My apologies for the lack of blog posts in the past weeks! We have only one week left of training and my time here has been packed full. Since I feel it would be nearly impossible to sum up the last few weeks in a single post, I thought I’d tell you about my possibly favorite topic: Food.
Fruit: The fruit here is unreal – sweeter, fresher and fuller of juice than anything I’ve ever eaten. It is hard to even bite into or cut an orange because there is so much juice! Pineapple and avocado seasons recently started which is splendid, but my favorite so far is the casamanga (has the flavor of a mango mixed with a nectarine but is smaller). Oh, and fresh coconut is also to die for.
Veggies: Used sparingly in cooking and usually cooked to death with oil and salt. However, one can find onions, green beans and carrots galore and pretty much everything grows here so I plan on having my own garden at post so I can enjoy some fresh greens again.
Starches: Cameroonians love their starches. Basically, starch = meal. Which starch is the question… you can have: potatoes, rice, pasta, bread, manioc (boiled, in baton form or in fu-fu/couscous form), couscous de maiz (think polenta), cassava, plantains (fried or boiled), macabo (potato like), patas (sweet potato like), ngames (also potato like) and probably something else I’m forgetting.
Meat: A real meal must have meat. Where I am living for training, fish (both fresh and smoked) is really popular and delicious (the fresh fish at least). Where I will be living the next two years, beef is the meat of choice. In general, pork is hard to find.
Dairy: Dairy most commonly comes in powdered form; EXCEPT for the region I’ll be moving to where one can find fresh yoghurt, some cheese, milk and soft serve ice cream.
Condiments: Palm oil, salt, piment (delicious hot sauce) and Maggi cubes (MSG cubes) are added to literally everything.
Favorite dishes: Peanut sauce, fish with tomato sauce
Street foods: Beignets, roasted nuts, roasted nut balls, baton de manioc, beans, skewered meat, grilled corn
Weirdest foods I’ve eaten: Lizard (komodo dragon size) and cane rat. And yes, they both taste like chicken.
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