A trio of award-winning chefs and their special moms this Mother's Day

TimesLIVE

10-05-2025

NINA DU TOIT
Head Chef Salsify at The Roundhouse, Camps Bay, Cape Town
Eat Out Woolworths Restaurant of the Year
I grew up in Johannesburg with my mother Lea Holtz and two siblings, I'm the eldest child. My mom has always made delicious food. We grew up eating very healthy, organic food and my mother has a gift for cooking vegetables and making them taste amazing. After school I wanted to do something practical and my mom asked me what I love doing, it was ultimately cooking and making food for others where I was always happiest.
There are many food memories growing up. My mom always made us lunch when we came home from school, and we all sat together and enjoyed dinner together too. In summer she would make us 'fruit soup' which was a fruit salad basically with polenta which she cooked and pressed and then cut into squares. It was all served together in a fruit juice... this was an interesting stand out dish she made, we loved it! But jokes aside she makes a delicious organic chicken soup (all ingredients must be organic otherwise it's not right) and to this day we ask her to make it.
My mom would wake up at 5am every morning before us and make us school sandwiches. Always on rye or homemade bread. I was fussy and couldn't eat unroasted bread so mine was always toasted first. Every day was different: lettuce, cheese, tomatoes, gherkins you name it. They were amazing. We did trade them some days at school though for the other children's white bread because that was not allowed in our house.
Celebrating Mother's Day together is tricky now that I live in Cape Town and work in a busy restaurant where our patrons come and celebrate their mothers with us. I always send my mother a meal from a restaurant she loves and always include a care package or a spa voucher because she's still my biggest supporter in all I do. When she visits, she still cooks and looks after everyone about her and the topic of conversation about the table is always food. She's always enthusiastic and excited to make dinner together and I love how food always brings people together. I am lucky to have grown up with the best organic food and today I try to find the best produce because I know how good it is for you and I can taste the difference.
Anything I make my mom loves. I made her gnocchi once — we make for one of our dishes at Salsify — and she was blown away at how light and delicious they were. She is an excellent baker and we often share recipes with each other and different flours and ingredients we've used. She always made us a birthday cakes which were always exceptional. She's always experimenting with new health products, and she has a little shop in Johannesburg where she sells organic vegetable and health products. Nowadays she makes gluten free, sugar free cakes for her cafe and they are really delicious... you wouldn't be able to tell it's not the real deal. Her banana bread is awesome.
LEA'S GLUTEN FREE BANANA BREAD
My mother Lea Holtz runs the Collaborative Healing Centre in Johannesburg offering alternative healing and sells organic vegetables, gluten free cakes and biodynamically made compost. It's inspiring to see my mother's dream become a reality.
Makes one loaf
5ml (1 tsp) bicarbonate of soda
4 very ripe bananas, peeled and mashed with a fork
125ml (1/2 cup) butter or oil
125ml (1/2 cup) sugar at most
3 eggs
5ml (1 tsp) vanilla essence
500ml (2 cups) gluten free flours, buckwheat, spelt, rice or cassava, well sifted
2.5ml (1/2 tsp) baking powder
Pinch of salt
125ml (1/2 cup) walnuts, roughly chopped
1. Mix the bicarbonate of soda into the banana mix. Melt the butter and let it cool a bit before beating in the sugar, eggs and vanilla.
3. Sift the gluten free flours well and add baking powder, pinch of salt and roughly ground or chopped walnuts. Pour into a greased medium loaf pan and bake at 180 deg C for 40 — 50 minutes or until a knife inserted comes out clean.