I’m a Zimbabwean 🇿🇼 who has stayed half of her life in Malawi 🇲🇼
If I could pick one souvenir food wise it would be this garlic sauce from here in Malawi.
Will make a series of posts on this.
Wooooo! 🇲🇼 Warm heart of Africa!
That hot sauce is indeed delicious. Great blend of heat and flavor!
Thank you 😊.
Peru should be shouting out their unique rocoto pepper cream sauces - Uchucuta is pretty great.
Anything with peanut butter and is spicy is a must taste on my bucket list 😋
Peruvian rocoto sauce is pepper-based, although China has my favorite peanut-buttery spicy sauce called 火锅填料, hot pot dipping sauce, usually made with a sesame seed base and commonly used as a condiment for hotpot：
Its not common or uncommon, I’ve seen it at a few Asian supermarkets in the US, but you can very easily make your own by getting sesame seed paste at most markets or creamy peanut butter and mix it with some 重庆火锅底料, chongqing Hot pot base，which is available at most Asian markets and usually looks like this:
You can throw a your desired amount of that brick(1x1 cm cross-section is a good start) into any dish you’re cooking and mix in as much spicy complex flavor as you like.
That’s my favorite cooking ingredient
Stroopwafels
Hard agree stroopwafels are amazing and all I’ve had is the commercialized mass produced versions.
(I’m in the US). I’ve been told by multiple friends in multiple countries that they appreciate Reese’s Pieces peanut butter candies. The salty-sweet combo is unique and they don’t get them often in their countries.
My other go-tos depending on who I’m visiting would be a locally roasted coffee or an over-the-top flavor bomb craft beer. Like my local brewery has a seasonal on rotation right now, “Sprinkled doughnut double spiced oatmeal stout” with a bright, colorful can. My German friend is offended but intrigued by the beers I bring. Usually he gets playfully wound up insisting they don’t count as real beer.
Don’t worry, Germans are offended by every non-German beers.
I’ve seen Germans turn their noses up at beautiful Belgian beers before immediately drinking a (delicious, but not legally allowed to be sold as beer in Germany) desperados. Granted, I shit all over German Mexican food and also love Taco Bell (and I don’t consider it Mexican food), so I don’t have a leg to stand on here.
Am German, found the exception. There is a beautiful little brewery in Lucerne right at the Lake. Go there and drink one of both beers on tap. Yes its that good. :)
Harsh, but true. Apparently Lone Star is acceptable?
Theres a brewery in Astoria on the Columbia river (Oregon side), they’re called ‘Rogue’. They have made some of the most out there beers i’ve ever had. The Double Chocolate Stout actually tasted like chocolate; the maple-bacon…something… beer, was possibly the worst beer i’ve ever tried 😆. Great venue, so glad we could stop there for a couple beers on a trip a few years back.
The US do beers well, its a shame the major beer companies from there give it a poor reputation. But i suppose thats the same with anything, you gota look more closely to see the stuff of value. I’d not want Aus to be judged on Fosters for instance… 😂
Unfortunately, not any more: Rogue filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy on November 25, 2025, and has choosen to close and sell off everything instead of trying to reorganize or recover.
I’d not want Aus to be judged on Fosters for instance…
Hate to break it to you, but in the US, Fosters is absolutely marketed as the Australian beer 😂. I think the Foster’s in our stores is brewed in Milwaukee, Wisconsin under license though.
I’ve never seen stuff like Toohey’s or VB here. Next time I go to Aus, maybe I’ll do a cheep beer swap and bring cans of Keystone Light, Natty Light, Miller High Life, some of our other “sex-in-a-canoe” beers, as in “fucking close to water”.
Hahaha! I wouldn’t be surprised if old mate Paul Hogan (croc dundee) is still in the ads! I can’t remember if theres a brewery still doing Fosters in Aus, I’m pretty sure the British just brew it somewhere on their patch as well.
Haven’t thought about Tooheys in years, seems to have gone out of fashion over in WA (Western Aus), the Queenslanders are probably still chuggin it though.
If you do a cheap beer swap VB is def one for the swap, other potential water substitutes might be XXXX, and Great Northern. Interesting thing about those beers is they’re way more popular in certain parts of the country and almost unknown in others.
I had to Google the Reese candies, they look like Smarties! I’m sure the peanut butter in them makes a unique taste.
That beer sounds super rich. Most visitors to Malawi are intrigued by the local “Kuche Kuche”.
