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Side

Chakalaka

A hot vegetable relish with curry, carrot, peppers and baked beans in tomato sauce. Eaten warm, at room temperature or cold, and served next to the pap rather than on the grid.

Chakalaka came out of the townships and mine hostels around Johannesburg. Mozambican miners cooked what was in tins after their shift — tomatoes, beans — and spiced it up Portuguese style. That became the side dish no braai is without.

Prep
20 min
On the fire
20 min
Serves
6
Effort
easy
Chakalaka in the pot: peppers, carrot and beans in tomato sauce
philipp from cape town · CC BY 2.0

When it goes on

Done beforehand

Made in the kitchen. On the table before you light up.

Equipment: Cast-iron pan

This line

Shisa nyama20th century to todayPortuguese-Mozambicanfrom the 1970s

Braai as a public affair, butchery and fire in one place, fatty cuts, pap and chakalaka as standard.

Method

  1. Soften the onion

    Heat the oil in a large pan or shallow pot and soften the onion over medium heat for a minute or two.

  2. Open the spices in the fat

    Add garlic, ginger, curry powder, paprika, cayenne and thyme and stir for a minute until they smell strong. Added dry, curry powder and paprika taste of flour — this is the step that makes the difference.

  3. Hard vegetables first

    Add peppers and carrot and cook for three to four minutes. Then stir in tomatoes, chilli and cabbage.

  4. Five minutes covered

    Cook covered over medium heat for five minutes, stirring once or twice. The vegetables should keep some bite — chakalaka is a relish, not a vegetable stew.

  5. Beans and paste

    Stir in the tomato paste, then add the beans with their sauce. Simmer gently for another five minutes until everything is hot and the sauce has thickened slightly.

  6. Season

    Salt and pepper firmly, more chilli if you want it. Serve warm, at room temperature or cold — all three are correct.

Tips

  • Chakalaka is better on the second day. Cooking for a crowd? Make it the day before and put it on the table cold.
  • Heat is a family matter. Leave out the cayenne and fresh chilli for children; the curry stays.
  • Leftovers become a filling — cold in a braaibroodjie, or in a split roosterkoek.

Chakalaka is proof that the best side dishes come out of scarcity. It comes from the mine hostels around Johannesburg, where Mozambican workers cooked with whatever kept: tinned tomatoes, tinned beans, some curry powder, plenty of chilli.

Which is exactly why there is no correct recipe. Some families use cabbage, others butternut, others again only carrot and beans. What stays the same in every version is the order: onion, then spices into the fat, then vegetables by cooking time, beans last.

And one detail that often gets lost: chakalaka is not served warm because it has to be warm, but because it has just been made. Cold out of the fridge the next day it is at least as good.

Where it comes from

Where the word comes from
Origin unresolved · Literally „no settled meaning“ Usually described as onomatopoeic; there is no documented derivation.

Chakalaka is one of the few South African sides whose ingredient list comes entirely out of tins and packets — and that is not a fallback but the origin. The dish grew up in the townships and hostels around Johannesburg, among mineworkers cooking after a shift and depending on things that keep: tinned tomatoes, tinned beans, curry powder.

The Mozambican share is named in several accounts: migrant mineworkers brought the heat that local cooking had not had. Attributions like that are hard to document for a dish with no written record — the derivation of the name is just as open, and is usually described as onomatopoeic.

What can be said: chakalaka is recent, it is urban, and it is spread across the whole country without there being a canonical version. Every family makes it a different heat, and carrots are obvious in one version and excluded in the next.

At the fire it has a fixed job: it is the sauce for the pap. And because it is as good cold as warm, it is the one thing on the table that is allowed to be ready before the fire is lit.

Sources for this section

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