13 Traditional South African foods you must try in South Africa (2024)

Experience

This traditional snack of salted, spiced and air-dried beef is something of a national treasure, sold across the country from the smallest corner store to trendy country farm stalls.

Experience

This traditional Cape Malay dish is a must-try in Cape Town. Minced beef is cooked in curry powder, herbs and spices; then baked with an egg custard topping. Savoury yet sweet, it’s usually served with turmeric-infused rice and piquant sambals.

Experience

Literally a ‘farmer’s sausage’, boerewors is a must-have at any traditional South African braai, or barbecue. The best butchers use their own blend of spices, but the classic combination is flavoured with coriander and pepper.

Experience

These salted air-dried fish are synonymous with the West Coast, used as either flavouring or a simple snack. Intensely pungent, eye-wateringly salty and –dried with the head and tail intact – intimidating to both the eye and the palate.

Experience

Durban’s classic street food; a half-loaf of white bread hollowed out and filled with sugar beans, butter chicken, moong dal or – the classic – mutton curry. Once the food of the working class, today it’s an iconic dish across countrywide.

Experience

Spicy vegetable dish of red pepper, tomato, onion, carrot and chilli that is usually served over ‘pap’, a stiff and starchy porridge of maize meal. Together they are a popular side dish at a braai/shisa nyama (barbecue).

Experience

These ubiquitous steamed dumplings are found across South Africa, as a street snack and staple side plate to a family meal. In KwaZulu-Natal ujeke are cooked on a stew, while in Basotho-culture the leqebekoane are made with fermented maize or sorghum paste.

Experience

Cape Town’s answer to the Po’Boy, this foot-long white-bread ‘sub’ comes stuffed to bursting with salad, chips, sauce and any combination of calamari, chicken, masala-spiced steak or polony. It’s a carb-laden feast that requires two hands and a healthy appetite.

Experience

Perfect for those with a sweet tooth, these pastry plaits are deep-fried then drenched in a heavy sugar syrup. Usually served with coffee, mid-afternoon.

Experience

Not to be confused with the ‘koeksister’, the ‘koesister’ is a spiced doughnut redolent with cinnamon and cardamom, dusted with dried coconut. Traditional to the Cape Malay community of Cape Town, they’re traditionally served on Sundays.

Experience

A classic teatime treat, this simple tart of creamy custard in a puff pastry base –liberally dusted with cinnamon –is best bought from a country padstal (farm stall) on your great South African road trip

Experience

Feeling brave? Ask your guide to rustle up a ‘smiley’ from the local shisa nyama (barbecue) in the township. A whole sheep’s head is boiled, then grilled whole over the coals. As the skin crisps, the teeth are exposed, hence the name.

Experience

A lamb stew usually served in springtime, when both lamb and the waterblommetjies (‘little water flowers’) are abundant. Waterblommetjies grow abundantly in the ponds and marshes of the Cape winelands, flowering in July and August.