Becky Brown, best in town

It is because I love cooking and baking,
because so many friends/family members have encouraged my efforts,
because it's nice to have an outlet for creativity,
and because it just seemed like it would be fun...

that Becky Brown is here!

If you're in Cape Town and would like delicious home-baked goodies made to order, just ask Becky Brown. Call 076-588-9530, email becky.brown.baking@gmail.com, or visit beckybrown.moonfruit.com.

the Northern Hemisphere trip

** Sorry for the technical difficulties- YouTube didn't approve of my original musical accompaniment. It should work now!**

We got back from our epic Northern Hemisphere whirlwind trip about a week and a half ago and we are still glowing from all the fun...and finally not jet-lagged. I had just over three weeks of family time, friend time, birthday time (hello 30!) and treat time with some favorite American delicacies (hush puppies! Carolina BBQ! Reese's peanut butter cups! bagels!). Big B was gone a bit longer what with his trip to Brown University (a total success by the way). Our return wasn't the smoothest- more in a later post- but it is great to back home in Cape Town, enjoying the beautiful weather, catching up with friends and family, and setting our sights on spring.

There was just too much goodness to share conventional blog style so instead here is the under four minute highlight reel! Enjoy!!

remembrance of things past

Many moons ago a boy I dated in college gave me a copy of Proust's Remembrance of Things Past as a the-school-year-is-over-and-I'm-a-graduating-senior-whilst-you-are-a-sophomore-so-this-is-over present. That's liberal arts college courtship (or un-courtship, as it were) at its best. I never managed to read much of it, but I do recall the scene with the ever important madeleine cookie and cup of tea:


I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary thing that was happening to me. An exquisite pleasure invaded my senses.


The taste of the madeleine sends the narrator into a vivid flashback, which forms the rest of the zillion page novel. Or so I'm lead to believe since I never actually read the dadgum book. So earlier this week while considering my next great cooking escapade I thought of Proust and the magical cookie. I was going to make madeleines.


I've had a few madeleines in my life, but truth be told they were usually purchased at a Starbucks on the New Jersey Turnpike in frenzied, low blood sugar state. They weren't very nice (no offense, Starbucks). But there is nothing inherently unlikeable about a spongey, bite-size, cake-like cookie so I bought myself a madeleine pan and got to work. You see, madeleines are what they are because of their shell-like shape so you need the special pan (at least this is what I told Brendan).

scalloped shell shape (say that three times fast!)

I used Gourmet magazine's classic recipe, swapping almond extract for the traditional vanilla because I am a rebel and like to live on the edge. The results were outstanding- light, airy, almondy deliciousness. I think madeleines have the potential to replace Parisian macaroons as the next mini-dessert fad. At the very least they are a great tea-time snack and a nice homage to former college beaux and voluminous novels.

birthday party

Our friends Trevor and Jahro have been in Cape Town for the last ten days. You might remember them from the post that went up after we visited them in Canada before our move. Jahro turned three on Tuesday, so we decided to make full use of the election day holiday and throw him a birthday bash. The birthday boy has a beloved hedgehog toy (aptly named Hedgie) so I decided to make him a Hedgie cake.

Hegdie was a delicious almond cake with chocolate frosting and almond sliver spines. Jahro rocked up in a clown suit ready to party with Hedgie.

"Happy birthday" was sung, a wish was made, candles were blown out.

Then it was chow time. Jahro wanted the head. Later he came back to eat Hedgie's bum.

I think he liked it. 

For his birthday, Brendan and I gave Jahro a real South African vuvuzela. People who don't have kids can do such things and vaguely get away with it. We'll see if Trevor and Dale are still on speaking terms with us in a month. 

Happy Birthday Jahro!

Nepal- the food edition

What did we expect of the food in Nepal? Dal...lots of dal. As part of our "training" we were eating dal at least weekly (although admittedly it was nothing like the dal we got there). We also expected to be inundated by yak milk butter tea, a drink that is said to be as grim as it sounds. Being the forward thinker I am I packed Milo (a chocolate drink powder) to surreptitiously add to the tea to make it more palatable. It turns out you don't actually encounter the stuff until higher elevations (because yaks don't live in the low territories). Unfortunately no yak tea was had on this trip. I spent my time at the highest elevation we reached communing with the squat toilet. I'm not sure what Brendan's excuse is.

