Welcome to the Traditional Food Around the World section of our repo! 🗺️🍴
If your hometown or country has a traditional food (especially if it's your favorite dish!), we encourage you to share it here. We're excited to learn about food culture from around the world!
Griot (pronounced "gree-oh") is a popular Haitian dish. It is pork marinated in a mixture of herbs and spices and fried in oil, resulting in a crispy and tender meat, and the sauce is rich and flavorful. Griot is often topped with a pickled vegetable sauce called "pikliz"(pronounced "pick-leez") and served along side with fried plantains, rice, and red beans, making it the national dish of Haiti.
Dosa is a delicious and popular South Indian dish. It is a thin, crispy crepe made from fermented rice and lentil batter. Dosa has many variations, like egg dosa, stuffed dosa, onion dosa, etc. This dish is typically served with sambar (a lentil stew) and coconut or peanut chutney.
A samosa is a popular fried or baked pastry with a savory filling, often consisting of spiced potatoes, peas, and sometimes meat. Originating in the Indian subcontinent, this triangular snack is enjoyed worldwide and is a staple in Indian cuisine.
The filling of a samosa typically includes spiced potatoes, peas, and sometimes lentils or ground meat like lamb or chicken, flavored with a blend of spices such as cumin, coriander, and garam masala. Samosas are often enjoyed with dipping sauces such as tamarind chutney, mint-coriander chutney, or yogurt-based raita, which complement the spicy filling with their tangy and refreshing flavors.
Rendang is a dish that originated in West Sumatra, Indonesia. It is a rich meat-based dish that is slow-cooked, braised in coconut milk, and seasoned with herb and spice mixture over a period of several hours. As the liquids evaporate, the meat turns dark brown and tender, caramelizing and infusing it with rich flavours.
Rendang is traditionally served at ceremonial occasions to honour guests during festive events, such as wedding feasts and Lebaran (Indonesian popular words for both Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha).
Adobong manok, or "chicken adobo," is widely regarded to be the national dish of the Philippines. The beauty of chicken adobo is not just the savory flavors of the dish but also how simple and easy it is to prepare.
Every cook might have their own methods for cooking but the recipe typically require only a few basic ingredients that are commonly available in most kitchens: vinegar, soy sauce, black peppercorns, and bay leaves.
The cooking process usually involves marinating the chicken in a mixture of these ingredients in a pot for a short period. After marinating, the chicken is simmered in the marinade until tender. This dish is traditionally served with steamed rice or garlic fried rice.
Image source: Joy D. Ganaden, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons