Food blog? At last we go for a ride

This is becoming a bit of a food blog! Because the weather has been so bad lately we haven't been able to braai and we haven't ridden the bike for quite a while, however I assure you that I have still been drinking quite a lot of beers. I have been suffering from biking withdrawal symptoms lately and luckily we were able to take the big red machine out of the garage this past weekend.

Before I get into that though I feel that I really must tell you about our Saturday lunch, a team effort which really turned out very well and which is very easy to do, I don't know if it can be called a beef stroganoff, but it's a real good beef meal;

This was more than 800g of good quality Sirloin steak and although it was way too much for two people, the left-overs were great late on Sunday. First I sliced the beef up thinly and gave it a good sprinkle of my favourite Aromat.

 The next part was to heat up a heavy pan and once it was good and hot we flash fried the meat in the dry pan just to brown it, we then removed the meat and set it aside.

Next we de-glazed the pan with red wine into which Janet mixed two table spoons of soup powder, two tablespoons of Hot English mustard and then a good splash of fresh cream.

Heat the sauce through, let it simmer nicely and then add some mixed herbs, keep stirring to loosen all of the bits of meat that are stuck to the pan.

It doesn't need much time now, keep stirring to make sure it doesn't get lumpy and then you chuck the meat back in and stir it around to warm through. A this stage I added my "special ingredient."

At the recent Wacky wine festival in Robertson I bought this jar of Marinated, dried olives in chili and garlic from Rhebokskraal in McGregor, this is absolutely fantastic and I have been using it in just about everything I eat - delicious! I'm sorry I only bought one jar but I can easily go back and get some more up there. They advertise that all of their products are 100 per cent organic, check them out at www.rhebokskraalolives.co.za cell 0828960429, I'll definitely be getting more.

Obviously this dish will stand on its own without the olives and after just a minute or two it is ready to serve. I had already made some mashed potatoes and we warmed up some peas.

What a delicious lunch that was! About an hour later Janet went for a kip so I got the big red machine out of the garage and went for a local cruise, it was cold; 15,5c which is about 42f but still it was good to be out, I did a local blast just to clear the cobwebs and charge the battery and ended up at the Phoenix bar.

The sky was still ominously grey and it was bloody cold but there were seven bikes outside the pub, when the sun comes out so do the bikes!

 On Sunday we were able to go for a ride together, I managed to convince Janet that it was warm enough! We ended up at the "Vaatjie Taphuis" in Port Owen.

I had the seafood platter which consisted of a lovely fresh Hake fillet, mussels, prawns, calamari and rice for R95, Janet opted for crispy Eisbein and mash at R98 which she declared delicious but which could have done with a gravy.

I can vouch for the fact that it was delicious because I had her left-overs in my sandwich at work on Monday. After a nice relaxed lunch we mounted up and rode through to the Phoenix again, I played a couple of games of pool but it was still cold and after a short while I took Janet home.

I caught her trying to warm her....self in the sunlight by the door, isn't that a good picture of my two babes? It was a good weekend.