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New ZealandFlavors · Cape Town
Minced meat seasoned with curry and spices, mixed with bread soaked in milk and dried fruit and baked under a milk-and-egg topping. It is a well-known dish of Cape Malay cuisine from Cape Town, served with yellow rice and chutney.
Traditional dish from Cape Town, Cabo Ocidental
Also known as: babotie, bobootie, bobotee
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Bobotie — Cape Town, South Africa
Bobotie is a baked dish of minced meat, usually beef or lamb, seasoned with curry powder, turmeric, cumin, coriander and clove, mixed with sautéed onion, bread soaked in milk, raisins and a little chutney or apricot jam. The mixture is placed in a baking dish, topped with milk beaten with eggs and bay leaves, and baked until the topping sets and browns.
It is a dish of Cape Malay cuisine, developed in Cape Town by the descendants of people enslaved and brought from Indonesia, India, Madagascar and other parts of Asia and Africa by the Dutch East India Company from the 17th century. Many were Muslim, and the name Malay stuck because Malay was the common language of many of them. By the late 18th century the community was already living in Bo-Kaap, the neighborhood of colorful houses on the slope of Signal Hill, where the tradition is maintained.
The origin of the dish and the name is debated. One hypothesis links bobotie to the Indonesian bobotok; another links it to the Malay word boemboe, the name for curry spices. The Dictionary of South African English records the dish in the Cape from at least 1870, in spellings such as babootie and bobotie. The recipe was taken inland by settlers who left the Cape in the 19th century, and today bobotie is made across the country; there are milder versions in Afrikaner households.
The result blends sweet, salty and tangy flavors, with aromatic seasoning and little heat. There are variations with fish, lamb and with vegetables instead of meat.
Cape Town , Cabo Ocidental
A dish of Cape Malay cuisine, created in Cape Town by the community settled in Bo-Kaap.
Minced beef or lamb, onion, garlic, bread soaked in milk, curry powder, turmeric, cumin, coriander, clove, raisins, chutney or apricot jam and bay leaves; on top, milk beaten with eggs.
Hot, cut into portions, with yellow rice (cooked with turmeric or curry, often with raisins), fruit chutney and sometimes sambal, a spicy relish. It is a main course for lunch or dinner.
Year-round, as a family meal and for Sunday lunch.
Your questions
A baked dish of minced meat seasoned with curry and spices, mixed with bread soaked in milk and dried fruit, topped with milk beaten with eggs. It is a well-known dish of Cape Malay cuisine from Cape Town.
There is no certainty. One hypothesis links the name to bobotok, an Indonesian dish; another to the Malay word boemboe, which denotes curry spices. The dish is recorded in the Cape from at least 1870.
With yellow rice, cooked with turmeric or curry, fruit chutney and sometimes sambal. There are versions with fish, lamb and with vegetables.
Generally, no. The seasoning is aromatic, with mild curry, and the flavor mixes sweet, salty and tangy.
Flavors of South Africa
Stew of mutton or lamb with waterblommetjie flowers, an aquatic plant native to the Western Cape, onion, potato and sorrel. It is a winter dish, made in the short season when the flowers are harvested from the province's lakes and marshes.
Cracked white maize (samp) slow-cooked with beans until creamy, seasoned with onion and butter or fat. It is the everyday dish of the Xhosa of the Eastern Cape and was Nelson Mandela's favorite.
A long roll filled with fries, meat, fish, or chicken, salad and sauce, cut into pieces for sharing. It originated in a fried-fish shop in Athlone, in the Cape Flats, and is Cape Town’s sandwich.
Fried dumpling with a soft dough, seasoned with cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, fennel and tangerine peel, dipped in hot syrup and coated in coconut. It is the Sunday breakfast of Cape Malay families in Cape Town.
A hot amber-colored beverage made from the oxidized leaves of a shrub that only grows in the Cederberg mountains and surrounding areas. Clanwilliam, at the foot of the range, is the center of cultivation and processing, and the name rooibos has a protected geographical indication.
Curry served inside a sliced loaf of white bread cut into a quarter or half and hollowed out, with the removed crumb placed on top. Created by Durban’s community of Indian origin, it’s the dish the city uses to introduce itself.
A quarter loaf of sliced white bread hollowed out and layered with fillings: fries, sausages, mortadella, a burger, cheese, achar and sauces. It’s the street food of Johannesburg’s townships, like Soweto, and of the whole Gauteng province.
Homemade fermented drink made from the juice of marula fruits, from January to March. In Limpopo, the season opens with the festival of the first fruits, and Phalaborwa hosts the annual marula festival where the drink made by local cooperatives is served.
Pinotage red wine, a grape variety created in Stellenbosch, South Africa, from crossing Pinot Noir with Cinsaut (which in the Cape was called Hermitage). It has a dark color, aromas of red and dark fruits, and soft tannins.
