Beware the Dakanuts

I should have known really, the grimy label and the 5mm thick layer of oil floating on the surface really should have told me that no-one had touched the Dakanuts for sometime. However, my craving for peanut butter overwhelmed my better judgement and so I tipped the jar on its side allowing the oil to pool away from where I scraped out the merest sliver of nutty paste to spread on my lovely, fluffy, lightly toasted, white French bread.

It tasted ... well, not quite right really, and I ate only half my slice of toast thinking I'd maybe get away with it. I wish that Philippe had stopped me being so wilful and reckless - at the time he was probably thinking to himself "Poor unrefined Australian girl, does she not know that peanut butter is a terribly pedestrian thing to eat?" I spoke to Dr Loes later on who told me that the Dakanut peanut butter is mixed with honey, which would explain the weird taste, but I did suffer for the next 48 hours with some unsettled belly issues. No more Dakanuts for me.

Aside from that experience the food really is pretty good - especially so considering that I am a) living on a minesite, and b) in the middle of west Africa and still miles away from Timbuktu (Tombouctou en français)! So far I have enjoyed eating escargots (the patisserie item - not the garden menace), brioches et croissants pour le petit déjeuner, beef wellington, boeuf bourgignon, African racing chicken (which actually tasted like actual chicken) and couscous salad for le dîner, and filled baguettes for lunch. And last night I had the singularly most spectacular mango I have ever tasted. Bintou brought me a couple from her garden in Fourou village and I am now completely sold on Malian mangoes.

There are lime trees (and monkeys) in the gardens here, and really good, if under-resourced, kitchen facilities in many of the houses - so I think there will be some opportunities to do some cooking for myself onsite at some point down the track. Hurrah!

But the most exciting meal I've been lucky enough to enjoy so far was provided by Wade last Sunday (my day 5 onsite) - and I have to say, my gourmand tendencies were used to the full for that feast!



Wade's sunday roast