A Fun Guy to be with.
I have always enjoyed food, from the moment I bounced into the world weighing in at a healthy ten and a half pounds, I was born to eat.
I was very lucky when younger I could plough my way through a minimum of five meals a day plus drinks and never put on an ounce, always rock steady at seventy five kilo’s.
As the years began to gang up on me so did the ounces, then they bought in their mates the pounds and now I just count in Kilo’s as there are less of them to the same end.
I topped out at one hundred and four when my thyroid decided it had, had enough of trying to keep me in check and ceased to function completely. I have battled my way down to eighty three and am aiming for seventy five again by the summer.
But the problem is the food. When thinking of the culinary epicentre of the universe, Ngwewere doesn’t exactly spring readily to the forefront of one’s mind. But since living here I have experimented with all manner of different types of food from parts of trees, insects, herbs, spices, parts of animals that you would not normally believe edible let alone tasty.
I am an honest foodie, If its good I love it and will have it again and again, if its crap, I will tell you and won’t eat it again. What gets me is the stuff that people tell you is great but, somehow I just don’t get it. Three foods spring readily to mind. Oysters, no I just don’t see what is so great about eating a live fishy thing that tastes like salt water with a lump the consistency of an egg yolk in the middle. And you are not supposed to chew it. Why not? In case you just might taste something bad? And who made up these non chewing rules anyway, they certainly don’t add to the taste of the product.
Caviar. No never really got that either, though to be fair it was a very long time last time I tried it, but I did enjoy the Ritz cracker it was on. Which in itself is probably against some other fine rule of eating odd things.
Away from things from the sea to a fruit. Papaya or Pawpaw. I lived in Ghana for a year and was served this tasteless pith every morning for breakfast, along with some fruit that was worth opening ones mouth for, Mango and pineapple. It was always the Papaya that was left, nobody liked it. It was not that it was particularly offensive it was just a nothing fruit. No vibrant flavour, no texture, well I suppose mush is a texture. It’s like sucking on sweet soggy toilet paper. (I’m guessing, right) So what is the point when there are so many other wonderful things to eat. And I have come across a handful in the last few months.
When the first scents of rain first filter through the forest, Life stirs everywhere. This explosion of new life is seldom more spectacular than when the white domes burst forth from the forest floor in the woods around Chengello. It is even told locally that you can actually hear them growing they push through the ground early in the morning when the mist is still has yet to be raised by the sun.
It’s called the Chengello Wild Wood Mushroom. Not extraordinary in its colour or shape, but they are the biggest I have ever seen in my life.
As a child you see, and conjure up images of Piskies sitting on large mushrooms. Well let me tell you the pixies of Chengello hold rock concerts under theirs.
These fungi can grow to half a metre in diameter which you might think would make them woody and tasteless. Oh, but they are not, get them fresh, carve them like a steak and cook them for just a few minutes in a splash of butter or oil with the minimal of seasoning and you will be rewarded with an aroma and taste that are superb. This will also make you never want to look at another oyster again.
When the Chengello Wild wood Mushrooms start to peter out around January there is a new phenomena in the Zambian mycological circus.
If only to be outdone by the Chengello on size, no other mushroom could outshine the Chililabombwe Chanterell for outright audacity in the field dressing brightly.
Normally mother nature gives us very clear signs. If it’s got a stripy yellow and black bum it’s going to sting you. If it’s got no legs it’s going to bite you.(well it can hardly kick you to death can it) If it’s big and hairy it will most probably eat you and if it is vividly coloured and looks like a mushroom it’s going to poison you.
But not in this case.
Quite why these delicate mushrooms that grow all over Zambia’s ever diminishing wooded areas, are such a fantastic Colour, I will never know, but what they overdo in colour, they more than make up for with the subtlety of their flavour.
The only slightly disappointing side of this shroom is that it is always full of grit. As the rains splash down all around them, the grit is washed up into the inside of the chanterell, and is not easy to get out again. Only by vigorous rinsing does it reluctantly relinquish its gritty stash. You have to be so careful of not damaging the mushroom because it really is a work of the finest art..
The last and to my mind the most fantastic of these Zambian trio of Fungal excellence is probably the most uninspiring to look at. But the Flavour is to die for.
I can see how pigs used to find them so easy to find. I left about a dozen of these Kalahari Truffles in the lounge one night and by the morning the whole house was stinking and there was not a canary left standing for miles.
These come from a small area in the East of the country and it seems that this is the only place they grow really well, I was offered about a ton and a half a year when I was once looking at exporting them to the UK but I thought that might just flood the market a bit.
Whilst their pungent aroma may put a lot of people off, I absolutely love them and have had them on their own, in butter, olive oil, delicate stews steamed, in brandy, on salads on toast just about every way. But it seems I am the only one in our family who likes them. Well me and the pigs that is. (Ok I walked into that one)
Roll on the truffle season.
Denzil Bark.
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