The Food

This is one of the fresh vegetable and fruit stalls at the Merkato, the largest open air market in Africa. All of the fruit and vegetables that we had were wonderful. It's amazing what a difference when things are picked and sold ripe. The carrots were especially sweet and we enjoyed bananas, watermelon, mangos, papayas, oranges (the peels were green but the fruit was ripe), beets, cabbage (multiple varieties), potatoes, onions and squash. Since you couldn't drink the water, all of the produce was soaked either in a mild bleach solution or potassium permanganate solution to disinfect them. Then allowed to dry completely before eating.

Eggs are a common form of protein and were generally available in even the small shops along the road. Like most protein, they were kind of expensive at 2½ birr (15¢) each. I thought it was interesting that when we were buying 15 eggs here, the proprietor got out her smart phone to figure out what we owed. She packed them in a plastic bag cushioned with straw.

Coffee is one of the major exports from Ethiopia and there were a lot of coffee vendors. One of the local staff went with us to look for beans to bring back and we ended up visiting a lot of stalls before he found some that he was satisfied with. The beans are sold unwashed and unroasted. He was looking for beans from a certain area with a certain moisture content. He also tasted the unroasted beans looking for a certain flavor. Before coming back, we had a local family wash and  roast our beans since we'd probably screw it up.

When visiting a family for dinner, their daughter did a traditional coffee ceremony for us. All of the cooking for this ceremony is done on a small charcoal burner. Here, she is roasting the coffee beans. After roasting, the beans are pounded to a fine powder before being carefully measured into a special coffee pot. The coffee is brought just to a boil three times then allowed to settle before being served in dainty ceramic cups. All of the coffee I had there was better than anything I've ever had at a coffee place like Starbucks. There was never even the hint of any bitterness.

The coffee ceremony was repeated for us at many of the homes we visited even in the poorest areas of town. It takes time to do the preparation and serving so there is plenty of time to visit. This is a shot of a coffee shop that we stopped at before breakfast. The charcoal burner is on the left of the small cups. The one in front was for incense. The grass was spread to make it feel more inviting and added a nice aroma when you walked on it.

The rolls of flat pancake-like bread are called injera and it is the national dish of Ethiopia. It is made from a grain called teff and had a wonderful sour taste like a good sourdough pancake. At this meal, it was served with meat in a spicy red sauce with the color coming from the spice mixture called berbere. This mixture of spices can vary from cook to cook and family to family is is made of paprika, chili, garlic and maybe 10 to 15 other dried spices. Most of the rest of the items were vegetables such as beets, kale and squash. All very good. I had to really limit myself especially with the injera and sweet vegetables and fruit.

While we were in a much more remote part of the country, the only protein readily available in one restaurant was eggs. This is scrambled eggs with peppers and onions served with injera and rolls. To eat, using only your right hand (even if you are left-handed), you get some bread or injera and scoop up a bite. No utensils. Before and after eating, they bring by soap and water so you can wash your hand (singular). This dish was very good and was lunch for five people.

On the way to the airport, we stopped at a hotel and had a traditional dinner. This basket/table was about 0.5m across and had about eight different items in it. Including chicken, ox, fish, goat, eggs, goat cheese, carrots, potatoes, kale, and more stuff that I didn't recognize or remember. This was dinner for eight though some in the group had started to grow tired of the taste of the food. I like spicy and rarely get a chance to try things like ox and goat at home. I must admit that most of the meat dishes generally tasted very similar.

I was surprised to see spaghetti on the menu. I guess pasta is a popular dish here as it is in other parts of the world. And dried pasta was sold in many of the stalls in the market. I did try the spaghetti with tuna and it is, as it sounds, spaghetti pasta with a spicy red sauce with canned tuna meat on the side. Since I like canned tuna, I would call it good but others in our group didn't care for the concept. If you look at the meal prices, please remember that the exchange rate is 17.3 birr to the dollar so most of these meals were just over a dollar. A real bargain.

Just in case you aren't wowed by the coffee, Coca Cola is readily available in the familiar bottles. The bottles are refilled at a local botteling plant. I can't vouch for whether the flavor is any different than what is locally available but it does seem to be popular. Diet Coke or any other sugar free product is just not available so I usually enjoyed mineral water. None of the beverages are served on ice. There were no restaurant chains though we did have lunch at Kaladi's Coffee though there was no tie to Kaladi's Brothers Coffee.