Tasty Tuesday + Tuesday Tunes: Cameroon’s Banana Pineapple Salad and Musician Henri Dikongue
I am taking a little liberty and borrowing a couple of great “coined” category titles from two of the blogs that I follow. The first is Tuesday Tunes from lifeintheblueridges and the second is Tasty Tuesday from dangerouslydreaming. I’ll trust them to inform me of any unintentional trademark infringement on my part.
TUESDAY TUNES:
Henri Dikongue (pronounced “On-ree Dee-kong-ay”), a musician who began playing guitar at the age of five has been called Cameroon’s unofficial global ambassador. Born in Douala into a family with seven other children, he was the self-professed “sensitive one” of the bunch. This bit of family friction caused his parents to send him to Switzerland to live with his older sister. As a teenager in Europe, he found himself opened up to a multitude of musical influences, especially from France.
Soon he began collaborating with French, Afro-French and French-Caribbean artists to create a fusion sound blending traditional Mokasau, Bikutsi and Assiko African rhythms with modern French and Caribean elements.
The result is a melodic multilingual and international sound featuring lyrics in Lingala, Duala, Zulu, French and Spanish. Dikongue’s music takes you on a beautiful journey and often leaves you feeling like you are floating on infinitely calm waters while surrounded by the most soothing breezes. Both of these videos are from his album C’est la vie.
TASTY TUESDAY:
photo by http://www.justfoodnow.com
Watching the featured dancer bare her lovely midriff in the Ndol’asu video makes me hungry for … salad or at least it should!!! So I thought I’d try this simple Cameroonian Banana and Pineapple Salad found in Auntie Katie’s Cookery Book by K.E. Idowu (out of print).
Ingredients:
* 2 firm ripe bananas, peeled and sliced
* 2 firm ripe tomatoes, sliced
* 1 small pineapple, peeled and sliced
* 1 avocado, peeled, pitted, and sliced
* 1 Tablespoon roasted peanuts, chopped
* 1 can coconut milk
Procedure
1. Boil the coconut milk until it thickens.
2. Set it aside to cool.
3. Pile the bananas, tomatoes, pineapple, and avocado alternately in layers in individual glass dishes.
4. Top with chopped peanuts and the thickened coconut milk.
5. Serve cold.
Serves 4 to 6.
I’ve found that sliced sweet cherry tomatoes are better in this salad for my tastes, but you may feel differently. I have even seen versions of this recipe that leave the tomato out entirely (as pictured above), which I am sure is equally as good. Give it a try and let me know what you think.
