Sweet Potato Calzone

Boil and mash one large sweet potato. (You can use a sweet potato/potato mixture). Add one egg and enough flour to make a soft dough. Refrigerate for half an hour. Roll into six inch circles, fill with the meat/veg preparation of your choice (great way to use leftovers!) and cook on a stove top or bake till browned. Serve with salad.

Strawberry Pannacotta

2 cups cream

4 cups milk

1 cup sugar

Vanilla

2 packets gelatine

Strawberries

Jelly 

In a quarter cup cold milk, sprinkle gelatine and leave for 10 minutes. Heat the rest of the milk, cream, sugar and vanilla to boiling point, stirring till sugar dissolves. Add gelatine and stir till it dissolves. If it doesn’t, heat a bit on very low heat. Cool and refrigerate. When set, decorate with sliced strawberries, add some jelly and set.

Crab Curry

I've got a wonderful cook, bless her soul! She's been with me for 26 years now and she's still so enthusiastic when it comes to our daily meals. Here's her famous crab curry recipe which everyone who comes over raves about.

For 1 kg crabs

Fry one large onion chopped in a little oil and when the onion is slightly brown, add 2 large red chillies, 1 tbsp raw rice, 1 tbsp dhania, 1 tsp tamarind paste, 1” inch ginger and 1 pod garlic as well as 1 vati dry coconut - copra - grated. Cool and grind. In oil, add haldi, Kashmiri chilli powder and put in the ground masala add water, salt to taste and add the crabs and cook till done.

Fake Caviar

Put one cup of vegetable oil in the freezer for half an hour.
Boil fish/fishbones/crab claws in water with a bit of salt till the liquid tastes nice and fishy. (Or use fish stock or a fish cube. Soak a bit of agar-agar in it for 15 minutes and then heat till it dissolves. Use a few drops of food colouring - orange or squid ink - and using a dropper, drop the liquid into the cold oil. Strain the oil once you're done and your caviar is ready!
(You can use gelatine instead of agar-agar.)

Tom Yum Soup

There's nothing quite like soup to lift your spirits on a grey, gloomy day. And there's nothing quite like Tom Yum Soup to lift them even higher. For me, especially so because so much of what goes in comes from the garden!

          

It's a simple, delicious soup that warms the cockles of your heart. The first step is to make the delicious clear soup. Of course, if you don't have all these ingredients at hand, just go get yourself a packet of Tom Yum Soup mix!

Ingredients

Lemon grass stalks, ginger, lime leaves, coriander stalks, basil leaves, limes, chicken or vegetable stock. And a green chilly if you can stomach it!
Vegetables: Cabbage, carrots, mushrooms, greens, capsicums.

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Boil the lemon grass, ginger, lime leaves, coriander, chilly and some of the basil leaves in the stock. When the stock tastes of ginger and lemon grass, add the lime juice (and salt to taste) and remove from the stove. In another pan, saute the vegetables chopped large, for five minutes and add to the stock and serve with basil leaves.

(Optional: you can add chicken or prawns to the soup. And a dash of fish sauce.)

Baked Cheesecake

Take 4 large eggs and beat with a hand mixer.

Add 1 cup of powdered sugar and beat for a few minutes.

Then add 400 grams of cream cheese and beat. I make my own but you could substitute it with 400 grams of Greek Yogurt or 400 grams of Mascarpone Cheese (you can make it at home – you’ll find the recipe here).

Add 500 ml. of cream, beat.

Meanwhile, crush 10 Marie biscuits, mix with 2 tablespoons almond meal and half a cup of melted butter. Line a baking dish and bake for 5 minutes at 250 degrees C.

Pour the mixture into the baking dish and bake till a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Mine takes 50 minutes with a 220°C setting.

You can eat it as it is or top it with jam or stewed fruits. I love marmalade so that’s what I use.

Home-made Mascarpone Cheese

Bring half a litre of cream to a simmer over very low heat.

Add 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and stir for a few minutes then remove from heat.

Line a colander with cheesecloth and pour in the cream. 

Place it over an empty pan overnight in the fridge. 

It’s ready to use in the morning.