Latest news with #AfricanCuisine
News24
2 days ago
- General
- News24
Cajun chicken pasta in Amarula sauce
Cajun-spiced chicken meets a rich Amarula cream sauce in this bold, South African-inspired pasta. The sweet liqueur tempers the heat, while the roasted peppers and sundried tomatoes bring bursts of flavour. Its a cosy classic, elevated. Want to make this later? Tap on the bookmark ribbon at the top of your screen and come back to it when you need to shop for ingredients or start cooking. Ingredients 3 chicken breast fillets 1 Tbsp (15ml) olive oil 1 Tbsp (15ml) Cajun spice ½ Tbsp (7.5ml) milled black pepper ½ Tbsp (7.5ml) garlic powder ½ Tbsp (7.5ml) dried parsley 1 tsp (5ml) salt 1 Tbsp (15ml) chopped fresh parsley 400g pasta (penne or similar), cooked 2 red/yellow peppers, roasted ¼ cup (60ml) chopped sundried tomatoes salt and milled black pepper, to taste Sauce 3 Tbsp (45ml) butter 1 onion, peeled and chopped 1 Tbsp (15ml) Cajun spice 1 Tbsp (15ml) smoked paprika 1 cup (250ml) fresh cream ½ cup (125ml) milk ½ cup (125ml) Amarula Cream 1 Tbsp (15ml) cornflour, slaked in 2 Tbsp (30ml) milk ⅓ cup (80ml) grated Parmesan cheese To serve 1 tsp (5ml) dried red chilli flakes or sliced fresh chilli fresh coriander leaves Parmesan cheese lime or lemon wedges Method 1. Coat the chicken breasts with the olive oil, Cajun spice, black pepper, garlic powder, dried parsley and salt. Cover and place in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes, allowing the flavours to infuse. To make the sauce 2. For the sauce, melt the butter in a large pan over a medium heat, then add the onion and cook for 3 minutes. Add the Cajun spice and smoked paprika and cook for 1 minute. 3. Stir in the fresh cream, milk, Amarula Cream and slaked cornflour mixture. Cook, stirring continuously for 4–5 minutes, until the sauce is smooth and creamy. Remove from the heat and stir in the Parmesan cheese. 4. Heat a griddle or frying pan on the stove and cook the chicken fillets for 5–8 minutes per side, depending on thickness, until cooked through. Set aside and allow the chicken to rest for a few minutes. 5. Reheat the sauce and add the fresh parsley, cooked pasta, roasted peppers and sundried tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Once heated through, divide the pasta among serving bowls and top with the sliced, grilled chicken. To serve 6. Garnish with chilli, coriander, additional Parmesan cheese and lemon or lime wedges if desired. Supplied/Penguin Random House Publishing This recipe is an extract from ' The Great Marula Menu ', a celebration of Amarula-inspired recipes, crafted by passionate South African home cooks and renowned chefs like Mogau Seshoene, also known as the acclaimed The Lazy Makoti and J'Something. The collaboration reflects a shared love for great flavours and showcases the rich diversity of South African home cooking.
