Disrobed of flavourants and all extras that delude the taste buds, Sonia Cabano's 'naked' food signals a return to the sensual art of eating.

She’s a gorgeous mother of two, a journalist and author, a  familiar face on TV, a stylist, soul-food activist and  chef… and she wants world peace too.

Watching Sonia Cabano flit from dish to dish as she  prepares her signature "naked" food is not unlike watching water ballet. Nimble, graceful, perfectly executed moves.

On the menu today: mushroom tart with fontina and truffle oil; Provençal leg of lamb with garlic, rosemary and  anchovies; pavlova topped with whipped cream, mango and pomegranate; chocolate sponge cake with raspberry  am and whipped cream, and a finale of honey-drenched goat’s milk cheese.

As she readies one dish, Sonia talks about the  preparation and presentation of the next. But she’s quick to point out that she’s actually a boeremeisie from the Free State, whose cooking influences have much to do with her mother, Adele Retief de Waal.

Tastes were "pure", devoid of rubs, flavourants, colourants and all the other added extras that today delude the taste buds.

Hence Sonia’s insistence on a return to "real" food, where the emphasis comes back to preparation: "We live in a  eady-made society and it has reached the point of  bsurdity that you can easily get your hands on out-of- season produce. We blindly adhere to the tenets of fusion  cooking and heedlessly track overseas trends, forgetting to celebrate the uniqueness of our own culinary offering.

"The point is that we have a rich food heritage of our very own. I like the word "boerekos", but it’s often misread as the food of white Afrikaaners. But to me, it’s really peasant food – food sourced only from local suppliers and freshly  repared from scratch every day."

Other influences include what she rates as the "three best cuisines in the world" – French, Chinese and Italian. "Apart from being masters at their craft, all of these culinary cultures, with South Africa included, have a rich tradition of
food preservation – they are all hugely skilled in the age-old techniques of keeping and preserving food."

Sonia happily admits that, when it comes to cooking, she is a total purist, and works hard to instill her food philosophy in her children. She recounts to her children the many food-related urban legends she’s collected over time – like the Japanese belief that you live 100 days longer with every new taste you try and like.

Healing food, sensual eating experiences, slow cooking… Sonia implements her food philosophy in her new cookbook, Easy: Simple and Delicious (Random House, available in September 2010) and plans to do so too at a new eatery, set to open in Cape Town sometime in June/July.

"We have become disconnected from who we are and I am going to try to return to that," she says  determinedly. "When I put something like olives stuffed with bokkoms on the table, you should go 'wow!'.

Images: Top: Sonia's honey-drenched goat's milk cheese with chorizo, Indian piccalilli, sun-dried tomato preserve, bread, marinated portobellini mushrooms and stuffed olives.

Centre: Sonia's daughter, Sabah, at her mother's 'convivial table'

Bottom: Leg of lamb stuffed with garlic, rosemary and anchovies.