food for thought | okra

There's a little Guatemalan vegetable called okra that I discovered when I moved to America and very quickly became obsessed with!  It's kind of a cucumber, kind of a zucchini, kind of a capsicum (green pepper), but not really any one of those.

It's prevalent in Southern-style cooking where it's added to stir-fries, pickled or mixed into the famous Gumbo stew.  But my favourite okra dish is simply having it coated in a batter and deep fried.  Mmmm. Delicious!  There was a restaurant in Atlanta just down the street from where I lived, that used to serve deep fried okra as an appetizer.  It came with a type of aoli dipping sauce and I don't think I'm lying when I say that I went there and ate it every other day for the first six months I lived in America!

While I definitely don't eat it that much anymore, I'm still not sick of okra.  Here in America's south, it's an easy choice as a side dish to many meals and I get it as often as I can.  If you're thinking of visiting America and want to try something new that's not too outrageous - I strongly recommend okra!