Culinary Adventures in Africa

“Wait, I’m moving to Africa, so I guess this means I won’t be able to have things like pizza and cinnamon rolls and chocolate”, I thought as I pondered my dietary options in Mozambique. The stereotypical images of a skinny Peace Corps volunteer, depriving their taste buds by eating beans and rice for two years straight was what came to mind. In actuality, just this weekend I ate pizza and cinnamon rolls and chocolate, oh my!

Already during training, I started to realize that eating here would not be nearly as much of a struggle as I had imagined.  Our Mozambican host family, who was responsible for feeding us three meals a day, had a steady supply of peanut butter and regularly provided chicken, rice, vegetables and fruit, bread and eggs. We learned that Mozambique’s climate allowed for a large assortment of tasty fruits and vegetables, grocery stores existed in bigger cities, and that many volunteers used an electric stove and portable oven for cooking. And, we received “You Can Make it in Mozambique”, a cookbook written by previous volunteers full of awesome Mozambican appropriate recipes. “I can make this food thing work!”, I thought. “See ya later beans and rice!”

…And then we got our placement in Mapinhane where the electricity was supposed to be on for two hours a night, but that never actually happened. So, how was I to live out my dreams of good eating in a village with no electricity and a tiny market? A gas stove, charcoal grill, Dutch oven and a weekly trip to the town of Vilanculos is how! I’ve learned that a gas tank attached to burners works quite well, we’ve found the tricks for starting a fire on charcoal and Dutch oven-ing is actually quite easy as it only involves putting a smaller pot inside of a bigger pot over flames. Electricity is definitely not a prerequisite for good cooking options. You might think a glaring issue would be life without a fridge, but you learn that many things last longer on the shelf then the “refrigerate after opening” label would have you believe. Sure, it would be nice to pull a cold drink out once in a while, but that’s a reason to go to Vilanculos! Thanks to South African tourists, this town with power lines is stocked with an array of delicious ingredients in their small grocery stores, and is only an hour chapa ride away. While we can get some basic fruits, veggies and cooking supplies in Mapinhane, Vilanculos is where we find our treasures like cheese. But I would be remiss to not give a shout out to all of the wonderful people who send us care packages as well. The regular influx of spices and candy certainly help in our quest for deliciousness!

So what is it that I make in my powerless kitchen?  On Thursday, I busted out flour, cinnamon, sugar and raisins to Dutch oven some tasty cinnamon rolls. Last night, we made fresh pizza dough, sauce, grated some mozzarella, and cut veggies for homemade pizza. I’ve made pasta salads, homemade mashed potatoes, and brownies. Usually, I make my spicy vegetable coconut curry once a week and a special breakfast on Sunday mornings with cinnamon French toast or banana pancakes. By the way, our daily breakfast consists of powdered milk and cornflakes, something else I thought I would never be able to eat here! The majority of what I cook has to be made from scratch. Of course, part of this is out of necessity as there is little accessibility to things with the word “instant” on the package. But, one of the many benefits to the slower pace of life here is that I have time to experiment with cooking and realize I actually enjoy making things that don’t come out of a box.  At home, I would squeeze in cooking somewhere in my 40 hour work week and it often involved using less ingredients than I can count on one hand. I felt like I just had too much going on to test my culinary skills, and restaurants were always such an easy second option for dinner. Here, I generally take off from cooking only one night a week when we ask our epregada (hired household chore helper), Catarina, to cook up the delicious traditional Mozambican dishes I have not yet mastered (I could probably write a whole blog on traditional Mozambican dishes but we’ll save that for another time!). Anyway, I definitely plan to take my new found love for cooking from scratch, and that handy cookbook, back to the States.

Now don’t get more wrong, we are not in the amazing food mecca of the United States of America so there are things I still miss dearly. One of the first things I want to eat when I get back is a good cheeseburger as you just can’t find one here! And a fresh, hot bagel with cream cheese.  And blueberries, oh how I miss blueberries!!! And, we miss going to restaurants. Going out to eat was always a fun, relaxing treat for Chris and I and we did if often. Here, there is little variety of food at restaurants, the service leaves much to be desired (i.e. customer service does not exist here) and let’s be real, a Peace Corps volunteer’s living allowance does not really allow for regular nights out on the town. So when groups of us volunteers get together, it’s not uncommon to engage in what we call “food porn”. Discussions of things like chipotle burritos, Dairy Queen cones dipped in chocolate or filet mignon.  But I still laugh to myself when I think of how bad my food situation could have been.  I mean, I love the occasional beans and rice but man I am glad that it only has to be occasional!