
South African Cuisine
We want to make sure that you don’t miss out on tasting our traditional South African cuisine when you visit our country! As such we are going to take you on a visual journey through some of our favourite South African local treats. We hope you have a “lekker” (delicious/yummy/fabulous) time nibbling your way through our country.
BRAAI or SHISA NYAMA
Our favourite way of eating on the weekends is to make a fire out of either wood or coal and then to cook up a meat storm on the fire. This is our favourite way of entertaining. We will have a “bring and braai” – this means the host does the salads, garlic bread and potatoes – and the guests all bring a few packets of meat………. the men cook all the meat and we then sit down to a meat feast! You either head to someones home or a more modern way to meet up with friends in the township areas is to meet up at a Shisa Nyama. Either way – all our different people across the country spend the weekend gathering around a fire!
It seems that the Shisa Nyama started its life as a way for Butchery shops in the townships to increase their sales. Buy your meat and then you can cook it outside for a snack! Over the years Shisa Nyama’s have become social gathering areas that combine – the butchery – the shabeeen – music and often a car wash! An example of a Cape Town Shisa Nyama would be Mzoli’s. Check out this article explaining Shisa Nyama
Note that a braai in the Cape can often be a fish or lobster braai. A favourite in the Cape is to cook Snoek (a game fish with lots of bones) on the fire. The snoek is cut open and basted with lots of apricot jam. It is then wrapped in foil and cooked on the fire. A braai is also a great way to cook vegetables. We wrap potatoes, mielies and butternut in foil and put them in the fire.




Note that accessing a braai is hard as it is a home cuisine. A really lovely way to experience it is to book at MIDDELVLEI WINE ESTATE in Stellenbosch for their Boerebraai (farmer BBQ) lunch. That way you will get to experience it from an Afrikaans families way of doing it!
Eat Steak in South Africa – we are very passionate about good meat in our country. This steak was served at lunch at Vadas Smokehouse at Spier in Stellenbosch – they prepare their meat in the smoker – what we would consider a modern way of Braaiing!
SOME MORE TRADITIONAL SOUTH AFRICAN FAVOURITES:




















Note this blog is a work in progress – I still need to track down a few more pics of local dishes – dried snoek, snoek pate, pickled fish…………………………….chicken feet………potjie……..rusks ….amarula… don pedros!
Happy eating! Wishing you lots of fun trying out the local traditional South African cuisine!
For those on a short visit to the Cape – we would recommend you do two days of touring with us. Tour 1 – our foodie walking tour of Cape Town City that we call the Cape Town Eats City Walking Tour and Tour 2 – a Cape’s oldest wine regions tour with Middelvlei for a Boere Braai or Spek & Bone/Overture for lunch to continue your journey learning our local flavours.