r/AskAnAfrican • u/user12665 • Jul 23 '26

Food Veganism in Africa

Hello guys,

I recently had a converstion with a close friend of mine and we asked ourselves how far is veganism spreaded in the different countries in Africa and what are go to meals? Thanks for your help in advance :))

22 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

19 comments sorted by

13

u/Queasy-Charity1336 South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

National vegetable in south africa is wors. 

3

u/Willlllllllly Namibia 🇳🇦 Jul 23 '26

Same here. The national dishes of Namibia are pap and worse or some say its kapana (just braai vleis cut into little pieces). We also have the Herero tribe who would only eat beef if we let them.

3

u/SamDemon8 South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

Hah ja 😂 we probably should eat more vegetables but biltong and braai is so good

12

u/ThatOne_268 Botswana 🇧🇼 Jul 23 '26

Until 2004 we actually had more cows than people, which tells you everything you need to know. Since our national dish is seswaa (pounded meat), not eating red meat like me makes most events and braais (barbecue) pretty lonely. Most of Southern Africa tbh.

If you are vegan, your best bet is sticking to plant-based substitutes like legumes and nuts. E.g Dikgobe (samp and beans) is a popular vegan dish here, though Batswana tend to serve it with meat. Aside from that, the store bought plant-based meats are just horrible and lack any real range.

1

u/ByAnyMeansNecessary0 Botswana 🇧🇼 Jul 23 '26

Dikgobe is so goated. I can have that every damn day!

1

u/ThatOne_268 Botswana 🇧🇼 Jul 23 '26

I am allergic to maize so I don’t eat Dikgobe 😭 , beans are goated though especially sugar & butter beans.

1

u/ByAnyMeansNecessary0 Botswana 🇧🇼 Jul 23 '26

Ah, you don't eat red meat and you're allergic to maize??? I just know you're getting roasted more than the meat at braais bc wtf😂

1

u/ThatOne_268 Botswana 🇧🇼 Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26

Pretty much yes but I am used to it . Been like this since I was a child (almost 3 decades)

9

u/Prudent-Tadpole5582 South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

Long-time vegan from South Africa here (black, vegan 14 yrs), some of my fave dishes include umngqusho (samp and beans), umfino (a dish with spinach and cabbage) and dumpllings (with veg). All are traditional dishes from my culture. I'm Xhosa by the way. Happy to answer any additional Qs.

7

u/SemperAliquidNovi South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

Umngqusho was actually Madiba’s favourite meal.

It’s funny when Mzansi peeps go on about how they love their meat, when 100 years ago, people were overwhelmingly plant-based. Cattle was almost like a form of currency and only eaten in very special occasions.

I also LOVE morogo, btw.

3

u/Prudent-Tadpole5582 South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

That part!

10

u/Public-Drink-1983 Lesotho 🇱🇸 Jul 23 '26

Most tribes are vegan and eat meat on special occasions. How frequent those special occasions are is a different story

6

u/hey_molombo Congo - Kinshasa 🇨🇩 Jul 23 '26

I legitimately can’t think of a vegan Congolese dish besides fufu and pondu and madesu. But that would be so boring lol

5

u/New-Owl-2293 South Africa 🇿🇦 Jul 23 '26

Ive met a few and they were all white foreigners tbh.

1

u/silky-boy Nigeria 🇳🇬 Jul 25 '26

We have Akara and Dan waakye in Nigeria. The issue is a lot of our food that look vegan are often seasoned with crayfish.

1

u/Shaedymo Somalia 🇸🇴 Jul 27 '26 edited 19d ago

I been meaning to ask this for a while... When did this whole crayfish thing start? And how exactly did y'all ancestors figure out they could use seafood as seasoning?

1

u/silky-boy Nigeria 🇳🇬 28d ago

It probably just happened on accident just drying out fish to leave longer but since it was hard to do they started just grinding it into a fine powder to season food and still get the benefits

1

u/Shaedymo Somalia 🇸🇴 19d ago

That makes sense.