Hi all,

2013 is certainly flying to a close with just 7 weeks left to go until Christmas! With the silly season just around the corner, why not get prepared now for Christmas lunch and avoid all the stress which comes with it. By putting your menu together now, you will remove 80% of your Christmas stress and will be able to purchase any specialised ingredients which you may need in advance.   If you are looking for a new way to prepare your turkey click here for a few wonderful ideas. Perhaps you are looking to try something completely different, yet still remain traditional. Click here for a succulent roast goose this Christmas.

This week we go back to Lebanon with Barbara Massaad as we review her new cookbook, Mouneh, which explores the traditional methods or preserving foods throughout the seasons. We also take a delicious Lemon Jam out of Mouneh for our recipe of the week.

We also find out what has been happening at Wickedfood Earth in the passed two weeks, as well as at our Sunninghill school.

Our classes for individuals is also up on the website, so click here to book now to ensure your spot in one of our great cooking classes.

Find us on Facebook and Twitter – just search for Wickedfood and you will find us. We update the blog on a daily basis and publish it through Facebook and Twitter.

Looking for info on food?

If you have any food-related questions, or a dish that you just can’t get right or even a certain recipe that you are looking for, but just can’t seem to find, then contact us and we will do our best to answer it as soon as possible. Click Here for more information. Hope to hear from you soon.

Wickedfood Cooking School news

Monday 11 November at 6pmInformal festive entertaining (R430pp). Entertaining during Christmas time does not have to be laborious and stressful, our informal festive cooking class takes the stress out of Christmas food planning. Dishes include potato cakes, seafood salad, orange glazed baby chickens, Waldorf salad, mushroom and cheese pie and a quick microwave Christmas pudding and brandy cream sauce.

Monday 18 November at 6pmSweet Treats – Advanced Baking recipes (R430pp). Baking, versus cooking, definitely requires more patience, precision and overall adherence to recipes. The most successful bakers are the ones who truly enjoy the process – not just the end result. Baking can be a great joy and lots of fun, but not if you feel disorganized and stressed. And you can definitely “up” the enjoyment factor in your baking if your confidence is high. Build your baking confidence with these 6 treats, which include: macarons, marshmallows, licorice, fudge, honeycomb dipped in chocolate and koeksisters.

Monday 25 November at 6pm Alternative to a traditional Christmas dinner (R 430 per person) Entertaining during Christmas time does not have to be laborious and stressful, our informal festive cooking class takes the stress out of Christmas food planning. Dishes include Chicken liver pâté, Sun-dried tomato soup, Roasted medallions of sirloin, Waldorf salad and a quick microwave Christmas pudding and brandy cream sauce.

Sunninghill Corporate News

The last two weeks have been quite busy for us here at Wickedfood as the year is coming to an end and christmas parties are picking up. A few classes which we have recently had include: Ogilvy in a Middle Eastern vs Thai menu, ABSA in a South African vs Italian class and Deloitte in a Spanish class.  All the pictures which we take we upload to our facebook page. If you are interested in seeing what happens during our classes, or if you have recently had a class with us you can click here to see all our class photos.

Places are starting to fill up for year end functiongs, so if you are keen to join us for one of our fun and interactive cooking classes book now! Click here for more information regarding our year end functions as well as our corporate classes.

Wickedfood Earth Country Cooking School

My, how time flies. Spring is long gone, and we are definitely now fully into summer.  All of our seedlings have now being transplanted and we look forward to a bumper crop of vegetables for our individual classes which we will start from mid January 2014. At Wickedfood Earth, over the last two weeks have:

  • Planted food training gardens –  We have established six vegetable show gardens around the buildings of our country cooking school. Each garden has a different  theme, depicting some of the worlds major cuisines –  Mexican, Asian, Mediterranean, a basic vegetable garden, a herb garden, and so on.
  • Processed a pig. Over the past year and a half, we have been growing out some of our pigs. They have a lovely life, wondering the forests, foraging and growing fat. We slaughtered one out at 150 kg of meat. All of this meet has now been processed: Apart from this large pig, we also slaughtered 6 sucking pigs, which there has been great demand for.  We however still have a few joints for sale. These are ideal small roasts for 2 to 4 people. Please contact Cilla should you be interested in purchasing any meat.
    • 6kg of neck was turned into Coppa;
    • The loins have been dry cured and will make the most delicious ham;
    • The bellies have been turned into bacon and pancetta;
    • The shoulders and offcuts have made some delicious breakfast and Italian spiced sausages; and
    •  The legs have all been turned into Christmas hams.
Wickedfood Earth Country Cooking School has a purpose-built training kitchen, fully fitted-out lecture room, as well as a series of training food gardens for half and full day corporate functions. 

Click here for more information on Wickedfood Earth. Bookings are now open, for our corporate programme, contact Cilla on 076 236-2345 or cilla@wickedfood.co.za

Cookbook of the week/span>

Mouneh, from the Arabic word mana, meaning ‘to store’, is what Barbara Massaads latest book is all about. Barbara has travelled all over Lebanon for five years in search of truly traditional Lebanese Mouneh. She moved from village to village and sat down with old and young to listen to their stories, as well as getting her hands dirty and jumping in to help the villagers in their processes to truly understand their unique methods. Click here for full review

Click Here for reviews of all our cookbooks.

Food quote of the week

How can you govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?”
Charles de Gaulle

Recipe of the week

Mouneh written by Barbara Massaad is full of unique and traditional Lebanese methods of preserving various foods during certain seasons.  This Lemon Jam was dicovered by Barbara in Bsharre in North Lebanon while visiting an ecotourism loge, whose philosophy is based on using only fresh and natural produce daily.  This fresh and zesty jam is delicious simply on toast or used between layers of cakes. Click here for full recipe.

Click Here for all our recipes.

Wickedfood Chef