Simply South Africa - A Culinary Journey by Elaine Hurford
Elaine Hurford is a former newspaper journalist who runs a National Monument guesthouse in Prince Albert, a small scenic village with the Great Karoo spreading out “infinitely” to the north and the Swartberg with its famous mountain pass as a backdrop to the south. All the recipes originate from guesthouses, hotels and restaurants renowned for their cuisine But she not only specializes in the local culinary delights such as loin of (Great) Karoo mutton in a herb crest with red wine and garlic sauce, which is a specialty of the Andries Stockenström guesthouse in Graaff-Reinet (member of the “Good Country Cooks”) but also delves into recipes from all regions of South Africa. The diversity of this country finds its true expression not only in its scenic assets and natural hospitality but also in the abundance of home-grown products and superb wine. Approximately 80 recipes are enticingly presented as well as informative descriptions of the different regions and their products.
Elephant in the Kitchen - Recipes from the Wilderness by Dereck Joubert
This book is not only a portrait of Craig Higgins, the head chef of the Wilderness Safaris Group and his quest to revolutionize African Cuisine. It also describes the (kitchen) life of Mombo Camp in Botswana - a place of rich splendour and an abundance of wildlife anecdotes, endearingly described in words and photographs by a husband and wife team. A succulent selection of biscuits (elephant tuille etc.), sauces (e.g. Kalahari lentil dip), preserves (e.g. Kebope’s marula jelly), hors d’oevre (chakalaka tartlets with sour cream), soups (Moremi butternut and cumin soup), salads, breads, vegetarian (butternut and ricotta ravioli) as well as meat (boma lamb, grilled ginger beef and picnic guinea fowl pie) as well as fish (Okavango sushi) and desserts (iced jackal berry parfait with coulis).
A Kitchen Safari: Stories & Recipes from the African Wilderness
von Yvonne Short, Dumi Ndlovu
Conservation Corporation Africa (CC Africa) is an internationally acclaimed corporation concentrating on eco-tourism. CC Africa was established 20 years ago and is totally committed to African hospitality - as a result it has developed into one of the finest lodge and safari circuits on the continent with 38 lodges in six different African countries. The authors of this exciting cook book, which does not fit into the usual concept of a cook book but successfully aspires to fulfil a delightful new concept, are: Yvonne Short, who, as the” food fundi” off CC Africa, has developed a unique fusion of world cuisines and is responsible for the mentoring of rural students into world-class chefs and Dumi Ndlovu, who worked his way up from waiter to head chef at at the Ngala Private Game Reserve.
Not only the lodges in South Africa (e.g. Phinda Private Game Reserve or Madikwe Safari Lodge) but also those located in Namibia (e.g. Sossusvlei Mountain Lodge), Botswana (e.g. Nxabega Okavango Safari Camp), Tanzania (e.g. Ngorongoro Crater Lodge) as well as Zanzibar (e.g. Mnemba Island Lodge) present a wide variety of culinary cultures with emphasis on local products – from breakfast to dessert - including high tea, picnics, snacks and sundowners. The layout is definitely conducive to laid back reading and the quality of the photography reminds the reader more of a photo-documentary than a cookbook. The recipes are not only beguiling but enable the hobby cook to evoke African memories at home.
The 4x4 Safari Cookbook by Rita van Dyk
Rita van Dyk is also the author of “The 4x4 Cook Book” — so she is an expert, given the fact that she has catered and cooked for a number of 4x4 expeditions and television advertisements in remote areas of South Africa. The book starts out with an interesting chapter , especially for the not as experienced 4x4 freak, which deals with planning and preparation (packing food & equipment, cooking & baking, reminder list) and then heads into everything from breakfast to vegetarian recipes - all in all 180 new and easily prepared dishes which have been adapted to suit outdoor cooking over an open fire. Mouth-watering photography!
A short summary of South African Cuisine
“Never can our modern epicures have such a dainty at their tables. I thought it delicious”, the 18th century explorer Francois le Vaillant remarked after trying barbequed foot of hippopotamus and elephant trunk.
South African cooking represents the most unusual combinations of ethnic cuisines: African, Portuguese, English, Dutch, French-Hugenot, German, Greek, Afrikaner, Indian-Hindu as well as Muslim, Malay, Italian, Jewish and Chinese.
Pioneer cooking – much like that of provincial France and Italy – was unhurried and full of rich tastes. Roasts of mutton and venison were steeped in the smoke of wood-burning stoves, the homemade bread had thick crusts from hours of baking in slow-cooling clay ovens. No part of an animal was wasted; pork intestines were used for the different homemade style pork or venison sausages spiked with coriander and lemon zest (boerewors) and sheeps’ heads and trotters were stewed. The art of potjiekos - the ultimate one-pot fare as well as the open grid braai (barbeque) were developed to perfection.
In times of plenty the pioneer women pickled the remains of the hunt and the season’s fruit and vegetables (atjar), an art introduced by the Malay slaves. From it developed such delicacies as kerriebone (curried green beans), slaphakskeentjes (onions in a creamy sauce of cooked vinegar, egg, mustard and sugar) and smoorsnoek (air dried or smoked snoek-fish braised with potatoes)…And confits and preserves were introduced by the Hugenots in 1688.
But the most typical South African cuisine is Cape-Dutch Malay - abbreviated to Cape cuisine - which includes such fare as bobotie (minced beef baked in a custard of eggs, lemon, raisins and curry, bredies (beef or lamb cooked slowly with tomatoes, onion, garlic, green ginger, cardamon, coriander and fennel seeds), sosaties (kebabs on a skewer grilled over the open fire) and smoorvis (smothered fish - salted and air-dried - with diverse ingredients such as lobster, crab, mussels or hard-boiled penguin eggs), which is flaked into spicy rice along with ginger, chillies, tomatoes, raisins ,potatoes and onions.
British settlers introduced the Merino sheep to the Karoo and lamb with wild lavender is a recipe dating back to 1820 (the leg of lamb is cooked in buttermilk, cream, sherry, lemon and garlic).
The most famous of all South African deserts are koeksisters (a fried dough with a special ginger-vanilla syrup) and melktart (a custard flavoured cake with dried naartje/tangerine peel and dusted with cinnamon).
Native food traditions also live on with wild figs eaten fresh or made into preserves, wild Cape sorrel simmered in soups and stews, pelargonium petals as herbs, various spinach-type plants (marog) turned into pestos, kinkelbossie added to bredies, and pumpkin leaves cooked into a mush and eaten with mealie pap (cornmeal).