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| As we sat down to dine on our African fare, The Lion King came on TV |
For week 6, we chose Zimbabwe, a country located in southern Africa. We knew right away after doing our initial research that we simply had to include the Zimbabwean staple food, sadza but definitely steer clear of Mopane Worms (blech!). Sadza is a type of porridge made from white cornmeal that Zimbabweans eat with nearly everything--it's so popular that people refer to meals as "sadza" due to it's prominence. It is served with a stew or "relish" and is eaten in a unique way--by hand! We also learned quickly that in Zimbabwe, it's not just what you eat with your sadza, but also how you eat it--Zimbabwean custom dictates that those dining all sit on the ground in a circle with the pot of sadza placed in the center between everyone. After washing your hands in your personal bowl of washing water, you tear off a piece of the hot sadza, flatten it out, and scoop out your stew with it and eat. Another important point to note is that Zimbabweans only eat with their right hands (the last time mom tried to dine on sadza with her left hand, the dinner hosts simply took off her left hand--if you don't believe me, ask her!).
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| Spinach for the Dovi |
Choosing the menu was theoretically simple--find a stew to serve with the sadza. After much research and some debate, we chose a recipe for dovi, a peanut butter-based stew (the debate was over whether dovi was original enough or not since mom had prepared a similar African dish in the past--peanuts and peanut butter are common ingredients in African cooking). Mom also decided to include a spinach side, which also included peanut butter. The ingredients for the entire meal were very easy to find--in fact, I think we bought everything from our local Harris Teeter, so it's a meal that's quite accessible to everyone; the recipes used familiar cooking methods, as well. Mom prepared the stew and the spinach with little to no trouble (I'd say the most time-consuming steps were prep work and allowing the stew to simmer for awhile) and I prepared the sadza. The steps for the sadza included mixing sadza with water and then simmering the mixture; after the brief simmer, add more cornmeal gradually and continue to stir until the mixture pulls away from the sides of the pot (which will wear you out--it gets thick!)--it only took me about 10 minutes to make the sadza. We served it warm alongside the dovi with spinach.
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| Eating our sadza Zimbabwe style |
The flavor of mom's dovi was very tasty--the combination of peanut butter, tomatoes and chicken, although a departure for most American palettes, blend very well together--even Rick liked it! Although Courtney wasn't a big fan of the spinach (and Rick didn't even try it), it was delicious as well--wilted spinach cooked in peanut butter was a unique-for-us approach that I'd suggest you try. The sadza, which was met with some trepidation from mom (and myself somewhat) for fear it would be a soggy cornmeal mush-type food, was a hit--we added some salt when we cooked it which may have helped it along for our tastes; not only was the sadza a success, I think we all found ourselves indulging on too much of it! Overall, our Zimbabwean meal was delicious--a meal you can (and should!) prepare for your family at home.
We were also very pleasantly surprised to find The Lion King on TV just as we sat down to eat--how awesome was that! Yay Africa!
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| The Circle of Life |
For Week 7, it's Japan--I won't lie, I've been a bit apprehensive about this one! Blog coming soon (since the fish is marinating as we speak ;-D).
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