As well as successfully climbing Mt Everest in 2010, Katie Sarah is one of the few Australian women to summit the highest peak on each of the world’s seven continents.

While working in finance and accounting and raising three sons, Sarah first became a triathlete and a marathon runner. Her new love of outdoor pursuits saw her take a role in adventure travel with DCXP Mountain Journeys, which ultimately led to her becoming an altitude climber.

In 2007 Sarah was the first Australian woman to summit Mt Himlung in Nepal and in 2010 she purchased DCXP Mountain Journeys from founder and fellow South Australian seven summiter Duncan Chessell. The business has now been renamed Sarah Mountain Journeys and continues to offer personalised international wilderness expeditions, specialising in the Himalayas of Nepal and Tibet, Tanzania and South America.

Between all that travelling, Sarah offers some insight into how she settles back into her kitchen on the Adelaide plains.

In the kitchen I am …
Super-organised. My sons laugh at me for spread-sheeting Christmas Day lunches.

I really enjoy “special” cooking for dinner parties or events, but I do find it hard to get very creative or excited for daily dinners after 20-plus years of cooking for my husband and three now-adult sons.

When I am not travelling, I do find it satisfying when I have the time to shop and cook properly, but at the end of a busy day dinner will be something that I can make quickly and without thinking too hard.

The fridge is nearly empty – what do you cook for dinner?
Pasta is reliable – it’s very rare that we don’t have passata, mince and at least dried pasta in the pantry. Otherwise, my mother-in-law’s egg and bacon pie is a fast and simple recipe that I usually have the basic ingredients to whip up.

Most useful cooking tool?
A useful cookbook and time to prepare a recipe from it with the fresh, delicious ingredients found in local shops.

Three essential grocery items?
Fresh vegetables, pasta and yoghurt.

How did you learn to cook?
I am self-taught. I love good recipe books and have rarely had a spectacular failure when following a recipe. But I do like to create on occasion, which is annoying when it turns out really well as I never make notes, so the chance of re-creating the dish again is almost zero!

Over the years I have also been inspired by my mother-in-law, Sally Sarah. She is an excellent cook and I have learnt a lot from her, simply by being around the family and eating meals she has prepared.

Favourite restaurant?
In Adelaide it has to be Orana in Rundle Street. They always provide impressive service as well as superb food. Amazingly, the staff can identify every single bizarre foraged item in the multitude of dishes they bring out, and the sommelier knows the wine list extremely well.

Favourite recipe?
I’m not strictly a vegetarian, but I prefer eating fresh fruit, salads, or a big plate of roasted vegetables. However, my favourite dish to prepare, because it is received so well by the boys, is an adaptation of Jamie Oliver’s “Dark, Sticky Stew” (page 167, Jamie’s Kitchen, 2002 Penguin Books). It can be popped in the oven to simmer away for ages, which is great when you are organised and can fit it into your day.

Of course I substitute Vegemite for Marmite, and being a good South Aussie I use Coopers Stout.

Jamie Oliver’s ‘Dark, Sticky Stew’ courtesty ‘Jamie’s Kitchen’, 2002 Penguin Books.

Jamie Oliver’s Dark, Sticky Stew

Ingredients

800g stewing lamb, roughly diced
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Small handful of fresh rosemary, leaves picked
2 heaped tbsp flour
Extra virgin olive oil
1 red onion, peeled and roughly chopped
8 field mushrooms, torn in half
Handful of baby carrots, scrubbed
1 parsnip, peeled and grated
1 dessertspoon Marmite
2 heaped tbsp pearl barley
285ml rich ale (Guinness, Caffrey’s, John Smith’s)
565ml stock
6 skewers or sticks of fresh rosemary, leaves removed
18 chipolata sausages

Method

Preheat your oven to 180°C. Put your lamb into a bowl and season well with a good pinch of salt and pepper. Finely chop your rosemary leaves and add to the bowl with the flour. Mix around so that the meat is completely covered. Fry the lamb in a couple of tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil in a hot casserole-type pan – do this in batches so the pieces get a nice bit of colour, then remove from the pan and put to one side.

Turn the heat down, then fry your onion, mushrooms and carrots for about 5 minutes until softened and slightly coloured. Add the lamb back to the pan along with the parsnip, Marmite, pearl barley, ale and stock.

Bring to the boil and then simmer for 20 minutes while you skewer 3 chipolatas on to each of the skewers or rosemary sticks. Just before the stew goes into the oven, add the chipolatas to the pan. Then place a lid on. Cook for around an hour, or until the lamb falls apart.

I love to eat it just as it is, almost like a thick soup, with some crusty bread.

Serves 6