Cuisine of East Timor facts for kids
The cuisine of East Timor is all about tasty local foods! You'll find lots of pork, fish, fresh basil, tangy tamarind, and healthy legumes. People also eat plenty of corn, rice, root vegetables like sweet potatoes, and yummy tropical fruit. East Timorese food has special touches from Malay and Portuguese dishes. This is because Portugal used to rule East Timor. You might even find flavors from other places Portugal once ruled, thanks to soldiers who came from those areas.
What Do People Eat in East Timor?
Farming is super important in East Timor. That's why rice is the main food, grown all over the country. Besides rice, other important foods grown here are sweet potatoes, corn, cassava, and taro. People often add beans, cabbage, spinach, onions, and cowpeas to their meals.
For meat, people often eat poultry (like chickens), pigs, and goats. Many families in East Timor raise these animals themselves. Fish is also a big part of their diet. Fishing is another important job in the country, right after farming.
Here are some popular East Timorese dishes:
- Batar daan - A popular dish made with corn, mung beans, and pumpkin. It's a healthy and filling meal.
- Budu - This is a special sauce. It's made from fresh tomatoes, cool mint, a squeeze of lime, and Spanish onion. It adds a fresh kick to many meals.
- Fuuntaul tong and gailong - A popular soup. It has red beans, beef, lettuce, and egg, usually served with rice.
- Ikan sabuko - This dish uses Spanish mackerel fish. It's marinated in tamarind for a tangy taste, then mixed with basil and capsicum.
- Tapai - A unique dish made from fermented rice. It tastes sweet, a bit sour, and has a tiny bit of alcohol from the fermentation.
- Caril - A mild chicken curry. It's made with a special paste of roasted capsicum and coconut.
- Feijoada - A common dish in many places that were once Portuguese colonies. It's made with pork, cannellini beans, and chorizo sausage.
The "Hungry Season"
East Timor's crops depend on the rain that comes after the dry season. Sometimes, the weather is unpredictable, with droughts. This can lead to a time called the "hungry season," usually from November to February. During this time, it can be harder for families to find enough food.
Many families rely on their own farms for food. When crops are scarce, some families turn to a traditional food called akar. Akar is made from dried palm tree bark. It's beaten into a powder, mixed with water to make a jelly, and then cooked over a fire. This helps families get through tough times.
Sweet Treats
East Timor also has some delicious desserts!
- Bibingka - This is a yummy grilled cake. It has many layers and a rich coconut flavor.
- Portuguese tart - A famous egg tart pastry that came from Portugal. It has a creamy filling in a crispy crust.
East Timor's Coffee
Coffee from East Timor is very special because it's grown organically, meaning without harmful chemicals. It's a huge "cash crop" for the country, which means it's grown to be sold for money. Coffee makes up 90% of everything East Timor sells to other countries, besides oil! Almost half of all families in East Timor (46%) rely only on coffee for their income.
Coffee has been grown in East Timor for hundreds of years. When it was a Portuguese colony in the late 1800s, coffee was half of all the country's trade. But during 24 years when Indonesia occupied the country, the coffee business was not looked after well. Prices went up and down, and many coffee farms became battlefields, which made the quality of the coffee beans worse.
After the conflict ended, experts said that two generations of farming knowledge were lost, and some coffee farms were left empty. But because the trees didn't get much attention, they grew without pesticides or fertilizers. This makes them perfect for people who love organic coffee! Today, East Timor's coffee is very important. It's worth about $10 million a year. About 46,000 coffee farms employ one-fifth of East Timor's people. Farmers are working hard to make the coffee even better.
