A passion for food led to a big win for a professional singer after she entered the Capsicum Chef Talent Scout competition

A red pepper cake has led a 36-year-old Rivonia resident to change careers.

The professional singer Nolwazi ‘Lwazi’ Ydrestal swaps the recording studio for the kitchen when she starts at Capsicum Culinary Studio’s Rosebank campus this month and sets off on her new culinary journey.

Ydrestal is one of five regional winners of the Capsicum Chef Talent Scout competition. Her prize? A one-year bursary at the country’s leading chefs’ school worth R90 000. To enter the competition, contestants had to create and submit a dish – sweet or savoury – using red capsicum pepper or any other red ingredient.

Ydrestal took the brief to heart and created a delicious and clever red pepper cake. The aspiring chef said she was a singer by choice and a musician by education. “I have been singing professionally for 12 years, which has afforded me the opportunity to travel and see different countries,” she said.

She shared that her passion for food started when she went to visit her khuluza (gogo or grandma) for the school holidays. “She was a housewife who kept a vegetable garden and would send me to pick carrots or whatever she needed. I was hooked. I learnt how to cook by watching her, sometimes she would give me a big bowl of butter and sugar to whisk by hand. This was for butter biscuits or jam squares. Yummy.”

On why she decided to enter the competition, Ydrestal said she saw an opportunity to finally go to culinary school. She had tried before but failed to come up with the funds so she decided to give it a try. Upon learning that she was a winner, the aspiring chef was elated. “I couldn’t scream because I was in a theatre but I danced for joy. I will be forever grateful for this opportunity. It is a game-changer for me.

“Winning fulfils a lifelong dream of learning more about food and working in a professional kitchen. I am an avid traveller and this opportunity allows me to go anywhere in the world and work. From the stage to the kitchen.”

Ydrestal said she foresaw many possibilities and no limits as she was ready to be moulded into any shape.

Method
Set oven at 150°C.
Whisk eggs and sugar until pale yellow. Add oil, vanilla essence and food colouring and mix well. Sift the dry ingredients and add gently to the egg/sugar mixture. Make sure there are no lumps but do not over mix. Pour mixture into a 15cm cake tin.
Place in oven and bake for 30-45min.
Let the cake cool.
Mix icing sugar and white margarine to make buttercream.
Take a sharp knife and start shaping your cooled cake into a red pepper. Cut a hole in the centre to add the nonpareils.
Take buttercream and coat the red pepper shaped cake. Put it in the fridge to chill.
While you wait, roll out the fondants. Cover the cake with the red fondant and shape the green fondant into a stalk and stick it into the red pepper.
In a small dish, pour a few drops of the red colouring. Take a brush and glisten the pepper.

Related articles:

https://www.citizen.co.za/rosebank-killarney-gazette/316900/rockie-chefs-wanted/

https://www.citizen.co.za/rosebank-killarney-gazette/285545/a-spirited-cooking-competition-with-a-difference/