Paneer Korma and Chai Panna Cotta

Recipe for Paneer Korma and Chai Panna Cotta, served by Déwald & Heidi on 10 Jul 2013.

Main:
Paneer Korma

Dessert:
Chai Panna Cotta with Spiced Orange Coulis

Guest Grubbers:
Pieter Louw and San-Mari Louw

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Recipe

Paneer (Indian Cottage Cheese):

• Bring 1l Full Cream Milk to the boil in a saucepan. Don't even bother with any of that "low fat", "skim" or "2%" rubbish. Cheese is basically the fatty part of milk so low fat milk = virtually no cheese.
• Add 1/3 cup vinegar to the milk and simmer for 2-3 minutes until the milk has curdled completely, stirring constantly. Lemon juice can be used in stead of vinegar and it would probably be a good idea, or at least a little less vinegar, as I felt our paneer had a little too much of a sour taste.
• Remove from heat and pour liquid through a cheesecloth in a colander to strain off the curdled milk fats from the liquid.
• Leave until the water (it's actually called "whey") has drained completely and then remove from the colander, fold the cheesecloth over the paneer and put something heavy on top of it to press. A cutting board with a pile of your heaviest cooking books piled on top will do nicely.
• Leave to press for 3 hours before opening up and cutting the cheese.

The whey can be used again to curdle the next batch or it can be used for making dough for paratha bread but we did none of that so just chucked the whey.

The above recipe would serve 2-4 but we multiplied by 3.


Korma:

• Coarsely grind 1 teaspoon crushed ginger, 3 cloves of garlic and 2 green chillies.
• Add spices to 1 cup plain yoghurt along with a pinch of turmeric powder, 1½ teaspoon flour and some salt. Mix with 1 cup water and set aside.
• Roast paneer to give it a golden brown colour.
• Heat sunflower oil in pan, add 2 bay leaves, 4 cloves, 3 green cardamom pods (crushed) and a few whole black peppercorns.
• When the spices give off a nice fragrance add yoghurt mixture and cook on low heat for 2-3 minutes.
• Add paneer and mix through.
• Add 1 teaspoon garam masala and 75ml coconut milk, mix through and cook until heated through. Do not allow the mixture to boil at this stage.

This recipe serves 2-3 but we multiplied by 3.


Chai Panna Cotta:

• Soak 3 gelatine leaves in cold water to soften.
• Add 500ml cream and a squirt of vanilla extract to a saucepan and bring to a simmer.
• Mix in Chai powder (4 teaspoons) . Hardcore chai panna cotta chefs (if there is such a thing) will probably mix the chai spices themselves but I'm much too clueless for that. We used this stuff.
• Squeeze as much water as you can from the soaked gelatine leaves and add the gelatine to the saucepan. Remove from the heat and stir continuously until all the gelatine has dissolved.
• Pour into moulds (I used espresso cups) and leave outside to cool down.
• As soon as the cups are no longer hot to the touch, cover with cling film to avoid the formation of a skin on the top and leave to set in the fridge.
• When plating up, let the moulds stand in boiled water for 10-20 seconds. This allows the outer layers of the panna cotta to dissolve again so that when you turn the mould into a plate, the dissolved panna cotta will give the moulded panna cotta a nice runny coating.

This recipe is enough for about 4 servings but I had my calculations all wrong and made roughly 3 times as much. That's not a bad thing either, as long as you like your own panna cotta enough to be willing to eat it for the next week.


Spiced Orange Coulis:

• Mix the juice of 3 oranges, zest of one orange and 4 tablespoons sugar in a small saucepan.
• Add spices to taste. I used some star anise, allspice berries and cloves but have no idea how much of each. Just wing it, that's what I did.
• Simmer this mixture over medium heat to reduce it to a thick runny consistency.
• Add 1 tablespoon unsalted butter and stir in until dissolved.

This makes about half a cup of coulis which is more than enough for the purposes of garnishing the panna cotta. I would say that the taste of it was a little lost though so you might want to consider not melting the outer layer of panna cotta and rather use more orange coulis.

Grub die aand toe Federer se Wimbeldon droom verpletter is!

Suurlemoen-kruie hoender
Pere in Rooiwyn

Suurlemoen-kruie hoender:

1 heel hoender

1t sout/ 500g

1t knoffel-en-kruie/500g

¼t swartpeper/500g

1 suurlemoen sap/500g

20ml olyfolie/500g

 

Meng en smeer in hoender, onder vel en bo-oor hoender

Plaas uitgedrukte suurlemoenhelftes in en langs die hoender

Plaas hoender op ‘n bed van geskilde aartappels (of in stukke, indien groot).

Sit deksel op en bak vir 30min/500g teen 180°C

 

Maak dan oop en bak teen 200°C tot mooi goudbruin

Pere in rooiwyn

 

6 pere – geskil, met “takkie” aan en bodem plat gesny

1 bottel rooiwyn

1k water

2k suiker

2 kaneelstokkies

6-10 naeltjies

Suurlemoenskil repies

 

Meng die rooiwyn en water en ‘n swaarboomkastrol, voeg die suiker by en roer tot opgelos.

Voeg die pere en kaneelstokkies by

Kook 45min oor stadige hitte of totdat die pere sag is – moenie laat pap kook nie

Laat afkoel (Kan die sous reduseer)

Bedien met geklopte room, roomys of mascarpone kaas en die rooiwynsous

 

En hopelik kry ons dit oor 2 weke weer - Dewald & Heidi!

