Hi Bridge and welcome.  It is good that you finally got here.

You will find a lot of good information here about Australia, camping and camp cooking.

I think all the folk here would be interested in your Potjie cooking.


Derek

Thanks for the warm welcome.

Camping is very popular in Africa, atleast in my country. People camp for various reasons. It could be because of a long distance journey on foot (very common in Africa), hunting (I started camping with my grandpa at 12), study trips, tours and sad to say war sometimes is another reason. These must sound very different from your kind of camping in Australia.

In my country most people won't actually cook during camping. They would simply heat up something (yams, cocoyams, plantains, cassava, etc) that had been cooked and packaged in a special way at home and then eat with roast meat, fish, etc caught in the neighbourhood. Cookouts are very popular especially when we camp during hunting expeditions.

Very different, isn't it?

In Africa now we no longer refer to specific countries within the continent. The AU (African Union) is leading Africa towards a new USA - one nation - one people.

If it's just my country you want to know something about, well it's Cameroon. It's quite a small country in terms of population (16million) but you might have heard of it especially if you are a football fan.

The name Cameroon originated from the portuguese phrase "rio de cameroes"  meaning "river of prawns."
Come to think of it, we are talking about camping here, that's where the portuguese explorers first camped. Running out of food they started looking around and found this river rich in prawns and other fish. It became their permanent camp. The name changed to "kamerun" under the germans and then to "Cameroon / Cameroun" under the British and the French.

The world fact book will tell you more but to sum it all Cameroon is usually referred to as "Africa in miniature." It's the only country in Africa where you can have a full taste of what Africa from the North to the South and East to West is, in aspects like weather, scenery, food, etc.
I hope this bit gives you an idea.

I am sure I can come up with something with time.

Here is a good link to the realities out there for other curious friends here.

http://www.saharanadventure.com/map.html

Reading about the people in Cameroon, it says they love football and beer, most Aussies would fit right in or vice versa.
BTW welcome.

pd

G'day Bridge and Welcome. Can't wait to try some African tucker. Might have to find a suitable substitute for Kudu though

Regards Skip

Vicky wrote on May 13^th, 2008 at 3:01pm:


Vicky, glad to know your grand child is taking African studies. It's one of those things we criticized when we were in college. We read very little about our own continent. History was all about Europe, Asia and the US. Geography was about Sweden, Norway, Japan, Australia, etc. If I were to go back to school I would study just stuff about Africa. Pass on this link to him. It has a more elaborate list of links called Africa on the web. http://bridgeafrik.com/mambo/index.php?option=com_weblinks&Itemid=23

Dodger, Derek is right. My favourite beer is the Irish brand Guinness. I got addicted to it as young as 18 in spite of the numerous local brands in Cameroon. We have brands like: 33 export (the oldest beer brand in Cameroon), Millenium, Beaufort, Castel, Kadji, etc. In Cameroon a meal served is considered incomplete if there is no beer. We have an old joke: 'the best remedy for hangover is a beer.' How strong is Australian beer?

Skiproosel, I promise an African recipe before weekend.

Little_Kopit, the thing is, after living in Asia for this long I have grown so used to overpopulation that I look at the population of my country to be so small. Cameroon could just be one city in China. In Africa we refer to Nigeria as 'the China of Africa' because of their population 112million atleast, and their business attitude of pouring goods into neighbouring countries. I hope there is no Nigerian here to shoot me. They are our neighbours to the west.
I think Australia must have a lot of uninhabited land. Is it allowed to buy land in Australia? It's one of those things Africans are thinking about putting and end to now. Foreigners have bought too much land in Africa.

Cheers to everyone!

Derek wrote on May 14^th, 2008 at 12:49am:


5years, it's as hard to leave as to stay here.

Hey that looks the goods Skip,
Have you tried the marinade I sugested in the Jerky post? I think that would work well,
you could also put a little smoke generator in the bottom (pan of alcohol with a tray of wood chips over it)

Mick.

Mick, I haven't made any for a while but will buy a full Rump or Topside when they come on special and will definatelty  try your recipe, the smoke would be an excellent idea to try. When making Biltong the meat slices are buried in salt for a few hours to remove excess moisture. I will post a few snaps here when I make some (soon).

Bridge the box is light I reckon about 7KG's tops!

Regards Skip