News24
2 days ago
- General
- News24
Cluck yeah! 9 delicious chicken recipes to try this week
Chicken dishes are flavourful, versatile, and comforting. From classics like peri-peri chicken to inventive fusions like Cajun pasta with Amarula, there's something for everyone. These nine recipes celebrate the versatility of Mzansi's most loved protein, chicken. Chicken is a staple in the South African kitchen for a reason; it's versatile, comforting, and works with just about any flavour. From a South African take on Cajun pasta to a comforting honey and soy stew, here are nine flavour-packed chicken recipes to add to your rotation. Want to make this later? Tap on the bookmark ribbon at the top of your screen and come back to it when you need to shop for ingredients or start cooking. Cajun chicken pasta in Amarula sauce Cajun-spiced chicken meets a rich Amarula cream sauce in this bold, South African-inspired pasta. The sweet liqueur tempers the heat, while the roasted peppers and sundried tomatoes bring bursts of flavour. This one-pot dish gets its depth from butter beans and an unexpected twist: chai rooibos tea in the sauce. Comforting and full of layered flavour. This easy stir-fry combines roasted chilli paste, pad Thai sauce, chicken, vegetables, and yellow (or egg) noodles. Topped with spring onion, coriander, and cashews, it's quick, satisfying, and remarkably similar to the real thing. Chicken and waffles Crispy fried chicken is served on top of golden, fluffy waffles and finished with maple syrup. It's a sweet-savoury classic that never fails. Chicken is spatchcocked and roasted in a velvety, spicy curry sauce until charred. It is served with a sambal of cherry tomatoes, coriander, onions, and fluffy rotis. This comforting stew features the rich umami of soy sauce and the sweetness of honey. It's flavourful and hearty, and it's made with pantry basics. A flavourful chicken wrapped in bacon to add something extra to your dish Spatchcock your chicken for even cooking and maximum char. The peri-peri marinade delivers bold, smoky heat, perfect for a weekend braai. Award-winning Chef Xoliswa Ndoyiya prepared this chutney-glazed chicken for Nelson Mandela for over twenty years. It's simple, tender, and steeped in legacy and re-imagined by celebrity chef Warren Mendes.
Mail & Guardian
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Mail & Guardian
Tasting the continent: a pan-African journey at Épicure
Eat your way around Africa: Épicure is a pan-African fine dining restaurant in the Joburg suburb of Rosebank (left) where Fathi 'Chef Coco' Reinarhz redefines food from the continent. On a sunny yet cold Friday afternoon, I found myself in a gorgeous space on the seventh floor of the One Rosebank apartment building with panoramic views. I was visiting Épicure, a pan-African fine dining restaurant, which I soon discovered is not just a new addition to Joburg's culinary scene but the revival of a dream its proprietor has held sacred for years. Born in Burundi and brought up in Belgium, Fathi 'Chef Coco' Reinarhz arrived in South Africa in 2001 for what was supposed to be a six-month job. 'Three months in,' he says, 'I went back to Belgium and told my wife: 'We're moving. We found the best part of Africa.'' Épicure opened in 2018 in Morningside but closed two years later due to the Covid-19 pandemic. 'It was hard,' he admits. 'My partner pulled out. We lost the premises. 'But I always knew the vision wasn't dead. A setback isn't a failure. It's a realignment.' His dream wasn't just to open a restaurant but to redefine African fine dining. 'Too often, when people think of African restaurants, they imagine cheap, unsafe places in dodgy neighbourhoods. But I wanted to build something refined. 'I wanted people to feel proud of African food. Proud to eat it. Proud to serve it. Proud to share it.' That's why the menu is divided by region and why the set menu is called News of Africa. 'We hear so much bad news about Africa,' he says. 