The Africa Cookbook

By Jessica B. Harris

Book Overview

InThe Africa Cookbook,culinary historian and cookbook author Jessica B. Harris takes you on a tour of the Motherland, exploring the extraordinary diversity of the cuisines of the continent.The Africa Cookbookfeatures more than 200 traditional and contemporary recipes collected from home kitchens across Africa, including the familiar couscous of Morocco, the savory stews of the eastern grasslands, and the curries and chutneys of the Swahili coasts. From the sophisticated cuisine of Senegal to the creolized food of Mauritius and the Seychelles to the Afrikaner barbecues of South Africa, Harris presents the food of the continent and paints unforgettable portraits of the people who shared their culinary heritage with her. Illustrated with archival postcards from the author's collection,The Africa Cookbookcelebrates countries whose contributions to the way we eat today have been too long ignored. Now home cooks can sample Potatoes with Mint Leaves and Garlic from Algeria or Senegal's classic Theibou Dienn. Spicy fried oysters with peanut sauce from Togo wakes up the palate, while Mango Cream from Cameroon cools the fire. Carrot Sambal from South Africa makes a piquant side dish, while Kedjenou (chicken stewed with tomato, onions, chile, garlic, and ginger) from C3244;te d'Ivoire makes an intriguing main course.A special section of menus using recipes from the book complete with suggestions for appropriate decor and music, makes it easy to plan a variety of African feasts. Harris also includes a glossary of ingredients and utensils, a selection of mail-order sources, and a list of more good reading on African foods.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684802759
• ISBN13: 9780684802756
• Release Date: December 1998
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 2.21 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 7.7" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

A good book, but it shouldn't be your only African cookbook

It is hard to complain about a book that is so well written and attractively put together. Ms. Harris has done a very good job, and this is a welcome addition to the small (but growing) collection of African cookbooks. Many African dishes (e.g., Poulet Yassa or Groundnut Stew) deserve to be as well known as classic dishes from Europe, Asia, or the Americas, and Ms. Harris is doing something to make make these dishes better known. She has also collected a great many lesser known recipes, so there's something here for everyone. To the extent that she provides some information about African food, it tends to be anecdotal, though nothing is incorrect as far as I can tell. It may be a bit too much to expect one book to describe the gastronomy of an entire continent. (Could we imagine a book called "The Europe Cookbook: Tastes of a Continent"?) and therein is the problem. This book's title says "continent" and it contains recipes from Western Africa, Eastern Africa, Southern Africa and some from Northern Africa. My real complaint is the complete absence of recipes from Central Africa -- the Congo River basin area. This willful ignorance (in the sense of "to ignore") of Central Africa seems to be common among "fair-weather Africanists"; it also occurs in "Wonders of the African World" by Henry Louis Gates. It is distressing to see that even as we enter the 21st millenium there is still a "dark place", an unknown place on the map of Africa, much as Conrad described in "Heart of Darkness" over a century ago. True, there has been a civil war going on in Congo, and before that Zaire was not an easy place to travel. But there are many Congolese who live in Europe and America who could have provided insight into to the gastronomic traditions of Central Africa. Ms. Harris seems to have picked only the low hanging fruit. Of course it is much easier and pleasant to travel and dine in Senegal and Ivory Coast, or Kenya and Zanzibar rather than Congo and the Central African Republic, but if you want to say your book covers the continent, you can't ignore the very heart of Africa. Ms. Harris has written a good book, despite the fact that it ignores the very heart of Africa. If you're interested in cooking you should have some African recipe collections; this is a good one. Other good African cookooks that contain not only recipes but also very good writing that puts the recipes into a cultural context (but also mostly ignore Central Africa) are: Ellen Gibson Wilson - "A West African Cookbook: An introduction to food from Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone."Laurens van der Post - "Foods Of The World: African Cooking" (from Time-Life) and "First catch your Eland: a taste of Africa"

A fascinating--and appetizing--synthesis of food and culture

Jessica Harris is a national treasure. This is so much more than a cookbook, though it is certainly an excellent representative of that genre. In Harris's works, you get a palpable sense of the foods of Africa, but also the spirits and culture with which each recipe and dish is interwoven. I'm an unabashed fan. If only I could cook.

wonderful recipies, enchanting writing, easy instructions

This book is wonderful for anyone interested or experienced in Africa or cooking, because it gives recipies from all over the continent from soup to nuts, ie. main courses, salads, desserts, the range of food items. Easy to follow, delightful to read, many old-time photos involving markets. and food in Africa.