Fosh Food @Home and get a free copy of his cook book

Our aim is that you can say goodbye to take away with FOSH FOOD@HOME and order delicious, freshly cooked dishes to keep in your fridge or freezer for a simple lunch or dinner bursting with Mediterranean flavours. Cooked in our kitchen, just as you would in your own home, all our food will be freshly prepared to order and delivered to your door and ready to heat and eat. We make everything to order and we will never compromise on taste and quality. We only cook what you order from fresh ingredients each and every time without any extra preservatives or additives. So check out what’s on the menu at www.foshfoodathome.com during the next week.

A lot of our dishes will be classic comfort food. I really think that stewing and braising are the basics of good home cooking. Rich comfort food with robust flavours in the shape of pot roasts, casseroles, hot pots and stews, cooked slowly to create memorable dishes that are also economical.

There is a myth that slow cooking is a lot of bother and takes too much time. The reality is that braising can be quick and easy to produce, leaving you time to get on with other things while the meat is cooking and tempting you the fabulous aromas that float around the kitchen.

Without getting too technical, I’ll try to explain a few basic principals for braising and stewing. Firstly, I think that the flavour of the finished dish is improved enormously if you take a bit of time and trouble when browning the meat. If you’re using small pieces of meat, as in a stew, make sure you brown them in batches, over a hot flame, so the meat doesn’t steam. The temperature must be high enough to trigger the browning process. Contrary to popular opinion, browning, or searing, the surface does not seal in meat’s juices. It does, however, produce new and complex flavour compounds as the sugars and proteins in the meat react under high temperatures and the surface colour deepens. This browning reaction is known as the Maillard reaction.

Aromatic vegetables such as carrots, celery, leeks and onions can also be browned after the meat and you’ll trigger a different type of browning reaction called caramelization which will also add considerably to the richness of the finished dish.

Liquids, such as wine, beer or stock are also essential for braising because less tender meats have greater amounts of collagen. This is a connective tissue that needs prolonged exposure to heat to break it down, the higher the cooking temperature, the tougher the muscle fibres become so make sure it never boils. Cooking temperatures should be just high enough to kill micro organisms, yet not so high that the meat toughens.

Braising at low temperatures can never be done in a hurry. So take your time, be patient and you will be richly rewarded with tender, succulent meat, deep flavours and some amazing aromas. The following dishes are also on our Food Food@home menu.

Braised beef cheeks with black olives & sun dried tomatoes

These beef cheeks are unbelievably tender with a really big flavour.

INGREDIENTS
Serves 6-8
· 1.5kl Beef cheeks
· 125g sun dried tomatoes, chopped
· 20 baby onions or shallots (peeled)
· 20 black olives, stoned
· 2tbsp tomato puree
· 1litre beef stock
· 100g flour
· 100m olive oil
· 10 basil leaves, torn

For the marinade:
· 500ml Red wine
· 1 large onion (roughly chopped)
· 3 garlic cloves (crushed)
· 2 carrots (peeled and chopped)
· 1tspn Allspice
· A sprig of fresh thyme
· A sprig of fresh rosemary

Method

Place the stewing beef in a large and add all the ingredients for the marinade. Leave in the refrigerator overnight.

Drain the meat from the marinade and pat dry with kitchen towel. Heat the olive oil in a large heavy-bottomed pan and brown the beef cheeks. Stir in the flour and tomato puree. Add the ingredients from the marinade and pour over the beef stock. Cover with a lid and simmer gently for 3 hours, removing any fat and impurities that rise to the surface during the cooking.

Heat a little oil in small frying pan and saute the baby onions until golden brown. Stir them into the stew and cook for a further 30 minutes. Add the chopped sin dried tomatoes, black olives / basil leaves. Season to taste and cover again with a tight fitting lid. Open the pot at the table to enjoy the wonderful aroma of braised beef & with black olives & sun-dried tomatoes. Serve with potato puree.