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Braai Breakfast

Long-life salads

These two old-fashioned salads last for ages if kept cool. In fact, they last so well that you could load them into the ox wagon and trek over the Drakensberg to invade and annex another province. Then, when it’s time for a celebratory braai, their flavours will have intensified nicely.

African Salad

You will need:

1 can each of three different kinds of beans.
1 red onion, chopped
400 g of salami, roughly chopped

Tip: You can use canned chickpeas as one of the ‘beans’, but don’t use baked beans in tomato sauce.


Dressing

½ cup of olive oil
½ cup of vinaigrette (e.g. Italian salad dressing)
2 tbsp of balsamic vinegar
Salt and pepper to taste
A handful of chopped parsley or rocket as a garnish

Drain the beans and mix them together, along with the red onion and salami. Mix the dressing ingredients together, pour it over the bean mixture and allow the flavours to develop in the refrigerator for a few days before serving.

Slaphakskeentjies

2 kg baby or pickling onions

Sauce

5 eggs
3 cups of white sugar
1½ tbsp of mustard powder
1 tsp of salt
1 tbsp of cake flour
Salt to taste
2 cups of white vinegar
2 tbsp of butter

Peel the onions and boil them in salt water until just cooked, so they are still a little firm and crunchy on the inside. Blend the eggs, sugar, mustard powder, salt and cake flour very well, and then add the vinegar and mix well again. Pour the mixture into a warm saucepan, set the heat on low and stir continuously until the sauce has thickened and comes to the boil. As soon as it starts to boil, remove from the stove, stir in the butter and pour while still hot over the cold onions. This salad improves if kept in the fridge for up to two weeks. In the days before refrigeration, it was bottled and stored in the pantry until needed.

Skilpadjies to munch on

Skilpadjies are a traditional South African dish that is sometimes called the Karoo hors d’ oeuvre. It is a braai snack containing lamb’s or sheep’s liver wrapped in caul fat (netvet), the fatty membrane that surrounds the slaughtered animal’s stomach. Skilpadjies are braaied over hot coals and turned frequently until they are brown and crispy, but still juicy. They are served to whet appetites and appease hunger pains before the serious braaiing begins.
Although there are many different recipes, traditional recipes have a number of similarities. The liver is minced and mixed with other odds and ends like kidney and tail fat, onion, garlic and vinegar, eggs to bind it all together, and seasoned with salt and pepper. This mixture is then parcelled up in pieces of caul fat and sewn with needle and thread into little parcels. We braaied one batch done like this, but also made a batch of ‘straight’ skilpadjies that were simply slivers of lamb’s liver wrapped in netvet and held together with toothpicks.

Flick’s famous boerewors

95 g of salt
8 ml of pepper
50 g of whole coriander
10 g of ground nutmeg
5 ml of dried thyme
3.75 kg of boned beef forequarter, cut into 20 mm cubes
2 kg of boned pork forequarter, cut into 20 mm cubes
125 g of binder (available from any butcher) OR rolled oats (to loosen the texture)
125 ml of vinegar
190 ml of water
Sausage casings, soaked in lukewarm water (casings available from butcher)

Scorch the whole coriander in a dry, hot pan until lightly browned, and then grind finely. Combine with the other spices. Sprinkle the spice mix over the diced meat, then cover and refrigerate overnight. Mix together the binder, vinegar and water and sprinkle over the meat. Toss well together. Push the meat through a mincer and fill the casings. (This recipe makes about 6 kg of boerewors)

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The Gardener