Let's talk about food

Since yesterday's fact was a little bit dry (at least for me), I've decided to spice things up a little bit today by learning about South African cuisine. Due to my love of food and cooking, this will probably be the first of many facts concerning food. I'm a vegetarian, so I can't be as adventuresome as some, but I'm willing to try almost anything when it comes to food.

Whats4eats.com reports that South African cuisine is often referred to as "rainbow cuisine", being a mixture of indigenous African dishes, Dutch and English dishes, and the dishes of Malays, Indians and Indonesians who were brought to South Africa as slaves and servants. 


Southafrica.info begins their little blurb about cuisine like this:
"For the more daring diner, South Africa offers culinary challenges ranging from crocodile sirloins to fried caterpillars to sheep heads. All three are reputed to be delicious."

Fried Caterpillars

Maybe it's a good thing that I'm a vegetarian. I'm not sure I'm daring enough for sheep head and fried caterpillars.

For the non-so-daring eater, Southafrica.info suggests a selection of indigenous delicacies, including biltong (dried, salted meat), bobotie (version of shepherd's pie) and boerewors (hand-made farm sausage grilled over flame). These sound a little less scary, but still very meaty. 

Boerewor

Bobotie

Luckily, whats4eats.com assures me that there are vegetarian options available. Chakalaka "is a simple, spicy dish of onions, tomatoes and often beans. It has been a staple for generations of black South Africans, and is a required condiment at South African braais, or barbecues."

Chakalaka

Ugali, or mealie pap, is described as African cornmeal mush that is polenta-like in nature. 

Geelrys is South African yellow rice with raisins (apparently it is usually paired with bobotie). 

Samosas are Indian deep-fried potato pastries. Now we're talking. These sound fantastic!  What's not to love about deep-fried potatoes? Whats4eats.com writes that "Samosas are the perfect chaat, or Indian snack food. These tetrahedral pastry pockets are made with a variety of stuffings, both vegetarian and with meat. But a simple spiced potato and pea filling is the most popular."

Samosas

Just so we can add a little bit more into today's lesson, here's some food-related history:

Apparently spices originally drew the Dutch East India trading company to Java in the mid-1600s, and the need for a pit stop along the way inspired the Company to plant a farm at the tip of Africa (South Africa!). The Malay slaves, brought along by the DEI Trading Company, introduced their cuisine and cooking styles to this South African pit stop. Later, sugar farmers brought indentured servants from India to cut the cane, and thus the Indian cuisine. The British and German brought their cuisine when they came to South Africa looking for gold. The black communities of South Africa continued eating their traditional, healthy diet of game, root vegetables, berries, maize and protein-rich insects. So it truly is a "rainbow cuisine".

Okay, all this food is making me hungry. I'm going to move on to cheetah facts. Because this is getting to be a really long post, I'll make today's cheetah fact short and sweet, and also food-related: The cheetah preys mostly on small gazelles, antelope, hares, and ground birds. If given the choice, they'd go for Thompson's gazelle. They have to eat their food quickly before other predators get to it. 

Are you hungry yet? Go get some sheep head, then.