Turkey is very popular in the holiday season. Peri-peri for chicken and prawns, a gift of the Portuguese in Mozambique, has enlivened palates for decades. And one cannot - as much as one might like to - forget the McDonalds, springing up with some success in cities across the country.
Something fishy
The strandlopers aren't the only South Africans who have
enjoyed local fish, although it's harder today than ever before, with the
waters off the Cape and Namibia under siege from vast fleets of foreign
fishing trawlers from countries that have depleted their own stocks from
overfishing. Besides a national passion for prawns, South Africans show a
fondness for an odd fish called the kingklip - baked, deep-fried, grilled or
pan-fried - and for snoek, a game fish that is braaied, usually, or
smoked. Knysna, on the south coast, is world-famous for fabulous
oysters: large and small, wild and cultivated.
Another perfect dawn in
Africa
Rusks - descended from the Dutch rusk,
the French biscotte and the German zwieback - are far superior to any of
these. They are chunks of bread made with yeast or baking powder, baked as
a loaf, separated into rectangular slabs, then shoved back into the oven to
dry out. They come in a variety of flavours - buttermilk, marmalade,
aniseed, even muesli. They last a very long time - useful for trekkers and
farmworkers and, today, an essential with morning coffee before setting out
on a game drive or facing a day at the office.
That coffee - especially if it is ordered at one of the many superb Brazilian coffee shops - is likely to be the best outside Italy, thanks to an influx of Italian immigrants in the mid-20th century. Clearly South Africa hasn't just got the rainbow - it has managed to hold on to the pot of gastronomic gold as well.
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