn’t it look yummy?

It was.

If you want to try and match that perfection (ha!), check out the September issue of Fresh Living magazine (the salt and pepper feature) or follow this recipe:

Bistro-style at home.

Ingredients:

2/5 cup (100g) salted butter

2 Tbsp (30ml) green peppercorns

2 tsp (10ml) milled black pepper

½ tsp (3ml) milled white pepper

1 packet (700g) baby potatoes

Olive oil

4 stalks rosemary

1-2kg rock salt

4 (200-250g each) Angus steaks

Salt flakes and milled pepper, for seasoning

Watercress or rocket, for serving

Sour cream, for serving

Serves 4

Preheat oven to 220°C.
Allow butter to soften slightly.
Mix butter and pepper together. Place butter on a sheet of clingfilm and roll into a sausage shape.
Refrigerate to set.
Toss potatoes in a little oil.
Place in a baking dish with rosemary and cover with rock salt.
Bake for 40 minutes or until crispy and cooked through.
Rub steaks with a little oil and season. Heat a pan until smoking and cook steaks until done to your liking.
Cut butter ‘sausage’ into thick slices and use to top steaks.
Remove potatoes from salt and serve with steak, watercress and sour cream.

Photo of my very pretty steak by the ever-talented Mark Peddle.

Prawn and cashew nut korma

// August 26th, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Blogs, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Recipe of the Week, food

This week’s Recipe of the Week is a real challenge… My first ever prawn dish (and I overcooked them ever-so-slightly), my first ever curry-from-scratch.

And it was deeeeelicious!
If I made it again, I’d throw in some cauliflower to flesh it out a bit, but the flavour was incredible.

Here’s the recipe if you’re feeling brave! (Thanks Fresh Living magazine!)

A traditional Indian dish, the coconut milk is often replaced with cream or yoghurt.

Ingredients:

1 onion, quartered

4 cloves garlic, peeled

4cm knob ginger, peeled

Vegetable oil

8 cardamom pods, husks removed

1Tbsp (15ml) ground coriander

1 Tbsp (15ml) ground cumin

1 Tbsp (15ml) ground masala

3 bay leaves

8 curry leaves

1 can (410g) coconut cream

1 cup (250ml) chicken stock

1 packet (100g) raw cashew nuts

Salt and milled pepper

1kg whole prawns, heads removed, peeled and deveined

Serves 4

1. Blitz onion, garlic and ginger to form a paste.
2. Heat a generous glug of oil in a saucepan and fry paste until it begins to turn golden.
3. Add spices, bay and curry leaves and fry for another minute.
4. Toss in coconut cream and stock, cover and simmer for 20 minutes.
5. Pulse cashew nuts in a blender until they resemble fine breadcrumbs.
6. Take care not to over-blend as they will begin to seep oil.
7. Add cashews to saucepan and simmer for another 5 minutes.
8. Season.
9. Toss in prawns and allow to cook for about 5 -10 minutes or until prawns are just cooked.

Serve with plain, steamed or pilau rice.

Above: the photo from Fresh Living.
Below: my rendition.
Clearly, I have a long way to go still!

Gratitude in a breath of air.

// August 17th, 2010 // 1 Comment » // Decisions, Inspiration, Nature, Philosophy

Life is busy, isn’t it? And so much of the time (I realised recently) I’m so busy living it and discovering new things and figuring out how to live it better, that I don’t really take time out to appreciate where I am, right now.

We went away this past weekend, my man and I, with a group of friends, and at the end of the day on Saturday (after a delicious afternoon nap) I took a dog for a walk. This is actually quite big news: dogs and I don’t usually mix. Anyhoo, I took this very playful dog for a walk along these raised wooden walkways right next to the sea… The wind was howling, but it was a warm, friendly wind, and the waves were whipping up into froth, and there was nobody around as far as I could see. After I’d walked quite a distance I stopped and watched the sun set behind a mountain.

I only had a few minutes, because the dog was pulling to keep walking, but I had this sudden, very clear moment where I felt gratitude. For my life as it is right now: for feeling healthy almost all of the time, for having found a man I want to spend all my days with, for a job that challenges me and friends that support me and make me laugh. I suddenly felt this deep thankfulness for it all – as if I’d stepped out of the everyday run of things and could look in and see how lovely it all is.

And it’s stuck with me, this sense of lovely.

Have you had a moment like this lately? Have you given yourself a chance to?

Button mushroom and thyme soup

// August 13th, 2010 // No Comments » // Inspiration, Recipe of the Week, food

This week’s Recipe of the Week from Fresh Living magazine is (drumroll, please):

Button mushroom and thyme soup! The second successful soup I’ve ever made
Here goes:

15 minutes and dinner is served!

