Cooking and Beach Visiting

This weekend was a full one after a week of Swahili class as is now normal. On Saturday we went over to one of our Swahili teachers' houses and learned how to cook a lot of different Tanzanian dishes which was a lot of fun. I had fun also taking videos and photos of all the steps for the dishes - we took careful note of the recipes so watch out for some Tanzanian food come December.



The main dishes we helped with was pilau, a spiced rice made with potatoes and meat and chapati, a thin floury pancake/tortilla-like bread that you pan-fry with a little oil. We also cut vegetables for kuchumbari, a cabbage salad with onions, tomatoes and carrots I love and peeled bananas (more like the starchy plantains used in Latin American food) for a banana and meat stew of sorts. We also had beans which we mixed with coconut (which I grated by hand) and boiled cassavas, sort of like a sweet potato. All in all, a quite good meal and fun to see the way to cook the different dishes. We all have to do a research or creative project while we are here and I think I am going to do a short documentary about the markets and cooking.


Cooking chapati

Pilau on the outdoor charcoal stove

Our spread of food when we were all finished.


Us with two of our teachers after eating way too much.


Sunday the 25th of August we were gone all day at South Beach. We took a ferry there instead of the long drive around a long inlet cutting off the south part of the city which was fun of course - and only 100 Tsh for the 8 minute ride. The beach was also fun and I swam a lot in the Indian Ocean - be jealous. Quite salty but fun.

Boarding the ferry.

Had some goats and cows walk along the beach too - one of the many thing I love about Tanzania!

I am going to try and post again maybe Thursday about the primary school I have taught twice at, and then I leave for almost 2 weeks on break. I will be heading with two other members of our group to Mwanza on Lake Victoria, then the small town of Ngara and then down to Kigoma, on Lake Tanganika. So I will be off line until then - maybe for longer depending on how internet when we get back.