'This is a way to share good news — through taste, through beauty, through story.' I was part of a group of people invited to savour the News of Africa menu, taking Chef Coco's lead on a journey through the diverse flavours of the continent — and it was a journey to remember. Épicure discovered is the revival of a dream its proprietor has held sacred for years. The first sip of the Kinshasa Kir, a champagne-based cocktail laced with ginger and a touch of pili-pili from Central Africa, leaves a sharp bitterness on my tongue. It reminds me of Gemere, the fermented ginger drink, but this one doesn't land for me. The idea is clever, but it jars rather than opens. I chalk it up to the risk inherent in experimentation. Not every note will sing. But the day is still young and the cocktail is just the beginning. Next comes the prawn tail kataifi from North Africa — plump prawns wrapped in shredded phyllo pastry, fried to a crisp and served on a sweet pepper and tomato relish. The prawns are delicious, seasoned just right, the texture somewhere between a delicate crunch and a tender bite. It's paired with the Jasmine Mirage, a floral cocktail of vodka, pomegranate molasses, jasmine tea and rose water. A harmony of flavours. Clean, fragrant, bright. 'Ras el hanout is a term common in North African countries like Morocco that literally translates to 'best spice of the shop',' Chef Coco explains. 'So, if you go to each home, they usually have their own ras el hanout, or their unique combination of spices, and we created our own for this dish.' Then arrives a playful twist on a South African classic: magwinya mouthfuls. These deep-fried dough balls are familiar — but these ones are stuffed with smoked chicken, spinach and peanuts. I laugh with the diner beside me, joking about telling our mothers we went to a high-end restaurant to eat vetkoek with peanut butter. But that, perhaps, is the quiet brilliance of Chef Coco's vision. 'I want to change the narrative around African food,' he tells me later. 'People think African food can't be elegant, that it's too heavy, too rustic, too common. I want people to eat mogodu the way they eat sushi — with pride, in a beautiful space.' The cocktail pairing here is the Dangerous Lover: tequila blanco, Aperol, naartjie and lemon. Citrus to cut through the richness, with a subtle bitterness to balance the peanut's creaminess. I don't finish the dish — it's too filling — but the taste lingers long after. A harmony of flavours, clean, fragrant, bright. The next course is lamb dakhine from West Africa, a slow-cooked leg of lamb braised in a peanut sauce with beans, served with broken rice. There is a humble nobility in this dish. Earthy and comforting. The broken rice, once considered the scraps of the rice harvest, is transformed into something triumphant. 'Peanut butter is to African cuisine what cream is to French cuisine,' Chef Coco explains. 'It's what gives our dishes their richness, their memory, their body.' This course comes with my favourite drink of the night: Cup of Chino, made with coffee bourbon, muscovado and orange bitters. It tastes like a gentleman's study, like polished wood and deep conversation. There's something ceremonial about it, like a toast between old friends. The final course, taken straight from East Africa, arrives with the flourish of dessert: kilwa coconut cake served with chai ice cream. It reminds me of ndizi, that sweet Tanzanian dish of roasted bananas infused with coconut milk, cardamom and cinnamon. The cake is soft and fragrant, the ice cream spiced and creamy. Together, they dance. 'I wanted to pay tribute to my Swahili heritage, my personal roots in East Africa,' Chef Coco says, 'especially Zanzibar, which is the world capital of spices. I wanted to bring forward your cardamom, your nutmeg, your vanilla, your star anise, in that style of authentic Swahili cuisine. The Kilimanjaro Queen cocktail, named for the highest mountain on the continent, pairs whisky with pineapple, cumin and lemonade. It's sweet, aromatic and gently fizzy, pulling the curtain closed on the meal with a celebratory sigh. There is something moving about what Épicure offers. Not just good food, but a kind of homecoming. A reclamation. A deliberate insistence that African cuisine deserves to sit at the same table as French, Italian or Japanese. Not as fusion. Not as novelty. But as itself. 'This is not a trend. I want other African chefs to do this. In Cape Town. In Congo. In Chad. Wherever. We don't need to eat pasta in Chad. We need to eat us. But in places that are safe. Beautiful. Worthy.' Chef Coco speaks with the conviction of someone who believes food can shift culture. 'Mobility is humanity,' another artist once told me. Perhaps so is flavour. Perhaps what we share across borders and kitchens and spices is what ultimately binds us. At Épicure, I tasted a version of Africa that is complex, daring, elegant and deeply familiar. And as I left, I felt full — not just in my belly, but, in the best possible sense of the word, nourished.
