A devil of a time with heavenly vegetables

Red onion and fennel bulb risotto with beetroot sprouts

IN SUTHERLAND, where quality vegetables are not easy to come by, we grew courgettes for the table, inspired by dear Piet Klein, who grew a magnificent vegetable garden in a corner of the town.

Even when battling cancer, yet again, Piet would break his back keeping his charges alive and thriving. One day I asked him into the kitchen for coffee. He looked abashed when I pulled out a chair for him. After some hesitation he sat, and after we had had a lovely conversation he told me with some emotion that in more than 50 years in Sutherland no white person had ever asked if he’d like to sit down.

Inspired by Piet’s green fingers, I planted onions, leeks, spinach, courgettes and pumpkins in the vast back garden of what was about to become our restaurant. Not everything took. We had a few pumpkins, two or three sad leeks, and lots of spinach. But the courgettes developed a life of their own. They grew and grew, and then grew some more. I lined the hallway with them, and the tannies would squeal on sight of a row of priapic marrows.

Sadly the courgette season was over when a lovely old dear from Joburg booked lunch for 20 to celebrate her 80th birthday. “My dear, I should warn you that two in our party will be vegetarian,” she told us. I took some pride in always having something to offer vegetarians. I made a simple but delicious Italian tomato sauce, using ripe tomatoes, quality Italian passata, fresh garlic, olive oil, white wine and fresh herbs.

The first I knew of any dissent was when a waif-like creature draped herself in my kitchen doorway. “Is that all you can offer me?” I explained that the few vegetables you could get in town were inferior, and that I had made a plan to get in some lovely organic tomatoes for a quality Italian sauce. “I don’t eat tomatoes,” she said. OK, then, I said, I happen to have some fresh asparagus. I can make you a nice … “I don’t eat asparagus … ag, just make me some pasta and drizzle olive oil on it.”
Whereupon she stomped past me into my pantry and examined the (Barilla) pasta packet. “That’ll be fine,” she said. Oh, good.

After the party has left Di tells me that, when served her pasta, she opened her handbag, took out an avocado and proceeded to peel strips of it onto her pasta.
She is the kind of vegetarian who gives vegetarians a bad rep, but fortunately most are happy to sit back and have a good time without expecting to be made a special fuss of.

Red and yellow pepper soup

Like Lynne and Nicks, who came over for a vegetarian supper last week. I made red and yellow pepper soup, red onion and fennel bulb risotto with beetroot sprouts, and fresh cherries with Van der Hum creme fraiche. The meal took under an hour to put together.

I blackened the peppers under the grill, removed the skin and seeds, and set aside the flesh. Simmer chopped onions in olive oil with garlic, add vegetable stock and divide into two saucepans. Add yellow peppers to one, red peppers to the other. Check seasoning. Simmer for five minutes, blend thoroughly. Serve with a swirl of cream or yoghurt.

I used an Italian brand of risotto. Simmer chopped red onion and fennel bulbs with garlic in butter until soft, add vegetable stock and large quantities of white wine. Strain this into a second pot, reserving the onion and fennel. Season the stock and simmer, with a ladle handy. Add the risotto rice to the onion/fennel mix, and on a medium heat gently stir as you add stock, stir, repeating this until all the stock has been absorbed. If the rice is not yet al dente, heat more wine and vegetable stock and continue. Before serving, stir in mascarpone and/or fresh cream, and serve, garnished with beetroot sprouts.

For afters, whip some Van der Hum liqueur into creme fraiche, and serve with fresh cherries to be dipped into it. They loved this – in fact, Nicks and Lynne didn’t complain about a thing, possibly because I had told them the story of the waif in the doorway.

Cherries with Creme Fraiche infused with Van der Hum liqueur

Two years after we left to live in England, we came back to Cape Town on holiday and ventured up to Sutherland for a few days. I looked out for Piet for all of five days, and finally on the last day I saw his little bakkie cluttering along Piet Retief Street. I flagged him down and we hugged and talked. I asked him about his health. He said, “Die kanker is terug, meneer.” The cancer was back. He smiled, we wished each other well and parted.

When we returned to Sutherland two years later, I went looking for Piet. I heard that he had died two weeks after that meeting. The vegetables in heaven must be very green.

First published in Weekend Argus The Good Weekend, November 2009