The word cacciatore is the Italian word for hunter. Chicken cacciatore got its name from the rustic, “hunter-style” way this dish is prepared. Numerous versions exists all over Italy, from the southern region using red wine as opposed to the northern region which tend to use white wine instead. To compliment the rustic nature of this dish, we served it with sourdough bread with molasses and sunflower seeds.
This is a very easy recipe where you can basically use any type of stewing beef meat and any good quality fortified wine. The anchovies can be omitted, but it does provide that extra umami taste to the dish.
So what constitutes the perfect steak sandwich ? I take a look at some of the main criteria which for me contributes to a good steak sandwich and which should be kept in mind when preparing one.
I recently got hold of some good quality springbok knuckles on my travels and decided to make this dish. The way the meat is prepared is based on Jamie Oliver’sInsanely Good Oxtail Stew Recipe and the pilaf is based on Nagi Maehashi’sRice Pilaf with Nuts and Dried Fruit recipe. Jamie’s recipe I tweaked a bit and turned it into a one-pot dish while adding some ingredients like garlic and onions. Nagi’s recipe I pretty much kept standard, but I decided to work with ingredients at hand.
For those of you that are not familiar with springbok, it is a medium-sized antelope found in South Africa and also the national animal of this country.
Oven Braised Springbok
Ingredients
1kg springbok knuckles or other venison
2 leeks cut in half and then into 2cm pieces
2 carrots cut into 2cm slices
1 onion diced
1 celery stick with leaves cut into 2cm pieces
3 sprigs rosemary
5 sprigs thyme
3 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
4 bay leaves, fresh if possible
4 cloves
1 Tbsp all-purpose flour
100ml red muskadel or port or other sweet wine
400ml venison or beef stock (homemade stock produces a far superior dish)
425g tinned, diced tomatoes
Worcestershire sauce
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Method
Preheat a large casserole pot with lid in the oven at 220 degrees Celsius.
Remove the pot from the oven, add the meat, season it with salt and pepper, add a good lug of olive and mix it well.
Put the casserole back in the oven (with the lid) for about 20 minutes.
Remove the casserole from the oven and put it on low-medium heat on the stove. Turn the oven down to 170 degrees Celsius.
Add the leeks, carrots, garlic, onion, celery, rosemary, thyme, and bay leaves to the meat, stir well and cook for about 20 minutes with the lid on.
Vegetables added to the meat
Add the flour and cloves, and mix well.
Add the muskadel or wine, tomatoes and stock and mix well.
Turn the heat up and bring to boil.
Put the casserole (with lid) back in the oven for about 4 hours, turning the food over every hour or so.
Remove the casserole from the oven, add a good dash of Worcestershire sauce and let the dish settle for about 30 minutes before dishing up.
375ml chicken stock (once again, home made stock will produce a far superior dish)
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp cardamom
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp ground cumin
Method
Dry fry the nuts in a pan over medium heat. Be careful not to burn the nuts and note that the almond flakes will toast quicker than the whole pistachios.
Melt the butter in a large sauce pan over medium heat, add the onion and garlic and saute until translucent.
Add the rice and fry until mostly translucent.
Add the cinnamon, cardamom, pepper and cumin and stir.
Add the stock, and dried fruit and stir.
Cover with the lid, bring to simmer and then immediately turn the heat down to medium low or low.
Cook for 15 minutes until the liquid is absorbed. (Try not to open the lid while cooking). Remove the pot from the stove and leave for 10 minutes undisturbed.
Crush the pistachios slightly, add most of the nuts and toss.
Serve with remaining nuts as garnish.
We served the springbok and rice pilaf together with a bottle of Jacaranda Wines No. 47 2018 which is a Shiraz and contributed very well to the spiciness of the dish.
Note
You can basically use any dried fruit. The original recipe uses apricots, sultanas and raisins. The dried fruit mixture I used consisted of peaches, apricots, pear, prunes (pitted) and apples.
I got the inspiration for this dish by this Spanish recipe by Lauren Aloise, but I had to make quite a bit of changes as we are not so fortunate in South Africa to always get the produce our counterparts get in Europe – like Iberian pork cheeks for example. I also took the starch out of the dish and made a separate starchy dish to go with the main course.
So I Googled for “Pork and Bean” and came across this Corsican Bean Soup with Greens and Pork recipe on Food & Wine which sounded very interesting. Unfortunately I couldn’t source all the ingredients and had to make do with what I had. I also decided not to use the word Corsican in the title as I was not too sure how strict you have to follow this recipe to call it anything from Corsica.
We got our hands on some tenderized eland steaks and decided to make some prego rolls. (We also used some of the steaks to make schnitzels). This is our first stab at making a prego sauce so we had to Google a bit to get some ideas.