Malawi

And we're back with another post! I've been slacking on these lately, but I'm still on track with cooking. At this point I'm around 65% done with the project, with only 70 more countries to cook! I've also cooked over 50% of the countries in each continent, so that's exciting.

This entry for Malawi is pretty short; the foods I chose are pretty simple to prepare. Their national dish is a type of fish, which makes sense. Lake Malawi is a large freshwater lake; according to Wikipedia it's home to the most species of fish in the world, which is pretty cool. Since I don't eat fish, I decided to make a common condiment eaten with fish or meat, and a desert.

I kind of combined two different dishes for this recipe. Kachumbari is the main inspiration: it's a simple relish made from tomatoes, onions, and peppers. It's incredibly similar to pico de gallo.

One of the main differences is probably the use of lemon juice instead of lime juice. I thought I was putting lemon juice into mine but when I cut open one of my "lemons" turns out it was actually a lime. I got them from a Misfits Market shipment so it's not like I went into the store and grabbed some limes instead. These were just incredibly yellow limes.

I found another recipe for a "tomato and peanut relish" which ended up being the same recipe for kachumbari but with some peanuts thrown in (along with soy sauce, which I didn't use). I made the main kachumbari, cutting all the veggies and then marinating them with the lemon/lime juice and salt and pepper. I then added the peanuts on top just before serving, for a nice crunch. I also added cilantro for a nice fresh flavor. Parsley is also common.

I don't actually remember what I served this relish with. I must have simply made something else that wasn't related to the project at all and simply served this on the side. I probably tried to make something that it would actually go with, but I don't have any pictures so I have no idea what it was.

The star of this meal was instead the dessert. This dish was also super simple to prepare, but was delicious. Zitumbuwa are fritters made from banana.

I used three ripe bananas and mashed them up.

Then, a bit of sugar, a bit of salt, and some cornmeal are added.

Once mixed, the cornmeal soaks up some of the liquid so that it's the consistency of maybe a muffin mix.

Spoonfuls of the mixture are added to a hot pan with a bit of oil for frying.

And the fritters are fried on each side until they're nice and golden brown.

I was a little skeptical of the mixture of cornmeal and banana, but it worked really well. They didn't end up too starchy because of the lack of regular flour. Flour would make these heavier and denser. The cornmeal kept these very light. They weren't grainy at all which is what I was also worried about. The sweetness was perfect; probably unnecessary to add the extra sugar because bananas are sweet enough on their own, but they weren't overly sweet which was nice. I added a big of shredded coconut to the top for serving just to add another dimension since these were so simple. It didn't need the coconut, but it was a nice addition.

Recipes Used: Kachumbari // Tomato & Peanut Relish // Zitumbuwa