The Silver Spoon is considered the encyclopaedia of Italian food, and obviously I have a copy. This recipe is inspired by a “Grandmother’s stew” among its pages.

A caponata is a traditional eggplant dish from Sicily. The recipe here is my variation, staying true to the spirit of Italian cooking with a little bit of a personal twist.

It’s a simple recipe, and makes a nice vegetarian main, best served with a nice crusty bread to soak it up. It can even act as a side to any roast meat or chicken.

Ingredients

• 500 g eggplant (the long purple ones, or small ones; not the big round ones)
• 1 large capsicum (80 g)
• 1 small onion, chopped (about ½ cup)
• 1 large red chilli pepper, seeds and all (not a very hot variety)
• A scant ½ cup of sliced green olives
• 1 teaspoon of chopped capers
• 4 largish cloves of garlic, crushed and minced
• 1 small can of tomato paste
• A couple of sprigs of fresh oregano or thyme
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• Olive oil

Method

1. Dice the eggplant and put it in a sieve.
2. Salt the eggplant liberally and put a little weight on it to squeeze out some of the water.
3. Meanwhile, roast the capsicum over an open flame on all sides, then remove it and dunk it in cold water. You should then be able to peel off the skin. Remove the seeds and chop it into a big dice, similar in size to the eggplant.
4. Heat a pan and, when hot, add a splash of olive oil.
5. Brown the eggplant on all sides in the oil, then remove it from the pan and set aside.
6. In the same pan, add the onions and soften them over a low heat. We are not caramelising them, just softening them to remove the sharpness, so cook until they go translucent.
7. Still on a low heat, add the garlic and let it soften. Again, don’t brown it; we just want to take away the sharpness.
8. Add the thyme or oregano and the remaining ingredients except the tomato paste (eggplant, capsicum, chilli, olives and capers). If using dried oregano, don’t add it until the tomato paste goes in.
9. Mix everything together and let it cook.
10. Add the tomato paste and a scant splash of hot water. There should not be any sauce, just enough to coat the eggplant.
11. Cook for about 4–5 minutes. You are looking for the eggplant to keep its shape, but collapse with slight pressure from a fork.
12. Remove the stalks of oregano or thyme.
13. Check the seasoning and add salt and pepper. Don’t add any salt before this stage, as a lot of the ingredients are salty: the salted eggplant, the capers and the olives.
14. The oil will be released as well. Remove from the heat.
15. Serve with crusty bread or over a short pasta.

Tips

1. This is one dish where I don’t recommend salting and seasoning as you go. The olives and capers have their own salt and will release it.
2. Like most braises, stews and curries, this will be better the next day.

Eat in good health!

It’s a simple recipe, and makes a nice main, best served with an Indian bread like a roti or a simple paratha. Because it is a thick sauce, I don’t recommend it with rice.

Sorry, no image. We ate it all before the photos. 😋

Ingredients

• 1.25 kg chicken pieces (breast, leg, thigh), on the bone recommended
• 2½ tablespoons of whole black peppercorns (yes, it sounds like a lot, but it will be tempered by the other ingredients)
• 200 g Greek yoghurt, whipped
• 200 g sliced onions
• 2 bay leaves
• 4 cloves
• 1 tablespoon of garlic paste
• ½ tablespoon of ginger paste
• Salt to taste
• 2–3 tablespoons of oil

Method

1. Grind the black pepper in a spice grinder or with a mortar and pestle. You need a coarse grind.
2. Marinate the chicken in half the ground black pepper, 1 tbsp of oil, the ginger and garlic pastes, and 1 tsp of salt.
3. Allow the chicken to marinate for at least half an hour. If rushed, you can cook the chicken straight away, but marinating is always better.
4. In a thick-bottomed pan, heat the remaining oil and add the bay leaves and the cloves.
5. When they become aromatic and release their smell, reduce the heat to low and add the onions.
6. We need to soften the onions, not brown them. This gentle cooking removes their pungency.
7. Once the onions are soft and translucent, remove them from the heat and pick out the bay leaves and the cloves.
8. Grind the softened onions into a purée, adding a little water if necessary to get a smooth paste.
9. Meanwhile, brown the marinated chicken pieces in the pan, then set them aside.
10. Return the pan to high heat and add back the onion purée, the bay leaves and the cloves.
11. Return the chicken to the onion purée in the pan, and stir to mix everything together.
12. Add the remaining black pepper, reserving a large pinch for garnish.
13. Reduce the heat to low, whip the yoghurt and add it, stirring to mix everything together well.
14. Add up to ½ cup of warm or hot water to help blend everything together. Season with salt at this point.
15. Cook for about 30–40 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken pieces. Check the seasoning again.
16. You should have a thick curry coating the chicken.
17. Serve hot, garnished with the reserved black pepper.

