Soul Food: Crust-less Bacon and Leek Quiche. Sielskos: Korslose Prei en Spek Souttert

Food is one of my biggest passions... as I think was made clear in my previous post on soul food. Now, with the country being obsessed with the Banting-based Tim Noakes diet, it seems that everyone feels guilty about eating. Yes, I have also tried to cut back on carbs, but I think food is to be celebrated, not regretted. Heck, if you celebrate food by overloading on fat and protein, that's great too.

Bacon & Leek Quiche/Prei & Spek Souttert*

Who ever thought something with as fancy a name as "quiche" could be so simple to make? I follow the principle of throwing ingredients together until it kind of resembles what I'm trying to make, with a recipe as a starting off point. Do you also find it easier to remember made-up recipes than book recipes? I certainly do!

I'm taking liberties in posting this recipe on my blog, as pretty much everything was store-bought. Since I don't live on a farm it's pretty much impossible to make my own cheese and such, but one main ingredient came straight from my backyard vegetable patch. You guessed it; leeks!

Leeks being sautéed in butter/Preie word gesautée in botter

Quiche Recipe (serves 6):

500g chopped leeks/gekapte preie
500g sliced bacon/repies spek
200g cheddar cheese/kaas
8 eggs/eiers
150ml slightly whipped cream/liggeklopte room
2 tbsp butter/botter
1 tsp thyme/tiemie
salt and ground pepper to taste/sout en peper na smaak

Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius
Sauté leeks in the butter
Add bacon to leeks and lightly fry
Mix the cheese, eggs and cream together and whip lightly
Add all the ingredients to a large glass pan
Bake for approximately 35mins

The recipe is easily adaptable. Simply add more bacon for a meatier taste or more cheese and leeks (instead of the bacon) for a vegetarian twist. 

Have you ever tried to make a quiche?

*As this quiche is crust-less, it is Tim Noakes friendly

Soul Food: Pumpkin Fritters & Curried Beans. Sielskos: Pampoenkoekies & Kerriebone

I love food. I'm the first person to admit that, but for some reason I have an even greater passion for eating in the colder months. As soon as the leaves turn sunset shades of orange and yellow, I start to get hungry faster, nibble more and over-indulge on a (much more) regular basis. As per normal, the survival mechanism built into humanity since  cavemen days is  conveniently blamed for this turn of events.

I therefore thought it quite appropriate to write a blog post on soul food. Especially, two of my favourite recipes - both made from the bounty of my summer garden. I know, I know; "bounty" might be taking it too far, but here we go...

Pumpkin Fritters/Pampoenkoekies

Generally we Afrikaners view vegetables as something to sweeten and fatten up like a nice juicy chicken. Sugar and butter is added in very generous portions to most cooked vegetables and we subsequently brag to our English friends about our "healthy" diets... all them vegetables you see. This is naturally far from the truth, as the vegetables could just as well be dessert! Yes, I know there has been a trend towards healthier, raw or organic food in the last decade or so, but plain old traditional "Boerekos" (Afrikaner traditional fare; literally 'Boer food') still consist of a big portions of meat, two carbs (potatoes and rice of course) and normally two veggies - which is normally cooked with sugar and butter. I rest my case.

My mother's heavenly pumpkin fritters/Mamma se hemelse pampoenkoekies

Not that I'm anti-Boerekos! Oh no, this would be a dishonest and hugely ironic principle on my part, since "Pampoenkoekies" is my absolute favourite vegetable(-ish) dish. Let me share my aunt's easy recipe...

Pumpkin Fritter Recipe:

250ml finely mashed Butternut squash/fyngedrukte Botterskorsie
2 eggs/eiers
250ml cake flour/koekmeel
7ml baking powder/bakpoeier
15ml sugar/suiker
5ml lemon juice/suurlemoensap
1ml cinnamon/kaneel
a pinch of salt/'n knippie sout
sunflower oil/kookolie
cinnamon sugar/kaneelsuiker

Squeeze out excess water from the cooked and squashed butternut
Beat the eggs and add to the pumpkin, mixing it well
Add all remaining ingredients to the batter, except the oil or cinnamon sugar
Add spoonfuls of the batter into a pan with a bit of hot oil
Fry the fritters until bubbles appear at the top of each fritter, turn and bake on other side until golden-brown and done
Remove, place on kitchen towel and sprinkle each fritter with the cinnamon sugar.

Curried Beans/Kerriebone

One very sad thing about the current generation of younger adults (myself included) is that we are neglecting, forgetting and sometimes even losing the art of preserving. My maternal grandmother is a master at baking, cooking, making jam and preserving. I'm trying my utmost best to learn her secrets and observe her methods, but it's sometimes difficult jotting down recipes because she makes everything from memory and "... just add to taste..." How can one add Anything to taste if one has never made said thing?! Unfortunately (maybe fortunately?) the older generation simply didn't use recipes. Knowledge was passed from mother to daughter, and so the cycle was repeated.

One recipe I did manage to get out of the granny is her famous curried beans one. I've noticed that people overseas preserve their beans by pickling, but over hear in South Africa we simply adore our curried beans. Here is the recipe the granny uses:

Curried Bean Recipe:*
1kg grean beans/groenbone
2 big onions/groot uie
salt to taste/sout na smaak

Curry Sauce:
1 tbsp curry powder/eetlepel kerriepoeier
1 tbsp mild mustard powder/mosterd poeier
325ml vinegar/asyn
1 cup sugar/koppie suiker
2 tbsp corn flower/mielieblom

Mix all the sauce ingredients together well
Boil the beans until soft but still slightly crunchy, and then pour out all water
Pour sauce mix over beans and stir well
Bring the sauce and beans to a boil and remove from heat
Bottle the curry beans in sterilised glass jars when hot.

Grandma Baby's bottled curried beans/Ouma Baby se gebottelde kerriebone

Now I'm going to love and leave you... I'm off to enjoy a plate of soul food myself :-)

A mouth-watering plate of Boerekos/Heerlike bord Boerekos

* Rossouw, H. (1980) Huishoudkunde Handboek. Graaff-Reinet: H.Rossouw