The Kitchen

What defines a place? Weather, people, geography, culture and within those all the various aspects of life from religion to vegetation. And Food. Food is one of the most essential definitions of place, and it gives a view into the rest- how it is prepared, taken and what exactly it is. So. Ghanaian food.

The picture is of my first meal here, a gentle rice dish called Jollof. By gentle I mean it was roughly familiar and not too spicy. And of course there was fried chicken and some sauteed cucumbers, tomatoes and beans, which they call "salad" but is very different from my definition of salad. Jollof proves to be one of my favorite meals, and it is basically rice cooked in a tomato, pepper sauce, and there is usually some canned corned beef thrown in for flavor. But I shall zoom out to the main ingredients, because there are so many variations on roughly the same things.

For the starch of the meal there is rice, yam, cocoyam, plantain, potato, and some other types of yam. These are taken with sauces made out of tomatoes, pepper, onion, "spices", fish, canned corned beef or tuna and in one dish a spinach like leaf. Fish is a big part of the diet, in all the soups and sauces or fried on the side, though I have only had it like that in a restaurant. Gosh, how does one tackle food....

Breakfast: usually I have bread and tea. Tea meaning either PG Tips or Ovaltine or Milo. The bread here is amazing- it is very white, very square, and infinitely light. I have never had Wonder Bread, but I think this is basically the same. We buy it unsliced, every other day from the store down the street, and I got to see one of the bakeries so I know that it is local bread (though obviously not local wheat). It is slightly sweet which makes it perfect on its own or with the delicious chocolate spread, which gets me through my sugar cravings because...

Ghanaians are not big on sugar. There are not really desserts, except sometimes watermelon, which is surprisingly flavorless compared to what I have tasted before, or pineapple which is really really sweet and juicy.

One thing that all of us YESers have found that is like a doughnut is called a "bowfloat" and it is fried corn dough with a bit of sweetness. Unfortunately they are addictive but give me stomach aches.

But back to the starches- all of them can be fried or boiled, and my favorite is fried plantains with a bit of ginger, especially when they are really really ripe and soft.

The specialties are fufu, banku and kenke. Fufu is impossible to explain, but I will try. So you take the boiled cocoyam, and-or boiled plantain and-or boiled cassava and mash it up. The mashing process is impressive because one woman sits there slowly putting in the chunks of starchy tuber and then mixes it while a man steadily drives a long log into the mortar where her hands are. I thought her fingers would be smashed a million times, but I realized that you learn from early on how to be quick and if the man has a rhythm then it is easy to work together. Slowly the fibers break down until it looks like a lump of bread dough. I have just completely mutilated the process- it is so involved... I will try to post a video... So then the fufu is taken with a "light soup" but as they pronounce, liesoup, which is really just a broth of tomato and pepper and it always has a hunk of fish or meat for everyone. Fufu is a long process... we start it in the mid afternoon, usaully after church on sundays, and end around 4 or 5 and eat it as soon as it is done because first it gets hard when it sits, and second it is so heavy that one does not want to take it any later. Then sometimes we will have some small rice or bread with tea in the evening. I have had fufu a couple of times, but I find it hard to eat. Because it has been broken down by the pounding, there is no need to chew it, and truthfully chewing it is rather unpleasant because it gets all stuck in my teeth, so one just smooches off a bit with the fingers, gets it all soupy and then quickly swallows it... which I find not entirely enjoyable. But I love the light soup, so sometimes I just have that.

Now banku and kenke are made out of fermented corn stuff, and are stickier and less slimy than fufu, and have a flavor, which fufu does not. They are sour, to variying degrees, and if it is too sour I do not like it. We eat them with sauce, again, a tomato, pepper onion spice sauce... and again with fish or meat..... yes.... it does get a bit monotonous, there is little that is not spicy and fishy and starchy. Fresh vegetables are not a big thing.... most meals are taken hot, which is because of the tropical diseases that can get into cold food. So far I like most everything, though I have to be careful with the heavy foods because they are so much heavier than what I am used to. Then they ask me what I eat at in the US and it is so hard to remember.... its all so diverse and just so different....

Dairy is nonexistent.... they bought cornflakes, which I tried, but seriously, putting water with some canned "Ideal milk" was a little bit weird. I said that at home I have cereal with real milk, and my sister was saying that this canned creamy stuff made of palm oil and stuff was milk, and I was trying to tell her..... and of course there is no cheese, and they use margarine....

Water is another thing. We do not drink tap water, no, I have not had a glass of water since Ive been here, it has all be taken from bags or bottles. even the locals drink sashes of water, little bags that you tear the corner off of and suck on.

Food.... let me see.... preparation... Most things have been prepared in bulk and then we heat them up- sauces and soups and stuff... I can not wait till we run out and I get to see the cooking process. The starches of course we make as we need, and i love that our pantry is full of these HUGE yams, and whole bunches of plantains. Of course we do make simple tomato pepper caned tuna sauces when it is late and no one feels like cooking and eat it with rice.... Because my host mom is not around the food situation is different- it is more fend for yourself and then in the evening the girls makes something or my Auntie brings us banku or fufu if we do not have time to make it.

Taking food... first of all we say "taking" more than "eating" which tripped me up the first few times. And this family is informal about eating.... most of the food is finger food, which I love, but also gets me very messy, and most of it is taken together... I had my first experience eating rice out of a bowl with my fingers and three other girls, which was enjoyable, if a bit of a race to try to get enough... one can easily see that eating together has caused everyone to eat faster.

Salad- well they do have salad... usually it is cabbage, carrots, green pepper, canned tuna, onion, and noodles. Or else they don't add noodles and they make sandwhiches out of it... put it between bread and put the bread in this nifty little warming oven.

In general I like the food, but find it a bit repetitive. and i occasionally really miss a good feta, cranberry, walnut, pear, spinach salad.

Switching angles... communication is sometimes frustrating. When I feel like I've told the right person what I want to do it then ends up being mixed up in the wash and coming out some other way, and in the end I feel like I messed up, even though I can't think of how I could have though to do it differently. It hasn't happened too often, but the few times it has I have felt very regretful that I didn't play it differently. I just keep reminding myself that this is only the beginning and I am learning so that eventually I will get it.

School begins next monday, on the 14th... and I have to say I am nervous.
I will be going to a pretty prestigious school and I have heard the academics are much more difficult here.... though I'm not so worried about that as much as just getting along, fitting in, finding my place in another new school. fortunately this is not the first school transition i've had to make.

I hope all is well with everyone, and I would love to hear from any of you, email, facebook, anything.