Getting your house in order during lockdown.

AS Cyclone Eloise, now downgraded to a tropical storm, wreaks havoc in Mozambique and dumps rain on South Africa and Zimbabwe, it feels good to be safe and dry, and have a roof over my head. If the street was knee-deep in water, and the roof tiles on my house were floating down the Mukuvisi, there would greater concerns than dealing with a 30 day lockdown and a 6am to 6 pm curfew, in response to the virulent and rapidly-spreading COVID-19.

Crispy pork belly from Sabai Thai Restaurant.

Being confined to barracks can be considered an opportunity to sort out domestic affairs, previously ignored in the rush to wash and dress and travel to an office, where one hoped to salvage business opportunities in a rapidly-dwindling economy. Do you remember the list of essential to-do items you made during the last lockdown? And never completed? If not, rummage through the desk drawer for your notebook containing important lists, and get started.

Last year, readers were advised to stock up their pantries with dried beans, lentils, barley, rice and kapenta. I filled the top shelf (accessible only by step-ladder) in my pantry with essential lockdown items in 2020, all of which remained undisturbed. I thought it prudent this January to look at expiry dates on tins, and to check the condition of packed dried goods. The baked beans were good until next year, as were the tinned peas and tinned tomatoes; the best before date, however, on tins of pineapple and apricots, had passed shortly before purchase last March. Packets of dried beans appeared slightly shrivelled, but the packs of pearl barley and stone-ground wheat flour were a mass of weevils. Luckily, the packet of white rice was still intact, and the lentils, orange, brown and green, all looked as good as new.

So when shopping for your lockdown larder this year, examine the best before date on every item before putting it in your trolley. Prices on goods may be reduced when the expiry date has been reached, but saving money here and there could be false economy if you plan to stock your shelves for the months to come.

If properly packaged and sealed, white rice will store well for at least two years, although brown rice, the healthier alternative, will go rancid after six months. Dried beans don’t last forever, even if stored in a cool, dry place. I found that six months after purchase, haricot beans and chick peas that were soaked overnight and simmered for hours, remained hard and inedible. Always check the sell by date when looking at dried goods, as they may have rested several months in a warehouse or on a supermarket shelf before you bought them.

As much as I enjoy spending time in the kitchen, trying out new recipes or cooking old favourites, my real interest as a food writer is in eating out, interviewing chefs, and visiting as many restaurants as time will allow. Restaurateurs who have had their operating licences renewed by ZTA are going big on takeouts, advertising their menus on various social media platforms. Because restaurants and all their employees need our support, my sole New Year’s resolution for 2021 is to eat more takeouts.

Hungry fans are eagerly awaiting the re-opening for take away meals of Sabai Thai Restaurant in Stokesay Close, Ballantyne Park. I’ve tried with little success to re-create crispy pork belly stir fry, a favourite dish enjoyed in The Before Time. Until Sabai Thai is able to re-open, this fragrant combination of deep-fried pork belly with soy sauce, fish sauce, oyster sauce, garlic, chillis, sugar and Thai basil, that can only be achieved by Chef Ning and Chef Pimwipa, will remain a distant memory.

We have no idea how long the pandemic will take to run its course, or when a vaccine agains the virus will be made available to Zimbabweans. But in the mean time, in addition to stocking the pantry shelves to help us survive the lockdown, there is much more needing to be done to get our house in order. I’ll be touching on this in the coming weeks, in addition to reporting on takeouts available in my hood.  A Matter of Taste  Charlotte Malakoff

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