Tips

1. Always add dairy on low heat to stop it scorching and splitting.
2. Use ghee instead of oil for cooking the onions, to give an interesting depth to the base.
3. Like most braises, stews and curries, this will be better the next day.

Eat in good health!

The lasagna has two layers: mixed vegetables in a tomato sauce at the base, and a cheesy spinach and mushroom layer above. It’s all topped off with some more cheese for a nice crust.

It’s a simple recipe, but takes a little bit of work. The reward is well worth it.

Ingredients

Based on a 2.5 litre baking dish.

• 12 standard size lasagna sheets. I use the variety that does not need to be pre-boiled.
• 1 medium green capsicum
• 1 medium yellow capsicum
• 1 medium zucchini or 1 medium eggplant
• 200 g cherry tomatoes, or similar tomatoes, deseeded and chopped
• 200 g tomato paste
• 200 g mushrooms
• 800 g spinach leaves
• 3–4 cloves of garlic, crushed
• 2 tablespoons of cream
• Fresh basil, oregano or thyme, or dried oregano or thyme
• Red chilli flakes to your liking
• 200 g fresh mozzarella
• 50–60 g parmesan, or any cheese you prefer, for the top
• Freshly cracked black pepper
• Salt to taste

Method

Tomato and vegetable sauce

1. Chop the capsicum, zucchini, eggplant and mushrooms into a 1" dice.
2. If using eggplant, once you have chopped it, rub a little salt into it and let it drain in a colander. This helps remove some of its bitterness. Leave it for 10 minutes and then give it a quick rinse.
3. Heat some olive oil and add the cherry tomatoes. Let them heat up until they soften and start bursting with a little pressure, gently break down about half of the tomatoes, and add the vegetables you are using.
4. Mix them through and add the tomato paste, basil and other herbs.
5. Season with salt and add red chilli flakes to your desired level of heat.
6. The vegetables should only just start to soften, no more: we want a chunky sauce.

Spinach and mushroom sauce

1. Prepare the spinach by blanching it in hot water for 4 minutes, then removing it and plunging it into ice water.
2. Drain the spinach and squeeze all the water out of it. You will probably end up with a ball of about 200 g.
3. Heat a little oil in a skillet and add the garlic. Once it is fragrant, add the mushrooms and let them brown a bit. Add the spinach and mix everything together. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Turn off the heat, add the cream to the spinach and mix it through.

Build the layers

1. Put a little of the liquid from the tomato sauce in the base of the baking dish and spread it around.
2. Put 3 lasagna sheets on top of the sauce, trying to cover the whole of the dish.
3. Put the vegetable and tomato sauce on top of the lasagna sheets. Avoid adding too much liquid and try to keep the sauce chunky. Reserve some of the sauce to dress the top of the lasagna.
4. Cover the tomato sauce with more lasagna sheets.
5. The next layer is the spinach and mushroom. Cover the lasagna sheets completely.
6. Put the fresh mozzarella on top of the spinach and mushroom layer.
7. I usually tear the mozzarella into chunks and spread them around the spinach. You don’t want a complete layer of cheese, just cheese studded throughout.
8. Once the cheese is on, put on the last layer of lasagna sheets.
9. Lightly dress the last layer of sheets with the remaining tomato sauce. You are not going to cover it completely; in fact, you want some of the sheet showing.
10. Grate the parmesan finely and spread it over the tomato sauce and the pasta sheets. Again, you don’t want a complete layer of cheese, just a scattering.
11. Let the lasagna sit for 10 minutes to settle, and it’s ready for baking.

Baking

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C.
2. Lightly cover the baking dish with foil, so that it is not touching the cheese.
3. Place the dish on the middle shelf and bake for 30 minutes.
4. Remove the foil and bake for another 10 minutes to brown the cheese.
5. Remove the dish from the oven and let it rest for 10 minutes. This lets the liquids settle, and the lasagna will be easier to cut and serve.
6. Use a wide spatula and a knife to cut the lasagna into squares, and serve.

