Ant-cient recipe

It’s not only in Asia that rice is a staple food. Several West African countries also eat Jollof rice which is closely similar to the Filipino dish arroz valenciana.

Jollof rice is long grain or basmati rice simmered in tomato sauce and paired with meat or seafood. Arroz valenciana is glutinous rice cooked in coconut milk with chicken, chorizo de bilbao, and saffron.

Jollof rice took the spotlight last month after Nigerian marathon cooker Hilda Baci, together with 10 other chefs, prepared an extraordinary serving of the dish in Lagos. They cooked 8,780 kilos of Jollof rice in a giant custom-built pot and set a Guinness world record for the largest version of the dish, BBC reports.

The team used 4,000 kilos of rice, 500 cartons of tomato paste, 600 kilos of onions, and 168 kilos of goat meat, according to BBC.

Meanwhile, a Michelin-starred restaurant has revealed an unusual ingredient in its yogurt ice cream sandwiches.

Diners at the Alchemist in Copenhagen, Denmark tried the experimental yogurt that was based on an ancient Balkan and Turkish recipe.

Experiment lead Dr. Veronica Sinotte of the University of Copenhagen remade the recipe by dropping four whole ants into a jar of warm milk as instructed by co-researcher and anthropologist Sevgi Mutlu Sirakova’s family from Bulgaria and community members, New York Post (NYP) reports.

“The jar was then tucked into an ant mound to ferment overnight. By the next day, the milk had started to thicken and sour,” Sinotte said, according to NYP.

Insects carry lactic and acetic acid bacteria which help coagulate the dairy. The Bulgarian advisers said that formic acid, which is part of the ant’s natural chemical defense system, acidifies the milk, affects its texture, and likely creates an environment for yogurt’s acid-loving microbes to thrive, NYP reports.