A few months ago I would happily spend a three figure sum in Waitrose every Saturday afternoon, then go back to the nearest Marks and Spencer food-hall on Tuesday evening to forage for treats, as there was “nothing” in the fridge for dinner.
I admit that much of our supermarket bill was wine – decent Fair-trade red for weeknights and a bottle, or several, from the fine wine section for the weekend, but even taking into account our alcohol habit, we spent an obscene amount of money on food.
But organic baby plum tomatoes, cold pressed extra virgin olive oil and fresh Parmesan are now tastes and textures from a different world.
Since coming to southern Africa we have dined almost every night on chips, cheese omelet and “cut” tomatoes. If we are feeling adventurous we will sometimes opt for a Spanish omelet and have even been known to splash out on vegetarian spaghetti, but most nights it is cheese omelet and chips for two.
Our staple meal is washed down with a glass - or two - from whatever box of South African red is available, and followed not by a Gu chocolate pot, but by either a Bounty or bar of Dairy Milk. Both are made in Kenya - like many of the products on the fancier supermarket shelves.
We start the day with toast, honey and indifferent coffee and for lunch we usually have…chips.
We are drinking far too many bottles of Coke and Fanta, have re-discovered our taste for salt – how on earth did I ever eat chips without salt – and have realised that life doesn’t come to an end if we don’t have our daily fix of Green and Blacks.
Far from feeling deprived, food has once again become a necessity rather than self-indulgence. A treat now is not a night at Martin Wishart’s eating rhubarb foam, but an in-season, unadorned avocado from a street market.
However, this might all be about to change because on Wednesday we leave for a few days in Zanzibar, the spice island.
I hadn’t realised, or more likely I had forgotten that Zanzibar is also the birthplace of Freddie Mercury. According to our guidebook, Freddie guides the menu at Mercury’s bar and restaurant in Stone Town from his dressing room in heaven.
Mama mia, mama mia, let me go...omelet and chips a la Freddie. Not even Anthony Worrall Thomson could dream that up.
I admit that much of our supermarket bill was wine – decent Fair-trade red for weeknights and a bottle, or several, from the fine wine section for the weekend, but even taking into account our alcohol habit, we spent an obscene amount of money on food.
But organic baby plum tomatoes, cold pressed extra virgin olive oil and fresh Parmesan are now tastes and textures from a different world.
Since coming to southern Africa we have dined almost every night on chips, cheese omelet and “cut” tomatoes. If we are feeling adventurous we will sometimes opt for a Spanish omelet and have even been known to splash out on vegetarian spaghetti, but most nights it is cheese omelet and chips for two.
Our staple meal is washed down with a glass - or two - from whatever box of South African red is available, and followed not by a Gu chocolate pot, but by either a Bounty or bar of Dairy Milk. Both are made in Kenya - like many of the products on the fancier supermarket shelves.
We start the day with toast, honey and indifferent coffee and for lunch we usually have…chips.
We are drinking far too many bottles of Coke and Fanta, have re-discovered our taste for salt – how on earth did I ever eat chips without salt – and have realised that life doesn’t come to an end if we don’t have our daily fix of Green and Blacks.
Far from feeling deprived, food has once again become a necessity rather than self-indulgence. A treat now is not a night at Martin Wishart’s eating rhubarb foam, but an in-season, unadorned avocado from a street market.
However, this might all be about to change because on Wednesday we leave for a few days in Zanzibar, the spice island.
I hadn’t realised, or more likely I had forgotten that Zanzibar is also the birthplace of Freddie Mercury. According to our guidebook, Freddie guides the menu at Mercury’s bar and restaurant in Stone Town from his dressing room in heaven.
Mama mia, mama mia, let me go...omelet and chips a la Freddie. Not even Anthony Worrall Thomson could dream that up.
No comments:
Post a Comment