• Renowned Australian food writer and stylist Michele Cranston was recently in South Africa to promote her new book Seasonal Kitchen and to appear at the Good Food & Wine Show. F&H took her food shopping and discovered what she thinks about food trends in 2002. LEIGH HERRINGERMichele Cranston didn’t grow up in a particularly food-loving home. Born and raised in Newcastle, Australia, she lived on “meat and three veg family dinners”. But her grandfather instilled in her a lifelong love of food. He had his own vegetable garden and was a wonderful cook and baker. Michele still claims his potato…

    Bavarois, otherwise known as bavarian cream or crème bavaroise is a dessert cream that is especially delicious when flavored with fruit. Our version combines the tartness of green…

    Traditionally a stiff mixture of gin with the merest hint of dry vermouth, a martini could be described as “astringent” at best. Something of an acquired taste, it…

    The mojito has achieved fame twice in its lifetime, originally as a drink of preference (together with the daiquiri) of man’s man, writer Ernest Hemingway, and lately in the hands of large drinks conglomerates, where it provides a glamorous vehicle for rum. Hemingway, a keen game fisherman, had a home in Havana, Cuba. He also frequented a hotel bar in the city, the Bodeguita del Medio, where he became fond of a particular drink they served: a five-ingredient concoction of spearmint, rum, sugar, lime juice and soda water known as a mojito. To make a mojito, juice from a freshly…

    Serves 4 When making gnocchi rather steam your potatoes than boil them to avoid the potatoes being too watery. Use 500g potatoes and once they are cooked, mash…

    Pour enough water to reach halfway up a pot. Add 10ml vinegar and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and keep the water bubbling gently. Crack the egg into a small bowl or cup as this makes it easier to control, and position the egg over the pot. Slowly tip the egg into the bubbling water and cook gently for about 1 minute without touching it. Slowly and carefully spoon a little of the water over the centre of the egg, so that the yolk also cooks. Use a slotted spoon to lift the egg from the water. Neaten…

    For committed cooks and food lovers there is an exciting immediacy about food markets. The freshness of the ingredients challenges you to use them as soon as possible…

    Nic van Wyk loves fantasising about, talking about, and working with food. Over tapas at his recently opened Barnyard Brasserie in suburban Cape Town, he was spreading the mood. By Kim Maxwell We’re meant to be talking tapas, but pigs’ ears and tails are on the menu. We’ll get round to the tapas chat – when Nic van Wyk talks food there are always culinary diversions and detours aplenty. Chatting in the open kitchen of his new restaurant in Tyger Valley, Cape Town, Barnyard Brasserie and Tapas Bar, Nic rolls dough for fried Spanish churros for the day’s tapas gathering…

    Iced Chai tea is a delicious lightly spiced beverage. This tea is homemade in India, but the South African version comes ready-mixed in a powder, and is already milky.…