Tips

1. Use any vegetables you have or like. Even potato works well.
2. To turn this into a meat lasagna, add meat to the tomato sauce instead of the vegetables.
3. A traditional lasagna uses a béchamel sauce, made from a roux (flour cooked in butter) and milk. I like the mozzarella more.

Eat in good health!

Ingredients

• 400 g squid, cut into rings, or frozen squid rings (it’s quite forgiving)
• 1 level teaspoon of turmeric
• 2½ teaspoons of mustard seeds
• About 3 stems of curry leaves, about 30 leaves
• 3 dried red chillies
• Optional: a teaspoon of roasted chana dal or some salted peanuts

Method

1. This dish cooks quickly, so have everything ready to go.
2. Toss the squid in the turmeric and leave it for about 2–3 minutes.
3. Heat a couple of teaspoons of vegetable or peanut oil.
4. Once the oil is hot (but not smoking), add the mustard seeds and the red chillies.
5. Once the mustard seeds start popping, throw in the curry leaves, and the chana dal or peanuts if using.
6. Immediately follow with the squid, and toss it so that it is coated with the mustard seeds and the curry leaves.
7. Cook for about 3–5 minutes, until the squid is done.
8. Remove and serve hot, with a squeeze of lemon.

Tips

Squid needs to be cooked either really quickly or for a really long time. When it is ready, it will be an opaque milky white inside, and when you bite it, it will have a little resistance.

Eat in good health!

Ingredients

• 3 kg leg of pork (I used a deboned one, which was 2.5 kg)
• About a tablespoon of fine sea salt
• About a tablespoon, and a pinch more, of freshly ground black pepper
• ⅓ tablespoon of a flavourless high-heat cooking oil: vegetable, peanut or canola

Method

1. This is a slow-cooked leg, so set some time aside for it on the day you want to eat it. The slow cooking gives you tender meat, and then a burst of high heat at the end gives you the crackling.
2. The crackling depends on the moisture in the skin flashing to steam in a burst of high heat.
3. Dry the pork thoroughly, so there’s no surface moisture.
4. Score the fat lightly. I didn’t go too deep, because I wanted this puffed type of crackling. If you score deeply, you will get crispy strips.
5. Rub all over with the salt and the pepper, especially salting the skin.
6. Set the oven to 125°C.
7. Place the pork on the middle shelf, on a rack, with a tray underneath for the drippings.
8. Cook for about 5 hours, checking every hour and turning the leg around every couple of hours.
9. You should check for doneness regularly. The safe internal temperature is about 70°C, and checking regularly ensures it does not dry out.
10. At about the 5 hour mark, pull it out, tent it in foil and let it rest. You will cook it for another 25 minutes or so to get the crackling going.
11. An hour before you are ready to eat, crank your oven up to 250°C.
12. Rub some oil over the crackling. Use an oil that can take a high temperature: I don’t recommend olive oil, but peanut, canola or vegetable are all good.
13. Put the leg back in and let the crackling form, checking every 10 minutes. You can cover the meat with foil, leaving only the crackling exposed, to stop the meat drying out or charring (charred bits are good though, IMHO).
14. Pull it out once you are satisfied, and let it rest for about 15 minutes before carving.

To serve

I served this with fresh nuoc cham, a chimichurri, a Korean barbecue sauce and a basil and chilli sambal. We made lettuce wraps with spring onions, capsicum, green chillies and more. But you could also make a pan gravy or a similar sauce to enjoy it with.

Eat in good health!

Ingredients

For the chicken

• 350–400 g boneless chicken thigh fillets. You can use breast meat as well.

For the marinade

• 6 garlic cloves
• ½" knob of ginger
• 3 green chillies (seeds and all)
• 100 g coriander (leaves and stems)
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 3–4 teaspoons of water
• Salt to taste

For the breading

• 2 cups of breadcrumbs
• 4 eggs
• ¼ cup of plain flour
• Salt to taste

Method

Marinate and crumb

1. Prepare the marinade: grind all the marinade ingredients (except the water) in a liquidiser or a spice grinding jar.
2. The marinade should be a thick paste, so only use some of the water to help the ingredients grind.
3. Once done, it should be a bright, vibrant green.
4. Coat all the fillets with the marinade. You want a generous layer across the fillets, not thick, but with complete coverage.
5. Rest the fillets, covered, in the fridge for at least 3 hours. I suggest using a glass or similar non-reactive container.
6. To prepare the breading, season the breadcrumbs and the plain flour with a little salt.
7. Beat the eggs so they are a thick liquid, but not frothy.
8. Remove the chicken from the fridge.
9. Dip it in the flour and lightly dust all sides. The chicken should be damp enough from the marinade for the flour to stick to it.
10. Dip the chicken in the egg and then in the crumbs.
11. Dip the chicken in the egg again and crumb it a second time. This gives you a thick enough layer to protect the chicken and get nice and crispy.
12. Let the crumbed chicken rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes before you start frying. It can rest for up to 4 hours. If resting any longer than 30 minutes, pull it out 10 minutes before you start cooking.

