African Cooking (Time-Life Foods of the World)
- Year
- 1970
- Era
- 20th century
- Origin
- Pan-African · Africa
- Language
- English
- Category
- Africa
African Cooking, compiled by the South African writer Laurens van der Post, formed part of Time-Life's ambitious Foods of the World series issued throughout the late 1960s and 1970s. The volume surveys culinary traditions from across the continent, ranging from North African tagines to sub-Saharan stews and South African specialities. Issued with an accompanying spiral-bound recipe booklet, it remains among the earliest English-language overviews to treat African cookery on a pan-continental scale.
Cooking from this book
Bobotie
Signature dishAmong the many dishes surveyed in this pan-African volume, bobotie stands out as an emblem of the Cape Malay kitchen that van der Post knew from his South African boyhood. A gently spiced baked mince with a savoury custard topping and the fragrance of curry, turmeric, dried fruit and bay, it captures the cultural crosscurrents the book sets out to celebrate, linking African, Asian and European cookery within a single fork.
An editorial note on a dish associated with this book, written for The Coquinist. It is not a reproduction of the book's recipe.