 

Chicken Celestine

Let's get the ball rolling. Here's the recipe for the Chicken Celestine that was served by Déwald & Heidi on 12 Jun 2013. Sorry, no pictures for this one.

Starter:
Salmon roulade with herbed shrimps on a bed of watercress, rocket and mizuna.

Main:
Chicken célestine with pancetta potato and taragon veggies.

Dessert:
Orange mousse

Guest Grubbers:
Jacques van den Bergh and Donnay Torr

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Recipe

Salmon roulade and herbed shrimps:

• Buy from Woolies (this is highly irregular and should not set a precedent... oh wait, that precedent has been set already)
• Serve on a bed of various greens. I used watercress, rocket and mizuna but in future I'd probably drop the rocket which might have been a bit overpowering.

Chicken célestine:

• Cover chicken thighs (about 16) in flour, seasoned with salt and black pepper. Chicken breasts would probably have worked just as well, or better.
• Heat some olive oil (4 tbsp) and butter (200g) in a frying pan and add the chicken when the butter starts to foam. Fry until the chicken is browned all over.
• Pour Cointreau (400ml) over the chicken and sprinkle the zest of 4 oranges over.
• Pour in chicken stock (1 liter) and bring mixture to the boil. Reduce heat and let simmer until the chicken is cooked through. My célestine sauce was much too liquid in the end so it may be better to use only 500ml chicken stock.
• Add 500ml double cream and juice of 4 oranges. Continue to simmer until ready.

Pancetta potato:

• Heat butter (150g) in a frying pan and add cubed potatoes (1.5kg). Fry until brown all over.
• Drain potatoes on paper towls.
• Sprinkle chopped parsley (6 tbsp) and chopped pancetta (150g) over potatoes and mix through.

Taragon veggies:

• Steam julienned carrots (1kg) until al dente. I would have preferred baby carrots but couldn't find any.
• Steam sugar snap peas (1kg) until al dente.
• Add carrots and peas to pot with butter (50g) and chopped taragon leaves (3 tsp) and mix through.

Orange Mousse:

• Soak 4 gelatine leaves in cold water until soft.
• Nuke juice of 2 oranges for 1 min.
• Squeeze excess water from gelatine leaves and add to hot orange juice. Stir until dissolved. Set aside to cool down.
• Whisk yolks of 4 eggs with 100g caster sugar and zest of 2 oranges in a bain-marie until thick and foamy. Remove from heat, add 2 tbsp Cointreau and continue whisking until cooled down. Yes, this is effort but don't be a wuzz, proper whisking here will ensure a lekker mousse.
• Whisk the whites of 4 eggs until stiff.
• Whisk 300ml double cream until stiff.
• Fold the egg yolk mixture, meringue, whipped cream and orange juice mixture together taking care not to beat the aeration from the mixture.
• Spoon into cocktail glasses and leave to set in fridge.

(Note: the orange zest may have been a tad stringy under the teeth. You can't really use less of it as that would affect the flavour and I'm not sure how to strain it as that would compact the egg yolk mixture. Maybe it can be boiled somewhat before using to soften it up.)

Welcome to the world of The Grub Club

Better late, as in 8 years late, than never. We've been promising ourselves for yonks that we'd get a website of sorts up and running to share our recipes and pictures. It's really for our own benefit as we'd like to remember what we've cooked but, whatever, you can look too.

Who are we? We call ourselves "The Grub Club". Other people call us "Those amazing bunch of people who cook those amazing meals for each other", the envy in their voices usually only thinly veiled.

We're basically just a bunch of friends who meet once every two weeks and kuier around a lekker meal. If you don't know what "kuier" or "lekker" means then you're obviously not from around here. It's OK, nobody's perfect.

Where is here? That would be Johannesburg, South Africa - and more specifically the northern suburbs but we've had representation from all over Jozi throughout the years.

What? Years? Yes, we've been at it since 2005. The membership has been in a perpetual state of flux but the current active members are:

Déwald Swanepoel: The only remaining founding member of The Grub Club. This makes him hoofseun but he's still trying to figure out what benefits that might bestow upon him.

Heidi Swanepoel: Spouse of Déwald and foodie extraordinaire. Some argue that her charming personality and keen kitchen skills are the only reason that Déwald has not been kicked out of The Grub Club yet.

Johan Grobler: For when the party gets big. Even though most Grub Clubs are an intimate affair, he has been known to entertain small crowds. Suspicions abound that he is working on a medium term plan to service all of Johannesburg.

Elmarie Kotzee: Some go for numbers, others go for stature.Why invite half of the suburb if you can invite your boss. We're uncertain as to the points she has scored in the corporate environment but she certainly has scored points with The Grub Club.

Denise Nel: The wanderlustige member of The Grub Club. We're envious every time she zips off to Morocco, Italy or Neverknewitexististan, but we're thankful when the cuisine manifests in her next Grub Club hosting.

Former prominent members of The Grub Club include:
Ebbi v.d. Bergh
Jannie Muller
Elsie Labuschagne
Erina Weder
Elizma Oosthuizen
Jacobus Oosthuizen
Bernard Wolff
Cornelie Wolff
Heidi de Swardt
Hannelie Bruwer
Mari Molefe van Heerden
Louisette Hofmeyr

Guests members of The Grub Club are too numerous to mention.

At any rate, that's us. Hopefully recipes and pictures will start following soon and hopefully this will end up becoming a useful repository of recipes and ideas.