Monday, March 7, 2016

Rwanda food

 When I went on my first mission trip, when I was 16, one of the (many) things that scared me was the food.  New Englanders are not very spicy people, and I was nervous about what would be served to me in Mexico.  Turns out I only had one seriously bad encounter with a jalapeno pepper, which I mistook for a pickle.  We weren't coerced into eating anything.
I'm glad I didn't let that little fear stop me from going!  The Bible speaks of people "whose god is their bellies" and I suspect skipping a mission trip because of the food might have elevated my stomach or tongue above where it ought to be. 
Anyway, a few words about the food in Rwanda.
In both the first and second picture, the men smiled right after I took the picture.   Local food is mostly transported on someone's head or on bicycles.  It's amazing what they can fit on one. 
 In season at the moment are mangos,(bright yellow), pineapple, passion fruit/ granadilla, and those little tamarillos or "tree tomatoes" (less spotty looking of the fruit in the middle).  Pineapple is my favourite, and Josh likes mango the best. 
                               
 Now this was also a new one for me:  those greens are cassava leaves!  And cassava is the same as manioc.  I didn't realize.  We go for veggies every chance we get because we eat so many sandwiches when we're traveling.  Avocados are also in season, are a wonderful price, and we have a tree right outside our door until tomorrow.  That's a passion fruit open to the right, just for Ryan, our son in law.  He wasn't sure if we trying to pull a fast one on him when we gave him one in Cape Town.  He made me remember the first one I ever had, in Peru.  My students would bring them in their lunch, so I asked one prim little girl what that was, and she shocked me by answering, "It's a snot ball."  Took me awhile to get my nerve up to try one of those!
 Salads, so far, have been without lettuce.  I wonder why. 
 Bananas are a common cooked meal.  I confess I skipped.  Hot bananas is outside my comfort zone, though I like fried ones so I'll have to get up the nerve to try these, in gravy? 
 There's those cassava leaves again.  They didn't have a lot of flavour, and I added a bunch of salt and they were good. 
Buffets here are kept warm with little fires underneath them.  It must be the fire that makes it look blurry.  Surely can't be my photography! 

  "A man shall eat good by the fruit of his mouth: but the soul of the transgressor shall eat violence."
                                                                     Proverbs 13:2

Thank you, Lord, we haven't seen any violence on this trip!  (We're not counting the chicken I accidentally ran over.) 

1 comment:

  1. No counting your chickens before they're dispatched? But this is after.... :-D

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