Local Cuisine

April 2nd, 2009 by Elias Parisca

So it’s taken me a while to adapt to eating insect stews and monkey brains, but I’ve tried everything they’ve put on my plate thus far. The hardest thing to take down has been the guano. It just takes some getting used to. Ok that was totally a lie, but I’m sure some of you bought it. Food in Ghana does not resemble that of Indiana Jones or Ace Ventura’s adventures.

So some of the typical Ghanaian food is eaten with silverware and some with the hands, it varies. They eat quite a bit of fried rice with different spices and fried chicken. My caretaker Jennifer has been slowly introducing me to the local food. The first week she only served me oatmeal or bread with fried eggs for breakfast and simple salads with bread for dinner. Basically, LOTS of bread. But by now I’ve gotten to try most of the local cuisine.

The most popular local food is called “Fufu”, which is cassava pounded into a kind of masa, but a bit softer. Thumb-sized portions are dipped into “light soup” which is a vegetable stew (sometimes with fish in it) and then swallowed whole. This is, of course, without the aid of silverware, so right hand only! The Fufu itself doesn’t taste like much, but when dipped in the soup it creates a nice combination. The weird part is swallowing the entire bite whole, no chewing allowed, so it takes little getting used to.

My favorite dish so far has been “red-red”, which is white beans and fried plantains, covered in a red oil-based sauce and dried cassava, which has the effect of solidifying the mixture, Soooo good! I’ve also had fried yam dipped in some sort of fish stew, as well as fried plantains dipped in some other sort of mystery soup. So far I’ve enjoyed most things; from what I’ve tried everything has been, at the very least, fairly good.

And lastly, I have to say that with all the warnings my doctor gave me about the food and inevitable bowel problems, so far my stomach has been hanging in there strong (knock on wood). I attribute my well-being to my third-world roots and the bacteria-resistance I’ve built throughout the years by my intelligent employment of the 5-second rule (the scientific law affirming that you can eat something you’ve dropped on the floor as long as you pick it up within 5 seconds of dropping it). I’m sure I’ll get to try more exotic things before the end of my trip, I just hope my stomach holds as well as it has thus far…