WIN Tickets to Cape Town Festival of Beer with Olivia's Kitchen

There are some Cape Town events that are just not to be missed and the Festival of Beer is one I always attend and would love tickets to this festival. Held at the Hamilton's Rugby Club in Green Point on the 22nd -24th November 2013 for the fourth year running you can join to sample 200 of our Local, International, Artisan, Craft and Mega Brewer's, collect stamps on your "Beer Passport" along the way to win prizes.

Plenty of activities will keep you drinking, Food Stalls, Demonstrations, Best Beer awards, Food Pairings, Guided Beer tours and for the first time a GIANT Beer pong Tournament where Giant balls will be thrown into GIANT cups, teams may be entered already.

There will also be live entertainment and a selection of wines for the non beer drinkers.

Some of the brewers you will find at the festival are:
Lakeside Beerworks
Triggerfish
Devil's Peak Brewing
Robson's Beer

Award Winning Belgian Beers:
Celis White and Carolus Gouden Classic.

Pre Sale Tickets will be R120 with a beer glass, R100 for students at Webtickets, you can also book a table for R500 which seats 10 or contact info@capetownfestivalofbeer.co.za

I have a set of double tickets to GIVEAWAY for the Friday or Sunday!!!
Send me your Name, telephone number, email address and the day you would like to go along with the heading win tickets to beer fest to:
tamsyn.olivia@gmail.com

It will be a lucky draw and Entries will close on the 10th November 2013

Good Luck
Article Copyright by Tamsyn Wells

Make your own Caviar

This post goes with the previous one for the Four Cousins competition, I discovered making your own caviar is really quick and easy for my first attempt. I made Creme  De Menthe caviar which were a delicious peppermint flavour to go with my Springbokkie Panna Cotta's made with Four Cousins Marula liqueur. It took about 20 minutes and my only advice would be to make the flavour as strong as possible as it's lessoned when making caviar for some reason.

I am giving you a general recipe which can be used to make any flavour, most fruits you may use in their raw state but pineapple and kiwi must be cooked as bromelain an enzyme in prevents it from setting. The pineapple works really well but cooked kiwi is not such a great flavour.

Caviar

600g of any flavoured liquid, fruits work well (make it stronger than normal, blend fruits like berries, mango, passion fruit, orange etc)

60g sugar

12 leaves gelatine

1lt frozen sunflower oil

1 small nozzle squeezie bottle

Sponge the leaves of gelatine in water until softened.

Heat half the liquid with the sugar, squeeze out the gelatine and add to heated juice. 

Stir until dissolved, Add the other half cool juice and adjust flavour, adding lemon or sugar and colouring if necessary.

Place into the squeezie bottle, remove the oil from the freezer and squeeze the juice out in spirals into the oil as pictured above.

Chill in the oil in the fridge for 10 minutes then strain.

Keep refrigerated for up to 1 week. 

Pictures and recipe copyright by Tamsyn Wells

Springbokkie Panna Cotta's with Creme de Menthe Caviar

A Springbokkie is a well known South African Shooter, named after our Rugby team or as I know it, my first taste of delicious alcohol, after wine and beer comes Springbokkies and the love blossoms. Made with 2 parts Marula Cream liqueur and 1 part Creme de Menthe, you have to stop yourself from having more than one. My last shooter I had was very recently shared with chef Gordon Ramsay when he was in Cape Town, a Springbokkie memory I will keep forever.

Four Cousins has just launched two Cream Liqueurs one Strawberry and a Marula fruit, they sent a few bloggers a gift pack to prepare a dish for the #creamgenius competition so you will have to vote for your favorite dish soon!!! Hopefully you win a delicious gift pack like mine which I had to stop myself from popping in a straw and drinking it like a milkshake for adults.

The dish I decided to make for the Four Cousins competition is a Springbokkie Panna Cotta which is an Italian dessert, a just set cream jelly, the perfect ending to any meal in Italy. Make this dish as a dessert for an after dinner mint effect or as I made lots of mini ones as a jello shot canape's with Creme de Menthe Caviar as a fun party snack.

Creme De Menthe Jelly

makes 500ml

300ml Creme De Menthe

100ml Monis mint syrup (from a bottle store)

100ml water

5 leaves of gelatine / 8g gelatine powder

squeeze of lemon juice

few drops of green food colouring

Heat the Monis syrup and the water, sponge the gelatine in water to allow to swell, add to boiled mixture and dissolve.

Add the mint liqueur, lemon juice and colouring.

Spray and cook the moalds you will be using and using a measuring spoon place a layer of mixture in each cup. Refrigerate.

Reserve 125ml of jelly to make the caviar.

Creme De Menthe Caviar

makes 100ml

125ml of above jelly recipe

2 gelatine leaves / 3.5g gelatine powder

1lt sunflower oil kept in the freezer 

1 small nozzled squeezie bottle

Heat the reserved 125ml until just below boiling, sponge the gelatine to swell and add to the jelly.

Place in the squeezie bottle and squeeze drops into the ice cold oil, strain and keep refrigerated

Marula Panna Cotta

makes 15 mini's

900ml fresh cream

500ml Four Cousins Marula cream

Castor sugar added to taste

10 gelatine leaves / 16g gelatine powder

100g dark chocolate

1/2 bar peppermint crisp

Bring half the cream to the boil, sponge the gelatine in water to swell and add to the hot cream to dissolve.

Add the Marula cream and allow to cool slighhtly. Whip the other half of the cream and fold into the gelatine mixture, add castor sugar to taste.

Pour on top of the set mint jelly and refrigerate.

Melt the chocolate in the microwave on low heat stirring every few seconds. Spread onto greaseproof paper and sprinkle on some chopped peppermint crisp.

Unmoald the Panna Cotta's into your dishes and serve with chocolate shards and mint caviar.

Recipe and Pictures Copyright By Tamsyn Wells

Nominees for Eat Out DSTV Food Network Restaurant Awards

Well the Award is a mouthful just like Abigail Donnelly is going to be having a lot of as she is once again head judge for these prestigious awards. As a chef I have always secretly dreamed of having a job like Abigail Donnelly but this is the time of the year I become especially jealous as she gets to be wined and dined by SA's top restaurants and chefs while she chooses the top 10 list for the year.

The nominees are:
Bread and Wine
Camphors at Vergelegen
Delaire Graff Estate Restaurant
DW 11-13
Five Hundred
The Greenhouse
Hartford House
Indochine
Jordan Restaurant
The Kitchen at Maison
La Colombe
Makaron
Overture
Pierneef a La Motte
Planet Restaurant
The Restaurant at Waterkloof
Rust en Vrede
The Tasting Room
The Test Kitchen
Tokara

The awards are for Restaurant of the Year, Eat Out San Pellegrino Chef of the year, Service Excellence and Restaurant of the year.

Some of the above mentioned establishments have been on this list as long as I can remember so I am happy to see the high standards being upheld year after year as we all know how tough and challenging it is as well as a few newbies giving them a run for their money as they say.

The Awards will take place on the 10 November 2013 at The Lookout at the V&A Waterfront, Cape Town.

There will be a few other best of awards taking place at the ceremony like best Asian Restaurant, Best Italian etc and a new judging process is being put in place where the candidates will  see their scores.

Its a great job but also tough as peoples tastes and perceptions differ but the top restaurants are all excellent and I am happy there is such an anticipation for these awards.

Tickets to attend may be purchased at R1450pp from Julie Potgieter on 021-417 1257 or on julie@newmediaevents.co.za

Article Copyright by Tamsyn Wells