Advertisement
Published: December 13th 2011
Edit Blog Post
pass the goat, please
baguette. french jam. fresh goat...cheese. just call me french. or not. i wouldn't eat this until i met the goats first...that story up next! overall, this Sojourn was gastrologically like no other Senegalese trip of mine.
how much of that is due to the development of Senegal and the development of me...remains cloudy.
...unlike years ago, I finally have a strong enough body now to sit, for hours, in crappy lawn chairs. doing nothing. moving barely an inch, except maybe to bend down and pick up my
Coke. yes, Coke. i did more as the locals do this time 'round, too.
also unlike years, ago, my courage in vocalizing my vegetarianism brought all sorts of surprises, and salads my way.
i now announce myself within moments of meeting folks. i confess my strange, toubab lifestyle...making no lame excuses of belly aches or allergies or religious premises.
this meant, instead of ducking out of meal times or feigning illness...
i began conversations, i could sit on the floor and eat with the families (albeit with my private plate of pâtes). i also for the first time, cooked up some vegetarian storms for friends and family.
and maybe, things were peanut sauce smooth because Senegal has changed, too. as there did seem to be a glint of familiarity in many people's eyes
leftovers to the rescue!
me + my kitchenaid, reunited. as i tried in my most demurest to explain "je ne mange pas les animaux".
2 favorite food stories: 1) make me metric during my last week, i was staying one floor up in my old house from 2004-2005...so the layout was identical, but the furniture, kitchenware and broken locks only all vaguely familiar feeling.
one night, i finally got my act together to cook instead of feasting on pain au something, and being preciously careful with water, decided to actually measure out the proportion of rice to water. still in my northern ways, i clattered open dusty, cockroach poop smelling cabinets, thinking i'd magically find a
measuring cup.
and i
did.
a CUP. not some silly metric something.
as i held it in my hand, scooping out the rice (ziplocked by yours truly against the armies of ants, though it did not deter them in fact. 1 point for the inverts...)...i had a funny, nostalgic moment. laughing before the full realization hit...that this was not just
any measuring cup, this was a KitchenAid measuring cup,
my Kitchenaid measuring cup i had left behind in 2004.
2. big mystery in little chinese ni hao no how
what do these letter really say? and what really is in the chinese sandwiches...? i'll never know... breads
...as ever, the Senegalese strut entrepreneurial smarts. I noticed these little put-put mobile food stalls on wheels, advertising something called
„chinese bread“. What...
on earth...was that...i asked my middle class senegalese friends.
welllll, because there has been an influx of chinese people to senegal, local vendors have sprung up around the busy downtown streets advertising this special chinese bread....which, from what i could gather....had little to do with international cuisine and moreso with stuffing some white bread lame excuse for baguette with some form of hacked meat.
these mobile metal carts of meat are blue, with white lettering (which coincidentally look just like the little blue heaps of tin the chinese have dedicated to the senegalese notorious driving fleet of Heaps of Tin).
the mobile food maestros also go so far as to be complete with the chinese characters. of course, the degree to which these letters have anything to do with chinese characters may not surpass the degree to which the contents of chinese bread has anything to do with meat.
luckily, as a non-mandarinnerin and as a veghead, i have the excuse not to find out, either.
...and as always, i was
found a peanut, found a peanut
and this time, found the peanut plants! it took great restraint not to fling myself from the car window and rip up an acre or so...mmh...peanut butter jelly time! enjoying old stays and experimenting with new ways...
peanuts peanuts and more peanuts. though this time i went beyond nuts, mousses and sauces...and got up close and personal with the plants. it took full restraint to keep me from flinging myself out of the car window and snatching up an acre of them to bring back...
...and well, the french patisseries kill me every time. vegan? who's vegan? dropping my ideas at least once a week for what are known as
„drops“...fluffy pastries with dimples of chocolate. almost more exciting then a pain au chocolat, where all the fun is concentrated in the middle...
and sorry carnivores, no foto montage of the heaps of fresh seafood and grilled mouton for you. you'll just have to come smell for yourself.
more fotos below...
Advertisement
Tot: 0.133s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 10; qc: 25; dbt: 0.0604s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb