Food is time travel.

I think I have seen that line before. Aaah, it is in Reuben Riffel’s cookbook. And it is so true, food is able to take you to places and times you have never been to, or return you to places and past memories. I know that for someone near and dear to me, a braised lamb shank served with gnocchi will always evoke special memories. Just like having a braai with the portable braai boxes will for me.

Last week I went to Taiwan on business related activity and our hosts went all out to impress us. I must admit, I was a bit wary of what to eat there, as everyone seemed to have advice on what to eat and what not to eat. By the end of the trip, I was brave enough to even go and eat at some back door Korean barbeque, where the owner was really worried about the ‘shortage of cabbage’ and how this would affect his kimchi. I told him I could organize him cabbage from South Africa, we feed that stuff to cows down here.

Ok, so we land in Taiwan and our hosts insist on going out for dinner. After nineteen hours travelling and sleeping at airport benches I wasn’t really in the mood for anything adventurous, especially in Taiwan. Thanks to this, I chose a simple, safe dish for dinner. This dish actually changed my perception on Taiwanese cuisine, and by the end of the week there I had tried out everything from sea cucumber, to abalone, to shark fin soup (very little shark fin in that soup) and pineapple cake. The dish was beef braised in soy sauce. If something this simple can taste this good, then their food is with exploring was my deduction after that meal. When I came back, I tried making the dish, and I think I am not too far off from the one I had there. It has a beautiful dark brown colour, and the beef is soft after cooking slowly for nearly four hours.

I will blog about some of my experiences in Taiwan, like the visit to a restaurant called South Africa Fish House, and the weird things they serve there under the name of South African cuisine. For now, I would like to share with you the recipe.

Get a kilogram of beef steak and cut into cubes, roll this in flour and set aside. Heat some oil in a pot and brown the steak cubes. In the meantime, soak some dried shitake mushrooms in about two cups of warm water. Chop an onion, and two carrots. Remove the browned meat from the pan, and throw in the onions and carrots. Fry gently for about five minutes. Return the beef to the pot; add about two cups of chicken stock, a third of a cup of soy sauce, and a dash of fish sauce and two table spoons of hoisin sauce. Let this simmer for about two and a half hours. Check for seasoning, and then add the mushrooms (drain them first) and about two star anise. I added the star anise half way through the cooking as I didn’t want it to overpower the soy sauce. Cook over a low heat for another hour. Chop up four spring onions, add to the pot and cook for ten minutes.
Serve with rice and steamed beans.