BBC News
29-05-2025
- Business
- BBC News
'Why I decided to raise my family in Dorset'
Dorset Day is being marked on Sunday to celebrate the county's heritage and BBC has been finding out what life is like for people from different cultures who live of those is Prince Ehiechukwu moved to England from Nigeria 23 years ago to study and arrived in the south not long after he graduated. He soon found himself working in Bournemouth and has since opened an African restaurant in the town with his now very much considers the town his home – but it hasn't always been was not as multi-cultural when he first arrived, he says, and his family suffered some racism. He says his children were among the only from black backgrounds in their nurseries and primary school."Dealing with it wasn't easy," he says."It's quite sad as a parent to see your children go through that."But, at the end of the day you don't let them beat you down - you make your children learn from it. We chose to focus on the positives." 'Different vibe' Prince's family-run business, Nativ, started from the Ogbujis' kitchen in after attending food festivals in and around the county, his family opened a restaurant on Old Christchurch believes part of his success is a result of how engaged he has been with the Bournemouth community."It is one thing to go to a different environment and just live your life, it is also about going there, engaging yourself, being part of where you are," he says."Dorset is like home for me, all my children were born here and the reason why we settled here is because we felt it was a better environment to raise a family."The growth of Bournemouth University, Arts University Bournemouth and several language schools has helped improve diversity in the town too, Prince says."A lot because people from all over the world come here to study," he adds."For me as a foreigner it was a good thing because I got to see it grow as a community - it brings a different vibe."You can hear more about Prince's story during a Dorset Day special on BBC Radio Solent this Sunday. You can follow BBC Dorset on Facebook, X (Twitter), or Instagram.
News24
25-05-2025
- General
- News24
Sunday sweet treat: Rooibos-poached pears with Saffron ice cream
Rooibos tea is one of those proudly South African ingredients that is insanely versatile outside of the teapot. These rooibos-poached pears impart a sense of calm in the world that can only be described as you eat them. I adore the hot-cold combination of the pears and ice cream for that hot and cold sparkle. But, with or without ice cream, the pears will delight – the choice is yours. Want to make this later? Tap on the bookmark ribbon at the top of your screen and come back to it when you need to shop for ingredients or start cooking. Ingredients Saffron ice cream 2 cups cream 1 cup full-cream milk ½ cup brown sugar ½ tsp ground saffron A pinch of salt 6 large egg yolks 1 squeeze vanilla paste Rooibos-poached pears 3 cups water 4 rooibos tea bags ½ cup sugar 1 vanilla pod, halved and seeds scraped loose 4 firm pears, peeled but with the stalks in Method 1. To prepare the ice cream, heat the cream, milk, sugar, saffron and salt in a saucepan over a medium heat. Stir continuously. Once the mixture is scalding but not boiling and the sugar has dissolved, whisk the egg yolks in a bowl into a thick, aerated mass. 2. Take the milk mixture off the heat, then add about ½ cup of it to the whisked egg yolks and whisk together. Pour the egg yolk and dairy mixture back into the saucepan and heat on low until the mixture thickens. You will know it's done when it can coat the back of a spoon and a line remains when you drag a finger across the back of the spoon. Stir in the vanilla. 3. Before churning, be sure to cool the mixture for at least 4 hours or overnight. Churn according to the instructions of your ice-cream machine. 4. For the pears, add the water, tea bags, sugar, and vanilla seeds and pod to a deep pot. Heat until the sugar dissolves. Add the pears and poach for ±30 minutes, until they are soft but not disintegrating. Use a slotted spoon to remove the pears from the poaching liquid and set them aside. 5. Place the poaching liquid back over the heat and allow to reduce by half. The syrup will be pale and flavourful. 6. To serve, add a pear to each serving bowl with a scoop of ice cream and drizzle with the syrup. This recipe is an extract from Kamini Pather's debut cookbook, A ll Dhal'd Up! Every day, Indian-ish, Good-Mood Food. You probably know Kamini as the winner of MasterChef South Africa's second season and a food-loving TV personality who's taken the culinary world by storm, producing hit food-travel series like Girl Eat World. Her cooking is all about bold Indian-inspired dishes with an exciting global twist. All Dhal'd Up is her first full-length cookbook and her unapologetic love letter to flavour, where she serves up her signature style in every recipe.
