South African monkey gland sauce

Don't mind the name—this stuff rocks. It's one of South Africa's unknown masterpieces, and it's quite sad, as we've got plenty of monkeys that could donate their glands for this... It's dead easy too, and a good way to use up errant bits of veg and monkey parts in your fridge. Smother meat in it, either as a sauce or as a marinade. Remember to pick out the pituitary gland before you eat—the texture goes to pot when you boil it.

1 onion
3-4 garlic cloves
Thumb-sized piece of ginger
1 pepper (optional)
3-4 tomatoes, diced
1 small tin double concentrated tomato purée
1 tbsp Worcester sauce
1/2 cup chutney
big dollop of red wine (optional)
AND/OR
dash of balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp mustard
150 ml vegetable (or chicken) stock
tabasco, to taste
1 tsp sugar
salt and pepper to season

Fry the onion, garlic, and ginger (and pepper, if you're using it) until the onion is translucent. Add the other ingredients, bring to the boil and cook on a high flame for about 8 minutes, then simmer for another 30–40 minutes. Taste and season if necessary.

Use for marinade and sauce. It should keep for about 2 weeks.

Bacon, cheese, and monkey gland burger

Honey and mustard roast chicken with couscous stuffing

Make one portion of the couscous stuffing, and enjoy. The credits definitely go to food24's recipe.

One portion of couscous
1 whole chicken
1/4 cup Dijon mustard (or preferred, not-too-spicy mustard)
1/4 cup honey

Preheat your oven to 180 Celsius. Mix the honey and mustard. Smear over the chicken, stuff the stuffing into the cavity of the chicken, and then shove the chicken into the oven, breast down. Cook for 30 minutes, and then turn over and cook for another 60 minutes breast up. Serve with roast potatoes and assorted side dishes. Enjoy.

Couscous side-slash-stuffing

This is adapted from a food24 recipe. When I first made this recipe a few years ago, I really liked it when I used it as a stuffing, but (typically) I made more stuffing than I needed and it turned out to be the star of the show, so to speak. The good thing is it can be scaled up with no regard for loss of quality. Here's my version of a fantastic recipe:

Should serve 2:

1/2 cup couscous
Depending on instructions, 1/2 cup chicken or vegetable stock
2-3 tbsp olive oil
25 g butter
130-150 g courgette, grated
100 g dried cranberries, finely diced
1/2 cup shelled hazelnuts, crushed or ground up in a blender. You can add the cranberries to this and save yourself the hassle of chopping them up yourself
juice and zest of 1 lemon
salt and pepper to taste

Cook the couscous in the stock, according to the directions on the packaging. When ready, add the butter and the oil. Stir in the courgette, hazelnuts, lemon juice and zest (I guess this can be added with the stock, though), and season. I do recommend adding salt to your couscous, as it can be a bit anaemic without it. Serve warm or cold. This goes brilliantly with roast chicken, especially this recipe.

Hummus

I made a decent hummus, but then I added salt...

Moral of the story: never add salt to your hummus. It ain't worth it.

Ingredients:

1 tin chickpeas, very well rinsed
100 g or 3 big tbsp tahini
3 tbsp olive oil, but more to taste if needed
1-2 cloves garlic
Plenty of black pepper
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp cumin
1 lemon, juiced
A bit of coriander, if you fancy

Add everything to a hand-held mixer, blend until smooth, eat with whatever is at hand, but vegetables and bread are always good. Don't cut your fingers on the blades.

Smoked mackerel kedgeree

A slightly different breakfast dish, but this could be good for almost any meal. Despite the list of ingredients, it's very quick, easy and cheap to make. It shouldn't be too spicy - the main taste is the mackerel - so don't overdo the chilli. I based my version on this one from BBC Good Food, but I've made adaptations where necessary.

Should serve 2-3

1/2 cup basmati rice
2-3 thin smoked mackerel fillets
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
3-4 curry leaves (optional)
1-2 onion, diced
1-2 garlic cloves, minced
chilli to taste, finely diced
1 carrot, speed-peeled or thinly sliced
1/2 leek, thinly sliced
1/2 small bunch coriander, roughly chopped
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp curry powder
100 g frozen peas, cooked
knob of butter
4 boiled eggs (I put mine in the cold water in the pot and then boiled them for 3.30 and they were perfect, but you do you)
1 lime, juice

To prep: boil and peel your eggs, cook your peas and put them to one side, cook the basmati rice as per directions, and haul out your wok.

Place the mackerel fillets in a bowl and cover with boiling water. I suppose you'll cover it with around 200-400 ml of boiling water. Let to sit for a while.

Stir-fry the mustard seeds, corianders seeds, curry leaves, onion, garlic, and chilli for a couple of minutes, then add the carrot, leek, coriander and bay leaf. Cook for around 8 minutes.

Add in the rice, pour in about half the water from the fish, and stir very well. Add in the turmeric, curry powder, peas and butter, stir well, and cook for another few minutes.

Peel one egg, stir it in, then add the lime juice. Serve with the remaining eggs and with yoghurt if so desired.

Baked sausage, harissa and tomato casserole

This is a pretty simple dish that has an amazing flavour combination. It's adapted from Nigel Slater's recipe, with a few changes.

Should serve 3 or so, depending on how hungry you are

3 big sausages (boerewors, saucisse de Toulouse or something similar, should be around 600 g or so)
1 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tbsp Provencal herbs
2 tbsp harissa paste
250 g mushrooms (button mushrooms work well, but you could probably use porcini too)
1 x 400 g tin of red kidney beans, rinsed
1 x 400 g tin of chickpeas, rinsed
(or, use 2 tins of kidney beans, rinsed)
4 tomatoes, roughly chopped
200 ml chicken stock
Crusty bread, to serve

Heat the oven to 180 degrees. Brown the sausages in a grill pan. Remove, then fry the onion and garlic for a bit. When it starts to go translucent, add the herbs and the harissa, stir well, then cook for a minute or so. Transfer everything to an oven-proof dish. Add the beans and, if you're using them, the chickpeas, as well as the tomatoes and the stock. Chop the sausages up into bite-sized pieces and add them to the mix. Add in the beans (and chickpeas) and the mushrooms, mix well, and shove in the oven.

If you have only beans, cook for 25-30 minutes. If you've added chickpeas (and I do recommend adding chickpeas to your casserole), cook for around 35-40 minutes. In any event, make sure your sausages are not undercooked.

Serve with bread, lots of it. If you fancy, you could serve this over pasta.