Julie and Lou dropped me off at Bertie’s house so that he could show me how a Potjie (pronounced, poy-key) was cooked. This is a traditional Afrikaner dish. It is cooked in a potjie pot over the braai. The potjie pot is like a small cauldron with feet, and the braai is the South African BBQ.
Bertie informed me that they have potjie cooking competitions. There are certain rules that must be followed. You must build your fire, and make sure that you will have enough hot coals to cook the potjie, because you are not allowed to add to the coals. The next rule is that you are not allowed to stir the potjie once you have added the vegetables etc. You can only stir a potjie while the meat and onions are cooking. Once the meat is browned you then add your vegetables and the spices etc, close the lid and let it cook. No stirring allowed.
The no stirring rule is what makes potjie a potjie. I guess when you are not in a cooking competition, no one will notice if you have to add more coals to keep the heat going.
A potjie is pretty much a stew, but cooked in a cauldron over hot coals, and not stirred. It is usually served with pap (millie meal), which is a coarse maize (corn) meal that is (when cooked) kinda the consistency of mashed potato, but pretty much bland and tasteless on it’s own (used in place of rice). Pap is a staple food here in South Africa.
The potjie was in Afrikaans ‘baie lekker’ (pronounced buya lakkah) which means very nice. Directly translated into English it is baie = much, lekker = nice. You would say instead of delicious, baie lekker. Ok enough of the Afrikaans lesson – lol
We have a fun evening, Julie, Lou and Zoe joined us later on (they didn’t watch Bertie cook because they have already cooked their own potjie) and 2 of Bertie’s friends joined us as well. We had an afternoon and evening of chatting, laughing and eating. Learning about other cultures and customs. We discussed in detail a lot of the differences between Australia and South Africa.
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