Ingredients:
Olive oil, for frying
½ small onion, sliced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 packet (250g) button mushrooms, sliced
2 tsp (10ml) thyme leaves
¼ cup (60ml) white wine
1½ -2 cups (375-500ml) good vegetable or chicken stock
Salt and milled pepper
Toasted baguette rounds, for serving
Serves 1

Heat a glug of oil in a small saucepan and fry onion until soft.
Add garlic and fry for another minute. Remove and set aside.
Add a little more oil and fry mushrooms over a high heat until slightly browned.
Reduce heat, return onion to pan and add thyme and wine.
Allow to reduce by half.
Add stock and simmer for 5 minutes.
Remove a few tablespoonfuls of mushrooms. Blitz soup with a stick blender until smooth.
Return reserved mushrooms to soup and allow to reheat.
Season and serve with toast.

* This is part of our Dinner for One feature in this month’s Fresh Living magazine. If you’re cooking for 2 or more, multiply all ingredients except mushrooms. For 2 to 4 people, use 2 packets of mushrooms and then add one tablespoon of cornflour or one diced potato for every packet of mushrooms left out (i.e. if it’s for four people, use 2 packets of mushrooms and 2 potatoes or 2T cornflour).

Local bloggy gems:

// August 11th, 2010 // No Comments » // Blogs, Cape Town, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Links, food

I’ve recently stumbled across not one, not two, but THREE local bloggy gems, and I wanted to tell you about them. It always makes me so happy when I find local blogs that I love, because not only can I totally relate to what they’re talking about (especially if it’s about food), but because it means the South African blogosphere is growing! Great stuff.

So, in no particular order, three lovely blogs you should check out:

* Mint The Shop is my idea of heaven. Gorgeous vintage and retro homeware, from kitchen stuff to quirky home decor. Be warned! It’s difficult to leave without having bought something (because it’s reallly reasonable). That gorgeous vintage yellow Le Creuset pot is now mine! Thanks brother. Visit Mint here: http://www.minttheshop.com/

* Still Life With Wooden Spoon is a blog about cooking…. with a full time job, which I appreciate. Funny, self deprecating and with some incredible recipes, this is one to bookmark and look at just before you go home to cook dinner. I may even try the gnocchi-ravioli combo… Yum! Visit Still Life here: http://slwws.wordpress.com/

* love made me do it is extremely girly and whimsical and lovely, and I read the whole thing in one sitting. The author is actually going to be our wedding photographer (more on that soon!), and we have so much in common: a passion for old knick knacks (she’s also collecting vintage plates for her wedding), a love of proteas, a fondness for the phrase ‘love is all’ etc etc etc. Visit love made me do it here: http://lovemademedoitx.blogspot.com/

Happy bloggy browsing!

PS: It’s time for the SA Blog Awards, so if you’d like to nominate me, please visit here: http://www.sablogawards.com/or click on the banner on the right. I’m under ‘Best Personal Blog’. Thanks!

Image: love made me do it

Lemon meringue pie

// August 4th, 2010 // No Comments » // Inspiration, Recipe of the Week, Tea Parties, food

Okay, so this week’s Recipe of the Week is already halfway through the week… Blame my wonderful weekend away, and subsequent need to spend all my spare time potting succulents! Seriously, my succulent garden just doubled in size.

Still, I would like to show off by telling you how unbelievable this lemon meringue pie is. So unbelievable, in fact, that I’m using my own picture! Looks delicious, hmm?

Now I won’t lie, this baby takes a long time. Set aside 2 hours and do it properly – step by step, following the directions. It’s worth it! Here goes…

Lemon meringue pie
Absolutely divine! Don’t be put off by the long method, it will help you to avoid a raw-tasting filling and meringue slipping off and pulling away from the sides.

Crust:
¾ packet (200g) Tennis biscuits
¼ cup (60ml) butter, melted

Filling:
2 cans (397g each) full-cream sweetened condensed milk
½ cup (125ml) boiling water
2 Tbsp (30ml) grated lemon peel
¾ cup (187ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice
4 extra-large egg yolks
Pinch salt
2 tsp (10ml) cornflour

Meringue filling:
4 extra-large egg whites
1 Tbsp (15ml) lemon juice
¼ cup (60ml) castor sugar
¼ cup (60ml) icing sugar

Makes 1 x 24cm pie.
Serves 12

Preheat oven to 170°C.
Use a non-stick spray to coat the inside of a 25cm x 5cm pie dish.
Crush biscuits. Add butter and mix together. Tip into pie dish.
Spread crumbs onto base and up sides using the back of a tablespoon. Freeze for 10 – 15 minutes to firm.

Filling:
Beat condensed milk, boiling water, lemon peel and juice, egg yolks and salt together until well combined.
Carefully pour filling into crust to avoid disturbing the crumbs. Bake pie (without meringue) for 20 minutes.

Meringue:
Beat egg whites in a clean glass or stainless steel bowl until just beginning to foam.
Add lemon juice and beat until mixture forms stiff peaks.
Add castor sugar, a spoonful at a time, while beating fast.
Sift icing sugar over in 3 batches and beat well (meringue mixture must be stiff and shiny and be able to hold its shape).
Remove pie from oven. Sift cornflour over filling (this acts as a ‘glue’ to hold the filling and meringue together).
Spoon meringue over hot filling, working it up and over the edge of the crust.
Make a wave pattern in meringue by swirling it with a spatula. Return pie to oven.
Bake for another 35 minutes.
Open oven door by 1cm, switch off oven and allow pie to cool inside.