I would definitely love some roasted coffee. I haven’t had coffee in almost 4 years. I usually drink herbal teas from the farm.
Maple syrup. It works on everything. Cookies ? Maple, ice cream? Maple, ham? Maple, eggs, maple, potatoes! MAPLE ! Bacon, baked beans, toast, coffee, green salad. Whiskey, Maple.
Maple sugar candy is my go-to when sending a care package to far-away friends and relatives.
If I’m in the US state I grew up in, it would be Take A Boost or some fudge from the Jersey shore.
if I’m in my current US state, it would probably be Cholula.
Your hot sauce looks hotter than mine!
Fudge! The best thing! I was thinking that or salt water taffy.
I thought about mentioning salt water taffy since it’s a very New Jersey thing. But the last time I was there I had fudge from this little candy shop that’s been around for decades and it was sooooo delicious!
Damn. Now I’m curious what garlic sauce, it sounds delicious!
French leaving in Germany. To French visitors, we give German wine (from the Rhine region). The French are always blown away that there can be good wine on this side of the border. They also like some of the Joghurt from here. They taste like before… They are usually unimpressed by the German beer.
The pics of the Rhine area are beautiful. I’m sure the white wine must be exquisite.
Their Riesling is top notch. It was originally developed there and they’ve been growing it since the Middle Ages. Very lively grape (also a favorite for sparkling wine production). Basically the quintessential German variety, though it is also grown in other countries nowadays.
Kangaroo ballsack coin purse.
Had to look that up. Not sure how my former workmates in the vet sector would feel about this kkk. They are cute I must say.
Texas- probably brisket or tex-mex.
Also:
Had to look that up lol
Dehydrated reindeer meat is the first one that comes to mind. Salty liquorice would work too but they almost definitely wouldn’t like it so what’s the point in gifting it.
The Google pics remind me of biltong.
I think I once had liquorice as a child. I would love to have it again.
If its Dutch people, we’re the only ones that share the taste for liquorice.
I miss the fresh cheese curls in Wisconsin, US.
I always try to bring spotted cow to my Co workers in other states.
Guinness is the most famous I suppose but the thing most Irish emigrants want brought to them when you visit is tea or crisps. People get (fun) heated about which variety is best.
Tea it’s either Lyons or Barry’s. I’m Barry’s gang.
Crisps (aka chips) it’s Tayto or King.
King cheese and onion is best for a crisp sandwich IMO. Tayto with a pint.
The one that surprised me the times I’ve been over was your tinned beans.
I misspent my youth as an unenlightened eater of canned “Boston baked beans” (which are always way too sweet with corn syrup and weirdly thin sauce, but actually really lovely if made properly at home from scratch). I was certainly beans-n-toast-curious before those trips, but now I’m full-Irish bean-pilled!
I’ve tried all the English brands we have here, and some of those are nice, but almost any Irish tin will beat any of those. We can reliably get batchelor’s here in the States, so I’m fully graduated now to cracking open that greenish blue tin, heating on the stove til “stodgy”, just a shot of Worcestershire to kick up the umami, and on to hot BUTTERED toast, oh man. If I’m feeling fancy I’ll even grate some Dubliner reserve or something and crack some white peppercorns over the top. Perfect with a cuppa on these snowy and frigid New England days. Chef’s kiss 🤌
Please do let me in on any other Irish bean recs if you have em. My “actually Irish” peeps eventually got sick of my ranting about something as mundane as tinned beans but I felt like Anthony Bourdain discovering some long lost dish from an ancient cuisine for a minute. I do love a great deal more about your country than just the bean tins lol, but it’s nice to have that accessible at home to “feel Irish” for a minute haha.
Hahahaha. That is true love. Bachelors is definitely the peak here and I fully agree they are really great.
Somehow I ended up having a discussion on here about beans with some English folks and they swore blind that Branston were amazing and far better than HP so I must try them also but it is hard to beat Bachelors.
They used to have a constant ad campaign running here in the 80s with their mascots “Beanie and Barney”
Branston is my white whale at the moment, hard to get here, but yeah I wonder if it lives up to the hype because I’ve heard that too. I do enjoy the pickle from time to time
One of these:
In some way one can claim that this is a Latvian cocaine. They get hooked as soon as they taste it.
Apparently this particular rip-off is only available in Egypt!
alt-text
___A crisp packet of ‘Windows’ cheese crisps. Most of the writing is in Arabic. The logo is clearly modeled after the windows logo, only with two extra panes below the original four.
