Shara Burger | From The Kitchen
While many of you are lapping up warm summer days that seem to go on forever we are well and truly in the thick of winter, be that what it may. By most foreign standards our winters are mild, warm even, often we look on in woollen clad alarm as guests dip into the pool in mid-June!
So, regardless of your personal temperature barometer we are calling it a cold winter here in the Timbavati, and with this in mind we are sharing the most delicious and hearty winter soup recipe this week. Enjoy either now or later in the year when the weather is more condusive!
Prepare the soup first, followed by the croquettes. Pop the croquettes in the soup just before serving and garish with feta cheese.
The Soup
Clean the outer husks and leaves from the corn.
Place the corn into a saucepan and cover with cold water. Season the water with salt.
Boil the sweetcorn for 15 minutes.
Remove the corn from the water and allow them to cool for a couple of minutes.
Strain the sweetcorn water into a bowl using a fine sieve.
Once the corn is cool enough to touch, shave off the kernels from the centre cob.
Roughly dice the white onion and the garlic.
In the same saucepan that the corn was boiled in, sauté the onion and garlic in a little olive oil over medium heat until the onions turn translucent in colour.
Add the shaved sweetcorn, milk, cream and sweetcorn water to the onions.
Bring to the boil and then simmer for 15 minutes.
Once simmered, blend the soup with a hand blender until smooth.
Once blended, strain the soup into a new pot using a fine mesh sieve.
Push through as much liquid as possible. Save all the sweetcorn bits that are not able to be strained (you will need these for the croquettes).
Bring the soup back up to the boil and thicken with cornflour if needed.
Season to taste.
Corn Croquette
Rub the potato with olive oil and salt and bake for 30 – 40 minutes or until the potato is soft.
Finely dice the red onion.
Once the potato has cooked, remove from the oven and let it cool for 2 minutes.
Cut the potato in half and scoop out the flesh and place in a bowl.
Mash the potato with a fork.
Add the leftover sweetcorn bits from the soup, finely diced onion and chives to the potato and mix together.
Season to taste.
Roll the potato mix into small balls and freeze for 10 minutes to harden.
While the potato balls are in the freezer, prepare 3 bowl – 1 with cornflour, 1 with beaten egg and 1 with bread crumbs.
Coat the potato balls first in cornflour, then in the beaten eggs and finally in the bread crumbs. Make sure that the balls are completely coated with bread crumbs.
Deep fry the potato balls in sunflower oil until golden brown.
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