Around the World in the Hetzel Kitchen

Guinea is a coastal nation in West Africa.  The official language is French and it is slightly smaller than Oregon.  Read more here ! According to what Google tells me is West Africa, we have already done The Gambia, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Benin, and Burkina Faso.  I have already had a lot of difficulty finding recipes for countries in this region, so I decided to take a different tactic this time.  I got out my trusty International cookbook and found a recipe that said it was from Western Africa.  Do they make it specifically in Guinea?  I don't know.  But I am in the right region. The recipe that caught my eye was Kaklo - Banana and Chile Fritters.  How awesome does that sound?  More of a side dish or appetizer, but I can work with that.  I was originally going to do this in Colorado over Christmas, but things got a LITTLE busy.  Turns out adding seven to nine people to a household of normally two can create some chaos. When ...

History : Former French region of Middle Congo that gained independence in 1960 Government : First democratically elected government took office in 1992 Location : Central Africa bordering the South Atlantic Ocean Area : Almost 350,000 sq km; 64th largest in the world          Slightly smaller than Montana Noun : Congolese Official Language : French Religion : 48% "animalist" Population : over 4.2 million; 127th largest in the world Capital : Brazzaville Cities : About 70% of the population lives in Brazzaville, Pointe-Noire, or along the railroad between them Budget surplus : 7.7% of GDP; 8th highest in the world Source: CIA Factbook As we covered a little bit last time, the DRC vs Republic of the Congo cuisine was causing me some issues.  They both refer to themselves as the Congolese, and most sites just refer to it as Congolese cuisine.  In fact, there is only one Wikipedia article for both:  Congolese Cuisine .  Most other ...

Former names : Congo Free State, Belgian Congo, Congo/Leopoldville, Congo/Kinshasa, Zaire Location : Central Africa Area : Over 2.3 million sq km; 11th largest in the world          Slightly less than one-fourth the size of the US Noun : Congolese Official language : French Population : Over 71.7 million; 19th largest in the world Capital : Kinshasa Literacy : 54.1% for women (2001 estimate) Drugs : One of Africa's biggest producers of cannabis Source: CIA Factbook These next two countries are going to cause me some problems, I promise.  I won't get into all of it here, but basically it is hard to distinguish between the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Republic of the Congo from a cultural and cuisine perspective based on the research I was able to do .  Not saying they are the same, or even as similar as I may think.  But the internet was not very helpful when it came to differentiating recipes. There was actually a s...

Location : Southeast Asia, between Bangladesh and Thailand Area : Over 675,000 sq km; 40th largest in the world          Slightly smaller than Texas Population : Almost 54 million; 24th most in the world Capital: Rangoon People living with HIV/AIDS : 240,000; 25th most in the world Name : Military authorities in Burma promote the name Myanmar instead Diplomacy : The US and Burma do not have ambassadors to each other Per capita income : $1400; 203/228 in the world Source:  CIA Factbook When I  e-mail the embassies, I have no idea what will come back.  It is often an "address not found" or "mailbox full," but usually just nothing.  So I was pleasantly surprised when I received this from Burma (I have edited only some of the spacing) : Dear Mr, Danielle, Thank you for interesting our Myanmar food recipes. We have four or five Myanmar restaurants around Washington DC. Here are the list and address – Even though the...