As always, recipe courtesy of Fresh Living magazine.

One wonderful weekend…

// August 4th, 2010 // No Comments » // Cape Town, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Nature, food

This past weekend was one of those weekends that will stick in my memory for a long time to come… My man and I went away with five other friends to a tiny little town called Prince Albert in the Karoo. It was a four hour drive (a stunning four hour drive, through some really majestic scenery) to get to the little town, and we arrived on Friday just in time for dinner. I fell in love then, even in the dark, mainly because there were succulents everywhere. Everywhere! Excitement overload.

The next day I fell in love even more. The whole town is centered around a main street, which has lots of the expected restaurants and guesthouses, but also has a Saturday market run by Afrikaans tannies and ooms (aunts and uncles, for those not from SA). They were selling pancakes for R3 each, big slices of homemade cake for R5, pots of tea for R3 and homemade roosterbrood for R8. It was like being in the land that time forgot…

Before the Saturday market, I’d gone for a long walk into the surrounding orchards and then out into the veld. It’s extraordinary how vast the Karoo sky is – like a completely different country, with a 360 sweep of sky. Incredible.

The weekend was spent strolling around, stealing succulents (see above), sitting in the sunshine eating delicious food, visiting the dairy (yes! A dairy!) to sample the homemade cheese (yum!), and playing a particularly fun game called Post-It (our name) where you think of a famous character, write it on a Post It and then stick it to someone’s forehead. Then they have to guess who it is in 20 questions, while dealing with the humiliation of sitting in front of everyone with a blue Post It on your forehead. Ha! Hilarious. Until it’s your turn…

The highlight of the weekend was our ghost tour – dinner combo. Prince Albert is a  town rich in history (and ghosts) and we went on a ghost walk around the town with a fascinating storyteller (dressed in a long black coat) who told us all the local tales… Creepy! We then went to African Relish for a superb dinner – bacon and spinach fritters (wow), Karoo lamb stuffed with roasted celery and pecans with the most amazing polenta I’ve ever tasted, and hands-down the best milk tart in the world. The dinner was long and full of laughter and I can’t wait to go back.

Oh! And how could I forget! That afternoon we’d visited African Relish (which is also a cooking school, and is co-owned by our friend’s father) and I tasted jamon for the first time! Jamon! The real deal! Made in South Africa using all the Spanish techniques! It was extraordinary.

So, all in all, a pretty wonderful weekend. We stayed in the most amazing cottage (see below), we ate some truly special food, and we spent good time with friends, laughing. What more could you ask for?

Photos courtesy of the extremely talented Mark Peddle: www.markpeddle.com

Day 29: Last day…

// July 30th, 2010 // No Comments » // 29 Gifts, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it)

So I’ve come to the end of my 29 day giving challenge… And I wanted this last gift to be something meaningful, something that I will carry into the next 29 days, and the 29 days after that.

So I chose something simple but, for me, profound. I have always wanted to be one of those people who really focusses on someone when they’re talking to them. I am, by nature, a little flighty and scatty, but when I speak to someone and I can tell they’re listening, really 100% listening to me, it makes me feel so great. So noticed and validated and wise.

Do you know what I mean?

For my last day’s gift, I really listened when people spoke. And it felt so good to be right here, right now, present. Presence as my last present. I love it!

PS: The photo, of course, doesn’t really have anything to do with presence. I just love succulents (in case you hadn’t noticed…)

Day 28: Phil Collins CD

// July 29th, 2010 // 2 Comments » // 29 Gifts, Inspiration

I like Phil Collins. There, I said it! Groovy Kind of Love, Two Hearts, he has some absolutely classic hits. Of course, this appreciation of Phil Collins has led to more than a few rolled eyes, every boyfriend I’ve had being slightly turned off me, and (no doubt) a drop in my blog hits.

Which is why it’s so remarkable, in this Phil-Collins-lovin’ world I live in (a lonely world indeed) that I could have put off making my dad a Phil CD when he asked me for it months ago. But I did. He must have asked me for it over a year ago, and reminded me in the interim, but somehow I always forgot to make it… Until today!

Check out that baby! Do you want one?

Day 27: Stillness

// July 28th, 2010 // No Comments » // 29 Gifts, Decisions, Inspiration, Life (and the living of it), Love

As I mentioned yesterday, I have been B.U.S.Y lately… I’m not 100% sure why, but all of a sudden my man and I have been deluged with invitations and work has been reallllly busy too. So I’ve had very little time to myself, I’ve been rushing around too much (I hate rushing) and in general I’ve felt like my plate is full to overflowing.

So today I decided to give myself the gift of stillness. I left work on time and went for a 2 hour reiki session with an amazing healer. It was so wonderful to be able to lie down and soak up good energy. For anyone who hasn’t tried reiki, give it a go! It can be completely transformative. I went in feeling tired, rushed, a little worried and snotty. I left feeling pretty close to wonderful!