When it comes to a full course meal, Chef Matt Manning takes a page out of Jill Scott’s songbook and believes one is the magic number.
The British private chef, now based in the city, coined his signature One Ingredient dining. This sees him use one ingredient as the common thread throughout the meal.
South African Tourism recently hosted the media to a sit-down where Manning pulled out the stops for a five course meal using one ingredient - tea.
Over a couple of hours at the Skinny Legs Cafe in Loop Street in the CBD, our taste buds danced to each use of tea in a dish.
We started with chicken liver ice-cream with rooibos tea poached fig canapés.
Then moved onto sweet breads with porcini and tea broth. We also had a course of tuna that had been cured with lemon and ginger tea salt.
My favourite dish was the lamb which had been smoked with jasmine chamomile tea. It had a crispy-ness to it that is really only rivalled by my grandmother’s southern deep-fried chicken.
The dessert was a milky tea custard with a matcha tea sponge cake.If it sounds like this was the perfect culinary experience, then that’s because it was. It was also complemented by Manning’s sense of humour, which he gave us in dollops whenever he explained what dish was coming up next.
While the passion for food pours out of him, it’s clear he aims to please his taste buds first. If he doesn’t like it, he won’t cook it.
It is even more evident when I ask him how he comes up with a menu.
“I don’t over-think it,” he said.
“That’s the worst thing you can do. Being a chef, I’ve cooked for a lot of people and very rarely ask them what they want. The best thing you can do if you get a chef to come cook for you, is to say: cook what’s in season and whatever you want to. For me that’s a dream come true because I can literally go and see what’s available at the time and then put together a menu that’s seasonal and delicious and fresh.”
This dream was realised when he hosted his One Ingredient interactive cooking classes at Seventh Floor in Observatory for two years. There, he had a demo station set up where he would teach people - who were placed at group or individual work stations - how to make a One Ingredient meal experience.
“The original concept of One Ingredient was one where I would demonstrate a few dishes using the same ingredient and then have people like you guys actually cook in the kitchen with me,” he said. “That concept has evolved to just demonstration. The venue we were in for two years has since closed down and there’s no other venue around that has the same set-up.”
He took a six-month hiatus “because there’s only so much of a good thing that we can have. Like butter and cream. It’s so good but you will eventually get sick of butter and cream”.
However, he is back at it. One Ingredient classes are now held twice a month at Food Lab in the city CBD.
He had also invited sommelier, Ewan Mackenzie of The Wine Thief to pair each course with an adult beverage. This can feel like a bonus for those who love to mix their drinks while eating. However, I felt it distracted from the taste of the food.
I asked Manning what the strangest ingredient was he had used. He thought about it, then snapped his fingers and said: “The ingredient that challenged me the most when creating a menu was egg. I did an egg menu a year or two years ago. It was for Easter. For dessert, I made a chocolate egg shell and filled it with maple syrup. It was a maple syrup cheesecake mixture and I filled the chocolate shell with that. Then I coated it with toasted hot cross bun crumbs. It was like a little hot cross bun egg filled with maple syrup cheesecake.”
I asked him how he managed his weight, and he said: “My girlfriend put me on a diet and I’m like, all I want is to eat the parfait but I can’t. Usually, what you’ll do when you’re cooking for people is give one to the guest and one to you. Then one for a guest and one for you. You’ve got to put yourself on a diet every now and then otherwise it’s very easy for this boep to turn into a belly.”
That goes for you too if you’re frequenting the Food Lab.