The biggest food surprise in Nepal was that, like the country itself, it is a blend of the influences of the two major countries on either side of it: India and China. There were lots of curries and chapatis and the like right alongside chow mein and chop suey. Add in a little Tibetan flair and the continental food that pandered to the tourists and it was quite the food fest. Here are the highlights.

Momos (Tibetan dumplings). Really delicious. 

Thukpa (Tibetan noodle soup). Also really delicious. 

The one, the only dal bhat. Lunch of trekking champions. There are many awesome things about this dish, two of which are that a) it is one of the only ways to get a pretty balanced meal given the menu offerings along the trekking route and b) you keep getting refills of rice, dal, and/or curried veg until you cry for mercy (or just say that you're done). Now that is value for money!

Apple pancakes, black tea, and fresh mint tea. Our typical trekking breakfast.

Roadside pastries (and by "road" I mean dirt path). The Nepalis have clued into the fact that lots of their visitors have a soft spot for baked goods and there are now many German bakeries along the trekking route. I have no idea what makes them German, though, as there was nary a strudel in sight. Brendan is showing off his cinnamon bun here. This is definitely the prettiest dang place I ever ate a cinnibun.

Clearly not cutthroat business people.

Everest beer. This is the special Sherpa Nimbu Gombu edition dedicated to the man who summited Everest 12 times. Clearly a beer of champions. 

favorite desert (for the moment)

I have made guava cheesecake twice in less than a week. I'm in love, I'm in love, and I don't care who knows it (name that movie)! The biggest surprise to me about all this is how much I love something that isn't a pie. I must be becoming more open-minded.

(note: This is the picture from the food website that posted the recipe for this masterpiece. My pics came out a bit too dark and the guava looked like ham chunks, and no one likes a ham cheesecake.)

This cheesecake is pretty stinkin easy to make. It has a fluffy texture because it uses part cream cheese, part Greek yogurt, and some whipped egg whites. And it is pretty! And it's pink-ish! Do you need anymore convincing?? It isn't guava season here right now, so I used the canned stuff (scooping out the seeds before pureeing, of course). I used to see the canned stuff in the International food aisle with the Mexican/Latin items in the States. If you are in South Africa or any other country that doesn't believe in graham crackers, use tennis biscuits (but heads up- you will need a whole package and not just 4oz).

Click here for the recipe and bon appetite!

lately

We've had lots on the go lately. Last week was Valentine's Day and as per our tradition we had a fabulous meal at home, this time with our friends Annabelle and Dave. We dined on a feta and peppadew spread with veggies and mini pitas, a lemon, thyme & mascarpone risotto with walnut crusted chicken, and braided lemon bread for dessert. Yum all around.



We attended a protest in front of Parliament. School students and education activists were petitioning for increased financial support for schools in the Eastern Cape (like No-ofisi, the school that Write Our Future is assisting).


Our wonderful friend Atheen is here for a visit and work collaboration with Brendan. Last week we all had our debut visit to the Eastern Food Bazaar and loved it. It is basically an alleyway of cheap and great quality Indian, Chinese, and Middle Eastern foods. We are all very keen to get back there and try some more goodies.


And- perhaps the most exciting thing of all- we saw U2 last Friday night at the Cape Town stadium. It was the most amazing spectacle I have ever witnessed. The stage was trippy, political messages abounded, there was a great video clip from Desmond Tutu, and we sang our hearts out for two full hours. It was one heck of a cultural experience. I'll post a couple video clips from the show later in the week.





Oh, and pie. There has been lots of pie lately, like this peach and whiskey pie with a gluten free crust.

Good times.

local flavor

The word on the street is that 2011 is the year of the pie. Music to my pie-loving ears. If you don't believe me, read this or this or this. In my opinion, the secret to great pie is in the crust. I don't use shortening. It weirds me out, and there is no need to be weirded out when you can make a supremely delicious crust using good old fashioned butter. Mmmm butter. My recipe is very easy and very tasty...two of my favorite things.

