Saturday, June 16, 2012

photohunt: Cooking


This morning, in my Friday shootout meme, I wrote about a tour in my city and talked about a Hangi.

In New Zealand, our natives, the Maoris have adapted their version of volcano cooking called the Hangi.









I was teaching my ESOL adult students what a Hangi is.
I was pleasantly surprised that In South America, they also cook food in a similar way. In Peru, Felecites tells me they call it Pachamanca, and in Chile, Monica says they call it Curanto. My Samoa students call it Umu.
In my other blog, annkschin.blogspot.com, I wrote about Hangis and my book, Mail order Bride., and short story, Nadine in various posts, but I didn't have a closeup photo. Here I am fortunate that Ngarimu's cousin invited me to take as many photos as I wanted.
Here are pix of the hot pit.

Cooking for a storm, chicken, pork, mutton, potato, kumara, pumpkin, cabbage, wholesome food cooked on site. Food wrapped in paper and alumnium foil placed in a basket and steamed in the ground for hours from hot stones.

The Maoris got this idea of a hangi from the hot thermal volcanic grounds where eggs can be boiled by lowering into thermal pools. In a Hangi, a big pit or more than one square yard is dug in the ground. Timber is burned, and stones are heated. The baskets of food are put into the pit and covered with jute sacks. Dirt is dug on top of the pit. The food takes a few hours to cook. It looks like a smoking volcano.




http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.co.nz/2011/11/list-of-photo-hunting-themes.html


http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com


8 comments:

Susan Demeter said...

That is so cool! I had never heard of volcanic cooking before. Always love to learn new things :)

eileeninmd said...

Very cool, I'm sure the food is yummy too. Thanks for sharing, it reminds me of the Hawaiian luau.

diane b said...

The food tastes delicious cooked this way. Great post.

Ginny Hartzler said...

Have you eaten food cooked like this? And it doesn't smell or taste of the dirt? Is there any benefit to it instead of regular cooking? I have seen where they do this kind of thing in Hawaii, with a pig I think.

Karin said...

It's definitely interesting and fascinating when cooking for a crowd. Just wondering if a taste comparison with the same foods cooked another way has been done and what are the results. Seems to me this method would get the men more involved!

Ensurai said...

What a great idea!! Using nature and what it can offer to cook...love the photos which give a good guide.thanks.

In Sarawak the Ibans cook on river bank rocks too...but not as elaborate.

wenn said...

oh..interesting fact..

MaR said...

Yes, I know curanto!! great take on the theme.

cooking ~ripples