Around the World Food

We took the following route around the world in order to collect local recipes from 4 of the least travelled continents to bring you some good grub. 

*Note* these pages are still being populated, so bear with us while they are, we just could not wait to share some of these things with you!

India

Peru

Bolivia

Brazil

Argentina

Antarctica

New Zealand

Fiji

Hong Kong

Vietnam

Cambodia

Laos

Thailand

Coming Soon….

An in depth look at ocal food from around the world.  We travelled the world for 18 months to find the best local recipes that truly represent the people, their culture and what people genuinely love to eat.

The book is poised to combine interesting facts with true stories about the food and the people that are eating in their own homes around the world as you read this.  No westernised dishes, just great food that reflects real life.  Just the way it should be.

 

 

Why another recipe book surely there are enough?

There are a lot of recipe books on the market that focus on one aspect of cooking e.g. “The best BBQ”, “Top dinners under a fiver”, “100 Thai dishes” etc.  Yet there are no recipe books that explore the world’s local dishes that people actually eat and like. Every recipe here has come as a result of asking local people one simple question;

“What is the main local dish here that you love to eat?”

Recipe books tend to focus on the (generally a chef’s) personal preference as opposed to what people really like to eat themselves. We want to collate real dishes, eaten by real people from many different countries to give you an eclectic mix of the dishes you must try so you can say that you understand the food that people eat around the world.

Great food means great ingredients:

The key to great food is using the best ingredients. The trouble with recreating dishes from around the world is that the ingredients used are of a massively varied quality. Some ingredients are not available in your home country or have travelled a long distance to get there, thus affecting their shelf life and degree of freshness.

Fruit and vegetables grown in the tropics tend to be grown more organically and with more exposure to natural sunlight, as opposed to in greenhouses locally using un natural light, higher levels of growth agents, pesticides etc, according to the local standards of growing food. More exotic ingredients that cannot be grown locally tend to be picked before they are ripe and ripen in the dark when shipped to your home country. These and more factors contribute to the difference in the overall flavour of a dish when cooked.

As a result the best practice is to enquire when the items you are purchasing has arrived, any sell buy/ use buy dates, where the ingredients originated etc. Depending on the item the sooner ingredients are purchased after they have arrived the better. Items like spices are less affected by shipping than fresh fruit and vegetables and so buying spices that originated in the same country as the dish is likely to produce better results.

If you live in a sunny climate or it is summer in more temperate climate then buying fruit and vegetables when they are fresher, but not yet ripe is the best bet, as you can then let them ripen in the sun. This will produce a better flavour than purchasing items that have ripened on a shelf in a shop or supermarket.

What do you mean by….?

Measurements:

We have opted to measure things in both millilitres and cups.  A cup is ultimately a normal sized tea cup, when filled to the brim it contains 200 ml liquid.

Diced: Cut into cubes less than 1/2cm in thickness
Sliced: cut so the pieces are 1/2cm wide
Finely sliced: Cut between 1 and 2mm wide
Cubed: Cut into squares 1cm by 1cm to form cubes (as even as possible!)

For now here are some foodie pictures to date while we add actual recipes and all things relating to food across the globe from a local’s perspective- not that from a recipe book!

Permanent link to this article: http://alistairwilliams.com/aroundtheworldtravel/local-food/

Asado

Local Dishes in Argentina

 Argentina Background to Argentine Food: Argentina is famous for its steak and red wine.  Yet this is a misnomer as most of the more tender cuts of meat like fillet and sirloin are shipped abroad to sustain the insatiable appetites of the United States and Europe, where it will also attract a higher price.  Nevertheless …

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Urucum close up

Local Dishes in Brazil

Brazil Let´s get to the point. Brazil is massive. Looking at local dishes comes into its own in Brazil, as the culture of the coastal country versus the other side of the country in the jungle of western Brazil make for massive distances and differences in food and the people who live there. A few …

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spices

Local Dishes in India

Indian food Background to Indian Food: There are many misconceptions of Indian food and we try to dispel some of them here. Indian cooking is generally thought to be based around onion and garlic. However the Jain religion does not use either according to their religious beliefs that these ingredients increase sexual desire, and so …

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Noodles with Vegetables and Pork

Local Dishes In Vietnam

Vietnam Background to Vietnamese Food: Vietnamese is known as the healthiest in the world. Obviously this depends on the dishes that are eaten, but the Vietnamese often eat a mainly vegetarian diet, with small amounts of meat and fish. Today Vietnamese food is a blend of Malay, Indian, and French influences. For example it incorporates baguettes …

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Antarctica_sml

Local Dishes in Antarctica

Antarctica Let’s be fair, there are not very many people who live in Antarcica.  Based on the IAATO treaty no permanent residence in allowed on this vast desolate continent unless it is for scientific reasons. It is also pretty tough to eat or for the immigrants to have impacted on native culinary culture, as this …

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Sachlica

Local Dishes in Bolivia

Bolivia The west, Andean side of Bolivia tends to have a similar culinary choice as that of Peru, as the same challenges of cultivating food exist for people who live at these altitudes and as such their needs are similar.  People correctly group the Andean people of Peru, Bolivia and even Chile together and as …

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aji amarillo

Local Dishes in Peru

Peru Ultimately this is best done by avoid thinking of vegetarian (and I mean vegetarian not pescetarian, which is possible by the sea) and loving meat.  Most meals consist of meat of some kind, whether this is flesh from any animal, like guineapig (see picture to the right and see if you fancy it), a …

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P1110152

Local Dishes in Cambodia

Order our recipe book on food from around the world… …where all of these fine recipes have been taken. A feast of delights in our recipe book of dishes from around the world, signed as a thank you. Online price is now only £17.99 (RRP £19.99). Order now or learn more about the book here …

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Cooked Dalo or Taro

Local Dishes in Fiji

The following recipes have been taken from our upcoming book initially titled “Local Food Around the World”.  If you would like to pre-order the book before it is released then please do and we will sign it and send it as soon as it is done: Order our recipe book on food from around the …

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P1120127

Local Dishes in Laos

The following 3 recipes have been taken from our upcoming book initially titled “Local Food Around the World”. If you would like to pre-order the book before it is released then please do and we will sign it and send it as soon as it is done: Order our recipe book on food from around …

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Smoothy from Hong Kong

Local dishes in Hong Kong

As a Chinese based culture Hong Kong has its roots in their cooking. It is perhaps the most daunting, diverse and hard to understand food as a person from the west. Everything seems alien, even a smoothy, which is made with iced coconut milk, aloe vera jelly and mango puree. There are so many dried …

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Lamb Roast

Local Dishes in New Zealand

The following few recipes have been taken from our upcoming book initially titled “Local Food Around the World”. If you would like to pre-order the book before it is released then please do and we will sign it and send it as soon as it is done: Order our recipe book on food from around …

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P1130010

Local Dishes in Thailand

Ka Noom Pan Mu Tod These deep fried meatballs are generally eaten for an ocassion, but our hosts told us they were delicious and that they would eat them more if pork wasn’t so expensive. The only way to describe this dish is as a spicy, Thai version of a bolognese sauce. The deep crimson …

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Meal in Auckland

The KFC Diaries

Surely not a page dedicated to KFC?? Yes. We love food, we especially love local food that is honestly cooked, based on the ingredients of the area and lovingly prepared.  Food is a perfect reflection of anyone’s culture, upbringing and local geography.  As such food is the cornerstone of what people are all about. It …

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