national foods - M's Adventures

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

The square things are “rusks” which are dried bread.

Ajiaco, soup with chicken breast, guasco, rice, corn, and avocado.

Every place has it’s national dishes. Here in Colombia, if you ask, they’ll probably mention the two most famous soups: sancocho and ajiaco. Or the empanadas and arepas.

I really like ajiaco because it’s got cream on it and you can add your own rice and avocado (like bacon, avocado makes everything better). The distinctive taste and color of ajiaco is a herb called “guasca” which is translated into English to “gallant soldier” but I’ve never heard anyone call it that. It also has medicinal uses. There are many types of corn in the world. The cob in my soup was different than in the corn in the U.S. The corn that most of the world, outside from the birthplace of corn — the central Americas, eats is the small and sweet variety. This corn was starchier and each kernel was much larger (choclo, like what I’ve had in Peruvian restaurants). The way to eat the cob in the soup is to take the handy skewer, turn the cob, and spear the skewer into the end of the corn. Then it’s easy to bite the kernels off the cob. I’ll write more about the restaurant where I had the ajiaco another time.

Every country has a dumpling of some sort, sometimes boiled, steamed, or fried. The other day, I had a delicious fried Bogotano empanada. The sauce was surprisingly spicy. Everyone told me that Colombians don’t like spicy food. That may be, but this salsa did not take prisoners. Wowza. Eating these empanadas from a street stall reminded me of the fuchka of Bangladesh.

As for the arepa. This one was made of white corn, griddled and brushed with butter. Inside was a center of melted cheese. I didn’t actually like this very much as it had a slightly soured yogurt-like tang to it which I didn’t find all that appealing although I love that flavor in dairy products (more about dairy another time). I’ve had arepas before which were spliced and stuffed like sandwiches but this one was more like a pupusa. Will have to try others along the way.

Tag: national foods

10 Things To Eat and Drink in South Africa

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Trying the National Dishes of Colombia? Ajiaco, Sancocho, Empanadas, and Arepas

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