I was too hasty, posting the above CathyZ.... (long)
as I have read through all the other posts I see one needs to use a fatty cut of pork. It is not unlike Gretchen's pork, infact.
I am going to adapt the fire/cooking and try this out. This Sunday if all goes well.
A braai is nothing more than a BBQ. A causal cook-out. It is the South African word for it (short for braai-vleis, being fired-meat) In SA one has chops, steak, borewors (a special farmer type sausage of which there is no comparison in the States) pork sausage...also no comparison in the States (it's like the English sausage) kebabs in all sorts of guises... fish, chicken etc
Here in the Caribbean the biggest thing they go for is ribs, followed by chicken and small bony fish.
The potjie are cast iron pots and the most popular one is a pot-bellyied 3 legged pot. This is layered with the ingredients from the longest food needing to be cooked, usually meat, to the shortest ingredients needing to be cooked. Then in the flat-bottomed pots one can bake bread as well as rice, desserts etc. The round pot stands proud of the coals, the flat bottomed is set in/on the coals.
I do adapt slow cooking recipes sometimes but the family and others have come to expect certain things week in and week out,
The potjie potatoes are just so incredible but it is nothing more than the actual flavour of the fire and the cast iron that makes it so...
REC: slice peeled potatoes and layer with loads of butter and salt into the flat bottomed pot. Pour over heavy cream till almost 2/3 up the side of the pot. Bury the pot in the coals with coals on the lid and let it sing quitely to it'self for about an hour....this depends on the strength of the fire, size of the pot and the type of potato used seems to make a difference in the end result.
I find 8 large coals underneath and 4 on the top of one brand of charcoal is good but not so with other brands of charcoal.
NOW the problem here lies in the fact that if I vere to Asian flavours for a menu....the potatoes do not really go, IMHO, BUT that is what everyone wants....if I vere Greek or Mediterranean, the potatoes don't really go...cous-cous or pasta would be much more in keeping ...OH well.
I have been swinging things recently a bit as I have to peel 20 large baking potatoes to fit in my pot and THAT too was getting tiresome every week...for years!.....
My SIL told me the other day "If you do potjie tats on Sunday we will deff. come"!
They will come anyway but it was a nice way of telling me we haven't done these tats for awhile!!!
A really nice recipe for chicken in the potjie is to immerse the whole chicken in a very good apricot juice, we actually find it in our stores here, from S.Africa. It is the "Ceres" brand, you may get it. This I add onion, garlic and a South African chutney to and let this sing to it'self while we down a bottle of wine, serve this with yellow rice done in the flat pot...
rice with tumeric added to the water and a handful of raisins and let that sit in the coals.
I have recipes for the rice if you'd like.
We do this cooking in the Weber here but it is the best kind of primal cooking on a beach at the end of a long day surfing/sailing and a huge bonfire going on the side...it is camping cooking at it's best. Squatting around the fire , eating with fork and fingers.....
but one can sit at the table and be more refined too of course...which we do here at home...and then one can get really larney with the meal. Awhile ago the trend for doing potjies was on the up and one of the best "potjie cooks" in S.Africa..a dominee...priest did a full meal at one of the best smartest hotels in Cape Town.
This was a series of meals offered to show case some of the best chefs in those days...each meal was very different.
Well this potjie chef needed real fire to cook on and although he did the bulk of the big pots at his home and then transported the meal to the kitchens of this hotel he still had to cook the dessert and so with much trepidation he was allowed to make fires on the roof...in the middle of a big city quite a few stories up. The desserts were fantastc all cooked in wee cast iron pots, a sort of baked apricot pudding with sauce and this whole meal was served in the most luxurious dining room with linen table cloths, flowers and flatware and silver service with the waiters in the white jackets and gloves and beautiful wine glasses.... Fit for a king....a meal that goes down well anywhere.
