Desert Delicacy · Wild Underground Fungus
Kalahari Truffle (!Nabas)
Photo: Chtrede / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0
The San find these truffles by spotting hairline cracks the growing fungus pushes up through the sand, and they appear only in years with good rains.
Known to the San as !nabas and sometimes called 'sand potato', this desert truffle grows just beneath the surface of the Kalahari sand around Ghanzi and is dug up by hand once cracks in the soil give its location away. It's roasted in the coals or added to a stew, prized as a rare seasonal treat rather than an everyday food.
Why it's made this way: Harvested by San communities for millennia, the Kalahari truffle is both a traditional foraged food and, increasingly, a small source of income as interest in African desert truffles grows.
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Part of World of Street Food — 3443 dishes from 118 countries.
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