Frying

1. Use a skillet large enough to cook 2 fillets at a time with about an inch and a half of space around each fillet.
2. The chicken should be shallow fried, so use enough oil to come halfway up the thickness of the fillets.
3. Heat the oil on medium heat until a cube of bread dropped in starts gently bubbling.
4. Put in the fillets and cook until one side is golden, then flip them over and cook the other side to the same colour.
5. Pull them out and let them rest on absorbent paper.
6. Cook the other fillets in the same way.
7. Serve hot.

To serve

I would serve this with kasundi: strong and pungent, it looks like a bright yellow, liquid seeded mustard.

But this chicken holds up well with ketchup or mayonnaise, and I also recommend trying it with tzatziki.

Tips

1. If you want a lighter breading, don’t double dip, but stick a few more crumbs on in the first round.
2. Don’t let the oil get too hot, or the crumbs will burn before the chicken is cooked.

Eat in good health!

Ingredients

For the fish

• 350–400 g white fish fillets. Bhetki (sea bass / barramundi) is a popular option, but any firm white fish would work. See the image below for a cut reference. The fillets are about ½" thick.

For the marinade

• 6 garlic cloves
• ½" knob of ginger
• 3 green chillies (seeds and all)
• 100 g coriander (leaves and stems)
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• 3–4 teaspoons of water
• Salt to taste

For the breading

• 2 cups of breadcrumbs
• 4 eggs
• ¼ cup of plain flour
• Salt to taste

Method

Marinate and crumb

1. Prepare the marinade: grind all the marinade ingredients (except the water) in a liquidiser or a spice grinding jar.
2. The marinade should be a thick paste, so only use some of the water to help the ingredients grind.
3. Once done, it should be a bright, vibrant green.
4. Coat all the fillets with the marinade. You want a generous layer across the fillets, not thick, but with complete coverage.
5. Rest the fillets, covered, in the fridge for 2–3 hours. I suggest using a glass or similar non-reactive container.
6. To prepare the breading, season the breadcrumbs and the plain flour with a little salt.
7. Beat the eggs so they are a thick liquid, but not frothy.
8. Remove the fish from the fridge.
9. Dip it in the flour and lightly dust all sides. The fish should be damp enough from the marinade for the flour to stick to it.
10. Dip the fish in the egg and then in the crumbs.
11. Dip the fish in the egg again and crumb it a second time. This gives you a thick enough layer to protect the fish and get nice and crispy.
12. Let the crumbed fish rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes before you start frying. It can rest for up to 4 hours. If resting any longer than 30 minutes, pull it out 10 minutes before you start cooking.

Frying

1. Use a skillet large enough to cook 2 fillets at a time with about an inch and a half of space around each fillet.
2. The fish will be shallow fried, so use enough oil to come halfway up the thickness of the fillets.
3. Heat the oil on medium heat until a cube of bread dropped in starts gently bubbling.
4. Put in the fish fillets and cook until one side is golden, then flip them over and cook the other side to the same colour.
5. Pull them out and let them rest on absorbent paper.
6. Cook the other fillets in the same way.
7. Serve hot.

To serve

Traditionally this is served with kasundi: strong and pungent, it looks like a bright yellow, liquid seeded mustard. If you cannot get your hands on kasundi, mix Dijon and seeded mustard to get the consistency. Or try it with hot English mustard.

Alternatively, if you have some mustard powder, just mix a teaspoon with a couple of teaspoons of water.

Tips

1. If you want a lighter breading, don’t double dip, but stick a few more crumbs on in the first round.
2. If your fish fillets smell slightly fishy, let them rest in a bowl of water with a teaspoon of plain vinegar for 10 minutes before marinating.
3. Don’t let the oil get too hot, or the crumbs will burn before the fish is cooked.

Eat in good health!