Ground nuts

Yesterday was market day here in Zabzugu, which is always an exciting day. Although there is a small market in town everyday, the actual market day draws people from all the surrounding communities as well as people from Togo. People will spend all day either walking or in tro tros with all their wares to get here. Although there isn't a lot of variety in the things that are sold, there's definitely a better selection. So still the only veggies to buy are tomatoes, onions, okra, garden eggs, and ginger, but usually they look a bit fresher and are typically in better shape. Market day is also the only time to buy plastic things like jugs and buckets or to buy clothes that aren't tailored.

Haha, I should point out that the clothes are considered "dead obroni clothes". Obroni being white people and the only way they'd part with what seems to be perfectly good clothes is if they had died. Sort of morbid, but makes you think about home much clothes we waste in the U.S. So basically it's like a big garage sale of clothes, you either sort through a pile or they sometimes hang them from the sides of their stalls. It's pretty fun to go through the clothes. I haven't found any good finds yet, but some of my friends definitely have.

Yesterday, there were many women selling ground nuts (peanuts) and lately I've been wanting to try and make peanut brittle. Why, you might ask, because it's amazingly tasty and I haven't found the one lady in town that actually makes it, so I figured I'd take matters into my own hands. I've run into a few problems with this though. First, all recipes I've found call for corn syrup, which just isn't going to happen. So we're going for the good old fashion kind, but without a candy thermometer, so I'll let you know how this turns out. Anyways, we bought 2 cedis worth of ground nuts, which turns out to be about 3 lbs...yikes! The second problem is that these 3 lbs of ground nuts are raw. So now I have to sort through all of the nuts for rocks and gross things, and then roast them. haha. This morning I attempted to roast a few cups of ground nuts. And now I would recommend that everyone try this, because fresh roast peanuts are by far better than store bought ones. These things are tasty and I'm sure in the U.S. you don't have to do the "sorting of rocks" step, so it shouldn't take you too long to make them. Try it, it's good. So once they cool I'll move onto the peanut brittle step...should be interesting.

Other news, JB has acquired a follower. We discovered him (or he us) one night when we were watching a movie. During it we heard a voice behind us through the window turns out to be a boy wanting to greet us and bring us yams the next day. I personally do not stand for people peering through our windows, so I told him that to greet us he'd have to come to the door and to get away from our window! The following day he came to our door, not wanting to talk to the wife, he asked for JB. Many awkward events followed with the end result of him, his name is Swali, now coming our door at least once a day, typically a few, to greet JB and to talk. It'll be interesting to see how this all ends up. He's a sweet kid, if a little pushy.