aka Ishtar News
Solar cooking is one of the perks of living and working as a volunteer in Niger; a country rich in solar hours. Last Saturday, I posted a picture of a casserole destined for the sun. A lot of people wanted to know how the solar cooker worked, reminding me that it was time for a [...]
Copyright Eden Foundation
Meet Alhadji Bukar, an Eden farmer in the Tanout area.
Copyright Eden Foundation
14 years ago, Alhadji Bukar joined the Eden program and started to sow edible trees and bushes in his field. Today, these trees and bushes are well established and produce food, even during years where there is little rain. The Eden trees [...]
Omelets of various kinds are among my absolute favourite solar oven dishes. The other day, I made a super simple brunch version using eggs, tomatoes, basil leaves and spices. Easy, simple and ready in no-time!
For a more complicated version, I suggest this taste, vegetable-filled famine food omelet!
Ishtar’s Vegetarian Solar Cooker Omelet Recipe
1 dl of dried [...]
As many of you know by now, Niger is in the middle of its yearly three month long rainy season. According to the unofficial aid calender, this time of the year (up until the millet harvest in October) is considered the true “hunger season”, and yet Niger’s nature’s pantry is (as always) in full bloom. [...]
Being a person who always want to have things in hand, I love the idea of stepping outside the house in order to harvest ‘food for the day’. With little else going on at this time a year, green leaves are without a doubt the vegetables of the season. The culinary world as an expat [...]
Famine food or luxury food?
Hanza beans & wild Swedish mushrooms, both straight from Nature’s Pantry!
On July 16th, Sean Callahan, a top Catholic Relief Services (CRS) official, appeared before US congress to recommend “urgent response” to the people affected by the global food crisis:
In some regions of Niger, families have started eating only one meal a [...]
Winter (also know as the “contre-saison”) is the vegetable & fruit period of the year, when, if lucky, you get just about anything from cauliflower to avocados and imported plantains.
A stark contrast to rainy season, when all the vegetables and fruits above have gone scarce! I’m fortunate these days if the greengrocer brings me more [...]
Past Tuesday, after coming home from a full day at the field station, my sister suggested we treat ourselves with some good food and a cosy evening in front of the TV. I asked her want she had in mind (foodwise), and she said: “Oh, can’t you make one of those nice pasta dishes that [...]
With the rainy season in bloom, the garden is now full of greens. At first sight, the little plants popping up may look like insignificant weeds (or horse fodder), but on closer inspection, you will find Niger’s nature’s pantry right now in its most generous element. In addition to the hanza beans (whose fruits are [...]
One of the greatest luxury ingredients I know is actually a former Western famine food.
My grandmother Vivi Stranne showcasing handpicked mushrooms straight from nature’s pantry (1988)
Handpicked Swedish mushrooms that have grown wild in the forest are among my favorite culinary treats. Somehow, the combination of taste and texture make them such a generous contributor [...]
Copyright Eden Foundation
I hear aid workers in town talking about the need for emergency food operations in Niger again, and on UN’s Central Emergency Response Fund site, I read the following about Niger’s current state:
Almost 30% of the population is in need of emergency food aid
CERF 2008
And there we go again… It’s a never ending [...]
When I had my Jamaican neighbor over for a ‘famine food’ recipe last week, she thought the Boscia senegalensis was really good, and that it tasted a bit like peas. It was her idea to serve it like a vegetable, so today I had her over for a fabulous-looking new dish, namely the Hanza sallad! [...]
Copyright Eden Foundation
The Eden farmers and their families mix the cooked Maerua crassifolia leaves with crushed peanuts, decorate with an onion and sell it in the village. There is a lot of money to be made this way, because the meal is good!
And so when making one of the two casseroles I was going to [...]
From a world market perspective - where the global spotlight stays focused on a handful of species that still produce the majority of the food despite the fact that there is a total of 78,000 edible species available in the world (an untapped resource for the upcoming ‘world food crisis’) - it would not be [...]
With the Maerua crassifolia (jiga) bushes in my garden full of fresh leaves, I was itching to try a new recipe. A sudden burst of inspiration had me land on making a Maerua crassifolia risotto, with the aim of doing something simple, nutritious and nice - though not overdone. After all, with Maerua crassifolia being [...]
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