World Adventures in Sight, Taste and Sound

South Africa: Bobotie

Bobotie is akin to our very own shepherd’s pie. The recipe is mince based but instead of mash it’s topped with a savoury egg custard flavoured with bay leaves. It’s wholesome, hearty and wonderfully tasty and gives that lovely pogged tummy feel. Don’t be put off by what appears to be a huge list of in-greedy-ents, it really is very simple to make and trust us, it’s bloody gorgeous. Thank you to cooksister.com for this recipe, it has become our very favourite.

BOBOTIE Serves 4 to 6 persons

Ingredients:

1kg steak mince (or lamb mince)
1 large onion
1 tablespoon oil
1 thick slice stale bread without the crust (white)
1 cup milk (more or less)
1 tablespoon apricot jam
juice of half a lemon (you can add more if you like it less sweet)
10-12 dried apricots
2 tablespoons seedless raisins
3 Tbsp slivered almonds
1 teaspoon curry powder (more if you prefer it stronger, but the dish is meant to have a mild curried flavour)
1 teaspoon fresh ginger grated
3 cloves garlic
salt and pepper
6 lemon leaves (or 3 bay leaves as a poor substitute) -you could grate a bit of the rind of the lemon before you squeeze it for the juice and add it to the bay leaves but add carefully so as not to allow the lemon to dominate
2 eggs
Milk

Method:

Lightly fry chopped onion over medium heat in oil till golden. Add chopped garlic and grated ginger. Remove from heat.

Soak bread in half a cup of milk, then crumble with a fork. Add to the mince and mix well.

Return the pot to the stove on medium heat. Add a little oil if the onion has absorbed it all. Add the meat and all other ingredients except the rest of the milk, the lemon leaves and the eggs.

Mix well to avoid lumps of mince. Cook until soft and cooked through, to the stage when meat is getting brown and not pink.

Check for seasoning and add anything you think is missing.  Use a slotted spoon to transfer the meat mixture to a baking dish with about 5cm high sides

Reduce any residual gravy left in the pot by gently cooking without a lid.  When reduced sufficiently, add it to the baking dish – the meat should not be dry but there should not be any gravy pooling at the bottom of the dish.

Lightly beat the two eggs. Add 1 cup of milk plus what is left of the milk in which the bread was soaked. Total should not exceed one and a half cups. Mix well, add salt and pepper.

After beating well, pour the milk and egg mixture over the meat.  Place lemon leaves (or bay leaves & a little grated lemon rind) on top.

Bake uncovered in moderate oven (350-375F / 180-190C) for 30 to 40 minutes until the egg mixture has set.  Serve piping hot with rice and chopped tomato and onion salad. If that doesn’t set your mouth tingling, nothing will. Its forking delicious!