Day Fifteen - Thursday Tapas

On Thursday Little Kim, The Spik and I held our first dinner party at home.  With tapas decided on for dinner and guest requirements allocated we set about deciding on what we would, quite literally, bring to the table.  After a quick calculation on the amount of money left in our kitty, at that stage it owed The Spik bucks, we decided on raiding the freezer for our portion.  We ended up making it all except for the hummus and bread, we vowed next time to make the hummus as well!

The Spik and Little Kim did an amazing job preparing dinner, I was stuck on N2 traffic (what’s new?) and dispatched to the store for a last minute purchase of greek yogurt for the tzatziki. I came home to the meat balls waiting in the microwave, bread ready to serve, The Spik on chicken and Little Kim on meatballs.   I quickly found myself a spot at the table and started on the sauces.

Our tapas dinner consisted of; beer battered chicken strips, meat balls, crudités, bread, tzatziki, hummus, potato wedges and a pink dipping sauce.  Mich also added to this with some yummy samosa’s which we started climbing into beforehand. 

Dinner was a great success with interesting conversations running around the table and of course the usual googling of some shady character that we heard a shady story about.  We wrapped up with dessert brought by Lily and Lolo – delicious tin roof ice cream and triple chocolate mousse that coupled with cupcakes from Mich, completed our dinner and our appetites for the evening!

Day thirteen - My turn!

Tuesday night was my turn to cook, as my previous turn was an uninspired piece of frozen fish with salad I felt I needed to pull out some (not all, gotta leave some tricks up my sleeve) the stops on this one. 


Due to our massive bulk purchase of chicken breasts, none of which have been touched yet, I took on the challenge to start the demolition of our chook tower.  I started off by rubbing the chicken in garlic and then wrapping each breast in bacon and popping a piece of danish feta under the bacon in the middle of the breast.  These were then placed in a tray with olive oil spooned over them, with the three remaining pieces of bacon I placed onto the tray and drizzled olive oil over the top to ensure crispy strips of bacon. 

To accompany the chicken breasts wrapped in bacon I brought together a salad consisting of what was left in the fridge.  A crisp lettuce base, well as crisp as week old lettuce will be, topped with yellow and red slivers of pepper, chopped mushrooms, a sprinkling of danish feta finally tied together with quarters of sweet green grapes.

Due to a sicklet of a Spik and an ever so hard working Little Kim, I was treated to dinner on my own some. The table wasn't set, but I did sit down at it with my knife and fork to enjoy my meal.  The chicken was slightly dry, most definitely due to me leaving it in the fridge to defrost as opposed to a better location such as on the draining board next to the sink. However the bacon added a richer, sweeter flavour to the chicken with a great little surprise of the melting feta down the middle of the breast, tucked under the layers of bacon.  Although lacking in the traditional cucumber and tomato the salad was nicely brought together by the outstanding sweetness of the grapes, along with a well represented colour pallet the salad was a refreshing partner to the bacon wrapped chicken.


Although the company wasn't my first choice, the meal on offer certainly made up for what the conversation lacked.

Bacon Wrapped Chicken - a quick and easy Tuesday night option:


1x packet shoulder bacon
3 x large chicken breasts
Olive Oil
Garlic salt
Black pepper
Danish feta


Heat oven to 180 degrees
Rub each chicken breast front and back with garlic salt
Place an oblong piece of danish feta which stretches the whole of the chicken breast onto the centre of the breast.
Wrap each chicken breast in bacon strips from top to bottom so the entire breast is covered with the bacon.  The feta will now be secured into place by the bacon.
Place each wrapped breast onto a flat baking tray and spoon olive oil over the top of each wrapped breast.
Top each wrapped breast with a grind of black pepper
If there is any bacon remaining, place onto baking tray to cook crisply next to the wrapped chicken breasts.
Cook breasts in the oven for 15 minutes, then turn over and cook for another 5 minutes.
Remove from oven and place onto plate.
Remove the extra bacon strips after 15 minutes if crispy, leave for longer if neccessary.


These are great served with rice, potatoes or a salad.  I served with a lettuce, red and yellow pepper, mushroom, grape and danish feta salad topped this with the extra left over pieces of bacon crisped up in the oven.

Day twelve - tea time macaroons

With the burra friends visiting us I felt tea would definitely be the order of the day.  So on finding Daniela’s macaroons on sale at the I Heart Market, I could not resist.  With R10 a delicious round of crusty shell and velvety centre plus a sixth free when ordering five, I was sold and we had tea for Sunday!  I chose six different flavours so we would each be able to have a taster.  One Chai, Peanut butter and sea salt, Pistachio, Strawberry, Passion Fruit and Chocolate macaroon later we were all sighing in pleasure.  How can you not after feasting on macaroons!

We each had different views on the best flavours and a full-fledged discussion on the best flavour ensued.  With Little Kim and Bundle of Se agreeing on the peanut butter and sea salt topping the list, Miss Kirsti’s sweet tooth was sold on the Pistachio, while also finishing off the Strawberry. For me the chocolate is always a winner as it even tasted of chocolate and not something trying to impersonate chocolate, which I find is often the case with ‘bought’ chocolate treats.

Daniela’s has just YAY opened an outlet in Umhlanga and has others in Hilcrest and Capetown, with speciality cakes and high teas being their order of business (click here for a look at a brochure) along with supplying macaroons to numerous restaurants in the area, Daniela’s macaroons truly are a deliciously decadent experience.  Like them here on Facebook for more information on how to enjoy your own deliciously decadent Daniela’s experience.