Friday, June 8, 2012

Barbeque - actually, "braaivleis"

We did celebrate again.  The day was filled with a lot of excitement - they are working on our street, and first they sprung a gas leak right in front of our house.  Then, while fixing the gas leak, they broke the water pipes. I was laid back today, so I just laughed and let the boys look at all the fancy machines, but on a day that I actually had to get things done it would have been pretty frustrating.  The men were all very polite and apologetic, and the gas and water was back on by 5 pm, so it wasn't a disaster.  Later, when I fetched the mail, I met some neighbors in the street who still did not have gas.  They were all on their way to eat out.  The Mayor of our little city actually lives across the street from us, so I told her that we are making a fire and that I know that there is a burn ban but that we will be really careful.  She gave us the go ahead.




We made the fire with logs and branches that keep falling from the Ceder Elm trees in our yard.


 I marinated the meat and the onions in a mixture of red wine, balsamic vinegar, olive oil, brown sugar, soy sauce and garlic.


We made a table out of the stack of pavers (cobblestones) that is waiting for someone to come and pave with them. (We are just renting, the owners of the house decide every now and then to do something to the property, but it does not always happen as soon as they said it would).  Most of the time I find that an endearing trait, especially as it makes me feel less inadequate for not always keeping up with the schedule!


Now that, dear Americans, is braaivleis.  Do not get me wrong, I like hamburgers and brats as much as the next person, but this is what my mind conjures up if someone says "barbeque". 


An artsy perspective, to show off my pretty bowls, a gift from my sister.


The children sat on a blanket to eat, we just sat on chairs and ate with the plates on our laps.


It was a good celebration, with our family, at our house. Just the way we like it.

6 comments:

  1. I think you may have invented a new meat dish native to Texas and Africa: barbevleis

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  2. Braaivleis sounds and looks fantastic, if I just new how to pronounce it... :-) I wish we had some outdoor space like yours to our rented apartment but bbq on a balcony is not the same ;-) If the weather stays ok though we will head out tmw to the river shore and braaivleis!

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    1. Let me see: brIvlace? The aai is like an I in English, and the eis like "ace" in English. And remember to roll you r like the Italians, but not so much. I hope your weather is wonderful today, bbq on the balcony is not ideal, but it can surely be done!

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  3. love your braai emma, we didn't have one this time. 3 years ago our host on lake kariba bbqd crocodile and snuck it into the other meats for us to sample. hee hee, he didn't know i'd already had it and loved it!

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    1. 3 weeks and not one braai? I did not think that was possible, Lori! But you saw a very different side of it, so I can understand. For us Namibia means traveling and camping and having a braai simply as dinner, (but I have never had Crocodile!) After every post I pull up Google maps to see if we could possibly fit this into our itinerary - we hope/plan to drive up from Cape Town to Tsumeb after Christmas. But you did not really stick to the main roads, did you?

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    2. No, we didn't want to, there is so much more to see taking smaller gravel roads. We wished we were equipped to camp, another time for sure. How we would love to do that drive, when we were in cape town one time we thought 'what if we just kept going?' all the way up to and through Namibia. I hope you can make your plan happen, then I will be following along in your pocket!

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