Seven Grains of Paradise tells the fascinating and much neglected
story about many kinds of food in Africa, a continent with a rich
farming tradition, intricate cuisines, and a multitude of food cultures.
Centuries of disparaging judgements and a half-century of media reports
churning out images of famine, disease, and conflict have eclipsed the
facts that Africans have marvellous local foods and culinary delicacies,
and that small family farms still feed most of the continent.
Here is the story of Baxter's personal quest to learn about some
fascinating and new (to her) foods in a handful of countries in
sub-Sahara Africa as she visits African farms, markets, restaurants, and
kitchens. The people who grow, sell, buy, prepare, and serve the foods
help her explore the riddles of a continent better known for hunger than
for its plentiful food resources. The author draws on stories and
research conducted over the more than thirty years she has lived and
worked in Africa.
From the fabled city of Timbuktu on the southern edge of the Sahara
Desert to the rainforests of Central Africa, readers are invited along
on a delightful journey of learning and eating--and some drinking too,
of invigorating indigenous beverages, brews, and palm wine straight from
the trees. The culinary journey takes the reader down garden paths, into
forests that double as farms, through the chaos of markets, and into
modest little roadside eateries.
