Jenny's Week: Bobotie – pardon? (From Bournemouth Echo)

Jenny's Week: Bobotie – pardon?

3:14pm Monday 15th March 2010 in

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A bizarre name, for the most bizarre collection of ingredients I’ve ever tackled.

Bobotie is a savoury dish that purports to have been known in the Cape of Good Hope since the 17th century.

I understood it to be of South African origin – although I first came across it on one of Rachel Allen’s cooking programmes. It piqued my interest then and when I tripped over the recipe, it piqued my interest sufficiently to include it on the week’s menus.

I was nervous about it though, because in reading the recipe it looked very much as though it could wind up a bowl of slop, covered in eggy slop. Not a good look – and definitely off the radar for a “family friendly” dinner dish!

However, I figured that the said “bowl of slop” couldn’t be so disagreeable. After all, to have transcended time and still be showing up as a choice on a t.v. cooking programme, it had to have some good points!

The recipe, though, reads like a fairly random set of ingredients.

There’s butter and onion which are fair enough, then carrots, but grated. Grated? Oh well, okay. ~shrug~ Garlic comes next, with fresh grated ginger, ground coriander, ground cumin, turmeric – all of which sound like the recipe’s headed in my kind of direction.

Then it’s minced lamb, ahuh, okay good. Blanched, flaked almonds. Huh? Oh, maybe. Raisins or sultanas – aaah, right, I see where this is headed.

Chopped parsley, thyme, chives, bay leaf -cripes, that’s a whole heap of herbs! Salt and pepper, yep, they’re to be expected. What’s next? Oh. Two slices of white bread, soaked in 2tbsp milk and 2 tbsp vinegar. Eh? How do they fit in, then? ~scratches head~ Finally, three eggs, some milk and turmeric for the topping.

Wow. Can you see how the whole thing piqued my interest as to how it all fitted together and what sort of dish it would ultimately make?

So I made it. It was fairly simple to concoct as the steps are simply sweating off, browning and then it’s a matter of compiling everything into a casserole dish and putting it in the oven (after admiring the colour of the top, care of the wonderful Burford Brown eggs). Oh, and crossing your fingers. *chuckle*

The texture is a little different to what I was expecting, although that could have been down to the fact that I used frozen Lamb mince instead of fresh, which would have produced a coarser texture. Instead, it was a very soft – but not at all sloppy – texture.

The milk/egg topping had set into a sort of custard, which sounds a bit yuk, but was actually really nice. Had it have been any deeper, I think it might have verged on the “too much”, but at the depth it was, it was perfectly acceptable.

I served it with carrots and Savoy cabbage – both of which were perfect plate-mates for it. My son ate every scrap of his Bobotie but attempted to abandon his cabbage.

Bizarre, considering he began by exclaiming “delicious cabbage, Mum!”. What do you think, a failed smokescreening attempt? ::: nods ::: Yup, me too.