Pie crust
practically identical to the recipe featured on Smitten Kitchen
makes 2 pie crusts (or a top and bottom if you are making a topped pie)

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 sticks cold butter (or 226 grams if you live in a place where butter doesn't come in either sticks or tablespoons- dang metric system)
1/2 cup water with ice cubes in it

Mix all your dry stuff together in a large bowl. Cut your butter into little pieces and add them to the flour mixture. Use your hands to break the butter apart, really mixing it in with the flour, and ensuring that the butter gets evenly distributed. After a couple of minutes of this you should have pea-sized pieces and the contents of your bowl should look sort of crumbly. This is good. Next add a couple tablespoons of the icy water, and continue to mix the dough with your hands. Continue to knead, adding water slowly if needed, until it all comes together into a big non-sticky ball. Too sticky? Add a touch of flour. Lovely. Now split that ball in two, flatten into disks, wrap them in cling wrap, and chill it in the fridge for at least an hour. The dough will keep in the fridge for about a week, and longer if you freeze it. Voila. Easy as pie.

So what did I do with my pie crust this weekend? I made a nectarine and passion fruit pie with a lattice top. I chopped about 10 nectarines from the Kirstenbosch market and mixed that with a tin of passion fruit, some cinnamon, ginger, lemon juice, and flour. Baked at 350 for about an hour. Scrumptious.


In other food news, I had some litchi sorbet yesterday at the Italian ice cream shop on Hout Bay main road. Yum.


And this sign gave me the giggles at the Imhoff farm stall in Kommetjie.


My guess is that it's the chocolate chips that make those cookies American style...you can't get chocolate chips here to save your life. I've already mentally allocated space in my suitcase for a bag of Nestle's Tollhouse chips when I return from the States in July.

first days in Cape Town

We have been living a very charmed life during our first few days in Cape Town, and this charmed life has not been conducive to blog posts. We've enjoyed settling in, eating all our favorite South African treats, seeing friends, and waking up to views of Table Mountain and Lion's Head each morning.

But let's start at the beginning...

My parents met us at JFK to see us off. We arrived at the airport hotel after a bit of a fistfight with our car battery. It decided to be difficult and stop working the day we were leaving. The nice AAA man who replaced it got a big hug and a tip from me.

Away we went. This photo was taken approximately two hours before the nasty man in the seat behind me decided to shove my seat as hard as he could (causing my forehead to nearly collide with the seat in front of me). When I spun around to ask him what the heck his problem was, he informed me that I could not put my seat back because he did not have enough room. I gave him an earful, with some backup from the South African Airways flight attendant. I also tried to plead my way into an upgrade. Sadly, those efforts bore no fruit. 18 hours, 2 inflight movies, and a complimentary mini-bottle of sparking wine later we were in Cape Town. 

Two hours after our arrival we returned to the airport to fetch Parker. He was delayed, so we went and got a red latte to share. They are lattes made with a rooibus tea "espresso" and are just fabulous. We thought it was a bit of a good omen that the barista used the foam and honey to draw a cat face on ours. 

These are our views from our bedroom windows each morning. It isn't possible to wake up and see Table Mountain and Lion's Head and not feel happy to be alive and in Cape Town. 

Our darling cat had perhaps the most harrowing of all our trips. Thankfully he is settling in wonderfully, even if he is a little bewildered by the new view. I took him out onto Candice's balcony to scope out his new hood. 

Here is evidence of Parker's happy state. Candice's work seat is his new favorite spot to sun himself. It is a race to see who gets their bum into the chair to claim it first for the day. 

This past Sunday we went to Kalk Bay, a lovely bohemian little town on the sea. We went with a singular vision: breakfast at Olympia Cafe. My word, this place is like Cape Town's version of the lovely Tartine in San Francisco. We shared a mushroom and mozzarella croissant with some scrambled eggs, and then another croissant with jam for dessert. 

Swoon. It was too good for words. My face hurt when we left because I was smiling so much. 

After breakfast, we walked down the main road and window shopped. We ended with a walk along the pier, looking at the boats and chatting to a fisherman here and there. 

And this little house? This place, dear friends, is the the result of good fortune smiling upon us once more, because this is the house we are moving into next week. A colleague of Brendan's at the University has to leave suddenly for England to care for an ailing family member and has offered to rent her darling Victorian house to us. It has a wonderful sunny courtyard, a spare bedroom (book your tickets, folks), and a new kitchen. And there is a bathtub!! We haven't had one of those for 3 years. We are feeling so happy and fortunate and thrilled. Update addresses and such will follow, along with a virtual tour next week.

So life is great. We are embracing life in the Mother City in a big way, and there is no sight of decreased excitement in the near future. The weeks ahead will bring driving lessons for me (should be good for a comical blog post), settling into work life, a new sweet little baby niece, a visit from Brendan's parents, and lots and lots more guava yogurt for yours truly. Man, I just can't get enough of the stuff.