Tonight I'm making a South African dish called Bobotie.
It's a total comfort food. It's meaty, spicy, sweet and salty all in one dish. It's kind of like a kicked up version of a meatloaf (for lack of a better description), only it's faster to make and it's cooked in a pan with fruit and curry with an egg custard on top. It's quickly become one of my favourite home foods.
Here's my version which I derived from a South African Cookbook and a recipe from Sharl's mom:
Bobotie
1 slice white bread
1 cup milk
1 kg lean minced beef
1 medium onion peeled and finely chopped
large handful of raisins
3-4 tbsp blanched almonds
3 tbsp applesauce
3 tbsp lemon juice
2 tsp chopped mixed herbs (I use oregano, rosemary, thyme and basil)
3 tbsp curry powder (I tend to use a bit more becuase I like it spicy and flavourful)
1 tbsp turmeric
2 tbsp salt
sunflower oil
3 large eggs
6 bay leaves or lemon leaves
Soak the bread in 125 ml milk, then squeeze it dry and reserve the milk. Mix the bread with the minced beef. Mix in all the ingredients except the remaining reserved milk, the oil, eggs and bay/lemon leaves.
Heat the oil in the frying pain and brown the meat mixture lightly. Turn into casserole. Beat eggs with the remaining reserved milk and pour over the meat mixture. Garnish the top of the mixture with the bay/lemon leaves and bake at 180 deg C for approx 50 mins or until egg is set. Serve with rice.
|