Cape Town – Savour this peek preview of the second Cellarbake@Nitida, an irresistible one-day fest of bakes and wine (and pairing the two) which takes place at the Durbanville wine farm on March 21, starting at 11am.
The original concept that debuted last year was a huge success, and this year some of the Cape’s celebrity bakers have been invited to showcase their signature sweet and savoury bakes to a hungry public.
Visitors can wander around stalls and exhibits of baking and wedding ideas.
There will be a vast array of savoury delights, while children will be well catered for with activities such as face painting, jumping castle, and (accompanied) boat rides across the lake. Nitida’s award-winning wines will add summery pleasure to a relaxed day.
Tickets for the event are available through Webtickets at R100 a person, which includes sampling five bakes paired with wine, or R50 a head for the bakes without wine. Small children enter free.
In the Welgemoed Forum you will find Neil Swart’s Arugula Bistro & Bread, where he produces not only his moreish breads, but ice cream, pasta, bacon and almost everything else on the menu from his open-plan kitchen.
Neil blames his passion for cooking on an everlasting childhood hunger which drove him to learn to cook as an adult. He offers fine family fare from breakfast through to dinner. The menu includes a Banting section.
Visit www. arugulabistro.co.za for more information.
Of his sandwich roll recipe, he recommends using unbleached stone-ground white bread flour. He also starts preparations a day ahead of baking.
760g bread flour
10g instant yeast
20g salt
+/- 800ml ice-cold water
In a dough mixer, combine flour, yeast and salt. Add some of the water to form a stiff dough and mix on medium speed until all flour is incorporated. This ensures that no lumps form.
Now mix more water until the dough is smooth and comes away from the sides of the mixer bowl – you need to have a fairly firm dough.
Transfer dough to a large mixing bowl and cover with plastic wrap, allowing room for expansion and place in the fridge for 24 hours.
Next day, scrape the dough on to a well-floured surface. Fold the dough in half and cover the surface with a light coating of flour.
Pre-heat your oven to its maximum setting. Let the dough prove until it has increased in size by one-third. Cut into about 6 equal portions and place on a floured baking tray.
Transfer to oven and steam for 4 minutes. If your oven does not have a steam option, spray the sides of your oven with cold water just before putting in the dough.
After 4 minutes, open the door for a moment to let out the steam, then bake for a further 8 minutes, still at maximum heat.
When the rolls look golden, reduce heat to 180°C, and bake a little longer until the rolls feel light in your hands.
Foodbarn’s la belle pissaladière
This Provençal classic onion, thyme, anchovy and olive tart is the most appropriate recipe to emerge from the FoodBarn in Noordhoek, as it is native to its owner, Franck Dangereux’s birthplace. It is also a firm favourite with the restaurant’s head chef, Debbie Bisschoff who has been in the bistro kitchen for some four years.
She started her culinary career in Caledon, and has never looked back. She points out that it is important that the base consists of a soft bready dough rather like a thick, yeasty pizza. The onion topping mixture can be cooked well ahead.
Topping:
Olive oil
2 large white onions, peeled and thinly sliced
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1tbsp fresh thyme leaves
6 fillets of anchovy, chopped, plus 8 whole fillets
1 handful pitted black Calamata olives
Base:
150g cake flour
generous pinch of salt
1tsp sugar
3tbsp olive oil
5g fresh yeast, tempered in a little warm water, or 1tsp instant dry yeast
90ml water
Heat a generous amount of olive oil in a medium-sized pan. Add the onions, garlic and thyme.
Reduce the heat and cook slowly for 20 to 25 minutes, until the onion is really soft and pale, do not let it brown. Add the chopped anchovy and season with a little pepper. Chill until ready to bake.
For the crust, combine the flour, salt, sugar and olive oil in a bowl. Add the yeast and pour over the water.
Work with your hands to form an elastic dough. (Keep a small dish of flour beside the bowl to clean the sticky dough off your hands as necessary.)
Cover with a cloth and leave dough to prove until doubled in size. Knock the dough back with your fist, then turn onto a floured work surface and spread it with a rolling pin until just ½cm thick. Shape into a circle or rectangle, transfer to a baking tray and prick the surface with a fork, leaving a margin of about 1cm around the edge. Preheat oven to 180oC.
Remove onion mixture from fridge and spread evenly over the base, leaving a 1cm margin around the edge. Leave the pissaladière to prove while the oven heats – on a hot day allow at least 30 minutes, on a cold day, 45 minutes – the edges should puff up. Just before baking , arrange the8 anchovy fillets and olives on top.
Bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes until the bread base is cooked. As it comes out of the oven, drizzle it with olive oil and leave until the oil soaks in.
Never eat it hot – the flavours must have time to mingle and the tart should be cool enough to hold in your hand; room temperature pissaladière is best. Serves 4.
The Larder’s chocolate and ginger tart
Readers have a choice of two Larder venues, both serving the same delectable, rustic fare for breakfast, lunch and coffee time. One is in Claremont, the other in Diep River.
Chef and restaurateur Sonja Edridge makes sure that both present seasonal bakes and dishes, using local and free-range ingredients and pasture-reared meat.
Sonja comes with an impressive culinary CV, having graduated from a top London cookery school, followed by stints on British television. She edited the food magazines for three of Britain’s major supermarkets before going freelance as a food stylist for publications, cookbooks and television commercials.
See www.thelardercafe.co.za for more information.
This irresistible tart will take you about 25 minutes to prepare and 55 minutes to bake.
Pastry:
225g plain flour, sifted, plus extra to dust
125g cold unsalted butter, diced
25g castor sugar
1 large egg, beaten
Filling:
225g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
125g unsalted butter, diced
75g castor sugar
2 large eggs
75g ginger nut biscuits, crushed into small pieces
Pistachio nuts, chopped, to decorate
Make the pastry: in a food processor, whiz the flour and butter until they resemble fine breadcrumbs. Add castor sugar and combine. Tip into a bowl, stir in just enough egg with a spoon to bind mixture. Use your hands to bring the pastry together. Wrap in clingfilm and chill for 30 minutes.
Roll out pastry thinly on a lightly floured surface and line a medium deep, loose-based tart tin. Prick base all over; chill for 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 190°C (170°C for fan ovens). Line pastry with baking paper and fill with baking beans, bake blind for 15-18 minutes. Remove beans and paper, then bake pastry for a further 10-12 minutes until base feels sandy. Reduce temperature to 150°C (130°C).
Meanwhile, melt the chocolate with the butter in a heatproof bowl over simmering water. Whisk together the sugar and eggs until pale and thick. Stir in the melted chocolate and biscuits. Pour into the baked tart shell and bake for 25 minutes until just set. Leave to cool in the tin. Serve at room temperature decorated with chopped nuts. Serves 8 – 10.
Whipped Patisserie’s red velvet cupcakes
Candice Bowler owns the Whipped Patisserie, a stylish café in the Westlake Lifestyle Centre. The venue is filled to the brim with sweet and savoury delights, including special birthday creations and extravagant tiered wedding cakes.
She qualified as a chef from the SA Chefs’ Academy a decade ago, started her patisserie a year later and moved into her own premises in 2010.
Her decadent cupcakes are now being challenged in the publicity stakes by her prize-winning cheesecake. See www.whipped-cakes.co.za for more information.
Cake:
375ml oil
1½ cups castor sugar
2 eggs
2tbsp red gel colouring
2½ cups self -raising flour
1tbsp cocoa powder
1 tsp salt
500ml buttermilk
1½ tsp bicarb
2 tsp white vinegar
Icing:
2kg icing sugar, sifted
250g cream cheese
250g room temperature butter
Topping:
Edible glitter, optional
Strawberries
In an electric food mixer, combine your oil, sugar, eggs and red gel and whisk at high speed for 5 minutes. Sift together your flour, cocoa powder and salt, and add 1/3 of the dry ingredients to your oil mixture, whisk for 2 minutes.
Add ½ of your buttermilk to the oil mixture, and whisk till combined. Add another 1/3 of your flour mix, and whisk again. Add the remaining buttermilk and whisk. Now add the rest of your flour mix and whisk till there are no lumps and everything is smooth and shiny. Remove your whisk and add the bicarb and vinegar and fold through with a spatula till everything is incorporated.
Divide batter between 24 cupcake cups and bake at 180°C for +/-15 minutes or check by inserting a skewer and if it comes out clean, the batter is cooked. Leave to cool completely before icing.
For the icing, combine the icing sugar with the cream cheese and butter, and whisk till smooth. If the icing is too runny, keep adding icing sugar till light and fluffy. Swirl onto the cupcakes and finish with glitter, if using, and top each with a washed, halved strawberry.
Myrna Robins, Cape Argus