10 Things To Eat and Drink in South Africa

Steak, venison, filet, bone marrow, and game meat. Okay, also drinks. While there is lots to eat that is vegetarian, South Africa is delight for meat eaters. Not only is there a lot of meat on the menu, it is not expensive, and there is a great variety. One can have a full steak dinner for 20 bucks. Tip is ten percent.

Let’s start with the sweet tooth.

Malva pudding: It’s a dessert sort of like sticky toffee pudding in England, except that Malva is made with apricots instead of dates so it is not as sweet. Just kidding. It is served with custard rather than toffee sauce, and that is what makes it less sweet.

Malva pudding with distinctive custard sauce.

Wine: Wine tasting is a big thing to do in South Africa. They have so much wine.

Amarula: is a liqueur sort of like Baileys. The urban legend is that the elephants were getting drunk off the fermented fruit of the Amarula tree and the humans got inspired to try it.

Amarula shots.

Biltong: is dried meat, like jerky, but it can be soft like dried mango in texture. The South Africans don’t like it when you say it’s jerky…

Bunny chow: is curry in a loaf of white bread. South Africa has immigrants from South Asia so there is lots of curry.

Bunny chow.

Kudu: is a kind of deer, or DLC, deer like creature (as one South African calls anything that can be turned into biltong). Delicious.

Eland: another edible hoofed animal. Bigger and delicious. Maybe the most delicious.

Bone marrow: is served a lot here. Maybe it’s a fad.

Bone marrow.

Roosterkoek: is a kind of bread a bit like a bun that is grilled so it gets good smoked char and deep grooves for absorbing taste. The bread is a yeasty bread so I liked it. Crunchy and yeasty. Now we are talking.

Roosterkoek.

Calamari (chokka): in South Africa are often served as “fingers” and is probably made from the local Cape Hope squid. It is exceptionally tender. No rubber bands here! See below.

Calamari sticks that match the fries.
The square things are “rusks” which are dried bread.

Malva Pudding from Woolies

I’ll talk about the other things to try in South Africa but when you are there, there is one thing on everyone’s mind — Malva pudding. From Woolies.

Household items in Woolies.
Clothes in Woolies.

First of all, Woolies in South Africa is not like Woolworths in the USA or the UK, back in the day. No, it’s more like a Target or Macy’s with food. Or a Sears for those who remember them. Woolies is a place where you can get your grocery shopping done but also buy clothes and household items. A proper department store but on a more down to earth level.

Back to Malva pudding. It’s a moist cake served with custard or ice cream. If you like British sticky toffee pudding, then you’ll like Malva pudding as well. Malva pudding is not as sticky as sticky toffee pudding because instead of toffee sauce, it is topped with custard.

As to the origin of the name, the three theories are that it comes from the Afrikaans for a type of flower, or that it is named after a woman named Malva, or third, that it originally included Malvasia wine (Malvasia is a grape varietal, or type of grape).

The cheater/hack way to enjoy it is to buy it from Woolies, warm it up, and then serve with custard from Woolies. Easy peasy.