Hot weekend braais

Well it has been a hugely hot weekend, yesterday (saturday) I had thought of going for a ride but felt so slow and lazy that we just decided to do a braai. That was a good decision and we just sat and took it easy, I lit a good fire and then as soon as I had some coals ready I put some skilpaatjies (skill-pie-keys) on. For those of you who do not know they are commercially made of minced liver wrapped in the spleen or caul fat and pegged with a toothpick, when I make my own I use strips of liver wrapped in the fat.
I have mentioned them in a previous post, they are delicious even if maybe not so healthy with all of the fat which soaks into the minced liver and also runs down your elbows. After that I put on some de-boned lamb ribs, sprinkled with my favourite aromat and black pepper. Those were our starters and I then put some potatoes and a miellie wrapped in tinfoil into the coals to cook slowly as we planned a gap before the main course; sirloin steak.

Place a large pat of butter on the tinfoil then put the miellie on top, another pat of butter on the miellie and sprinkle with aromat and black pepper, roll it up tight and place it on the edge of the coals, not right in them, keep rotating it until you can feel that it is getting soft. This should be started at least half an hour before you start to cook your meat.
A while later, after we had relaxed a bit I cooked the steaks in a pan over the gas range on my back veranda, I had previously marinated them in olive oil, aromat, garlic flakes, mixed herbs and hot English mustard. Using gas you have the advantage of heating a heavy cast iron pan really hot and I seared the steaks quickly and then let them rest in the warmer with the potatoes and miellies, we had a really delicious meal.

You may have noticed that I use a lot of Aromat, that I mention it in just about every recipe but I absolutely love the stuff and the flavour that it brings to food so I do use it a lot, if you don't like it or can't get it where you are tough luck!

This morning we decided to do a breakfast run and be back home in time to watch the Pro20 cricket match against the Aussies. We left the house at about 0845 and already the temperature was up to 23,5 degrees, promising to be a scorcher.

We had a really nice if rather short ride, I headed through to Vredenburg then out towards the R27 and right at the "Orex" turnoff which takes you past the railway yards, there is a really nice S bend at the start and a longer one in the middle of the stretch of road before it rejoins the Saldanha-R27 road, a short blast over the railway bridge and then a right to go past the Saldanha Steel plant and the fuel farm before heading into Langebaan. It was not a fast ride, we just felt like a cruise because the big red machine had been languishing in the garage since Christmas.

After a rather mediocre breakfast we took the short way back home and watched the bloody Aussies beat us by 52 runs, we gave them a bit of a go up until JP went out! Watch that guy; JP Duminy he's going places, mind you the Aussie Dave Warner can hit the ball! I'm looking forward to the next Pro20 match and the ODI's.

I've got a braai planned for this evening and I have some super cold beers in the fridge, ain't life grand?!