Food (part 1)

As requested, I've been trying to get some stuff together about food in the Gambia. I think this is quite a big topic for any country, so I've started by looking at some of the "raw materials" that go into food in the Gambia.

Gambia's number one crop in terms of GDP earnings is the humble peanut. For those of you who, like me, don't know where peanuts come from (other than Sainsburys), the answer is quite often Gambia - it is a major world exporter of the things (see the BBC coutry profile if you don't believe me!). This is what the peanut plant looks like :



It's quite a non-descript thing really... The peanuts are the little bits coming off the roots. Local peanut-related products include peanut butter, peanut oil and a dish called domoda which tastes a bit like a curry but made with peanuts...

A second really popular crop here is maize : most compounds (=conglomerate of households) outside of the towns will have at least a small yard of these tall thin plants. The corn has just come into season in the last few weeks, and every street corner now has a little Gambian lady cooking corn on a miniature brazier. One cob is about 5 dalasi (10pence) and makes a good snack for hungry researchers like me...





The final key raw material for Gambian cuisine is fish : the best dishes I've had here have been very fresh fish... This is a photo taken from my flat of a local fisherman out in his pirogue early one morning.



Next time I'll try and do a bit more on the food retail and the actual dishes that are popular here ...