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Chef Jon's Recipes from the Road




Riders on the Tour d’Afrique call this guy, ‘the most important person on the tour’. Canadian Chef, Jon Shepheard, has to whip up three nutritional, delicious and energy-giving meals for about 70 riders and staff – daily.  Cycling between 100- 200km per day, for four months, makes you hungry; very hungry. Jon will often walk up to a small sidewalk stall and buy all the stock from a surprised, and obviously delighted, vendor. 

Here are the recipes to some of the meals  the riders enjoyed as they cycled through Egypt.
Use them at your next party...your next really big party.

“They are approximate measures, it's not like I measure quantities as I cook but I usually have a pretty good idea.” says Chef Jon.



Braised  Egyptian Chicken with Rosemary and Honey

18 whole chickens, 1kg each, quartered
3kg red onions, sliced
3kg green peppers, sliced
2 heads fresh garlic, crushed
2L honey
1L white wine vinegar
1 cup dried rosemary
1 cup salt
1/2 cup cracked black pepper
1/2L olive oil
4L water
5kg Basmati rice 4kg fresh peas

Season chicken with salt and pepper. Heat up 100L aluminum pot. Into the pot goes the olive oil and seared chicken. Add peppers and onions and continue to sear. Add the rest of the ingredients and bring to a simmer, cover pot and braise 1 hour. Serve on Basmati rice.

Serves 70

It took 6 people 1 hour to shuck the peas.  I got a lot of good comments for this one but one of the riders, Shona Bell I think, told me it was fucking delicious; which I found kind of funny.” - Chef Jon.

~~~




Lentil Vegetable Gratinée
 

“I was a bit nervous at first serving a vegetarian meal for everyone but at least a few people told me it was the best dinner yet, plus it was quick to make
.” -


10 Kg brown lentils, soaked in cold water overnight
4 Kg red onions, sliced
6 Kg green zucchini, chopped
4 Kg carrots, chopped
3 heads garlic, crushed
2 L tomato paste
10 L vegetable broth
4 Kg old cheddar
1/2 L olive oil
Salt, black pepper

Heat up a 150 L aluminum pot and start roasting vegetables in olive oil with salt and pepper. Add garlic and tomato paste and continue to caramelize. Add lentils and vegetable broth and bring to a simmer for about 1 to 1/2 hours, until lentils are soft and about 2/3 of the liquid has reduced. Cover with sliced cheddar and cover the pot for 10 minutes so the cheese can melt.


Serves 70

~~~



Dates with Milk and Honey
 

”This recipe is an idea from Remon, part of the Emeco support team. It is really simple but delicious.” – Chef Jon

20 L milk
4 L honey
4 Kg dried dates
1/2 cup salt


Heat up all of the ingredients and pour over muesli, cereal, oatmeal or whatever. Then go cycle through the desert with lots of climbing.
 

Serves 70

Posted February 06, 2012 by Guest Author
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Some Cool Facts and Figures about the Tour d'Afrique




In the first 9 years of the tour:

387 full tour riders + 262 sectionals = 649 total riders, representing 28 countries

Ages range from 18 to 70

75 different tour staff members

103 EFIers including 88 men + 15 women = 27% of full tour riders

2003-11 riders cycled an estimated total of 4,769,000 km = 2,980,000 miles = 119 times around the equator or 6.2 return trips to the moon



To these numbers in 2012 we add:

43 full tour riders plus about 35 sectional riders

Mr Ming-Jiing from Taiwan and Alaric Britz from Namibia represent country #s 29 & 30

8 new staff members

The 2012 tour is about 11700 km long = 94 riding stages, 2 travel days + 24 rest days = 120 days total

Average day 123 km, longest day 207 km

Total climbing 74000 meters or 74 km; most in 1 day = 2502 meters; highest elevation 3122 meters



Posted February 05, 2012 by Brian Hoeniger
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My Friend - a last thought on Egypt



When in Egypt the experience of being haggled by taxi drivers, shop owners and many others on street can become a lot to handle at times. However, sometimes, when you’re lucky you get to experience real Egyptian hospitality and all the bad experiences start to disappear for a while. One of the full tour riders, Michael Paull from Canada, was lucky enough to be on the receiving end of one such experience and shared his story with us.

Hello, my friend

By Michael Paull

This saying is very common in Egypt, perhaps too common. Wherever you go, the people greet you this way. Sometimes it comes of nicely, other times it sounds aggressive. In Luxor  - where we had our first day off - that saying was everywhere and aggressive. At night, one of the other riders, Herman and I wanted to go for dinner, so Mohammed, our horse-drawn carriage-taxi driver, said he would take us to a very nice place. We also used him so we wouldn’t be bothered by everyone else on the streets while getting to the restaurant.



We had a great dinner and when we came out, Mohammed was there to take us back home. The next morning when I left the campsite Mohammed was there so we could walk together. We went to the local market, and after, to his house for a cup of tea and so I could meet his two daughters (age three and five), his wife, his mother and his brother. After, we went to the tourist market. From there he took us to the Luxor temple, then lunch (sugar cane) and then back to the campsite. When I told my story to other TDA riders they all asked how much this had cost me. It didn’t cost anything because Mohammed was my friend.

Posted January 25, 2012 by Guest Author
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How TDA staff prepare for the 2012 Tour d'Afrique




One of our medical officers for the 2012 Tour d'Afrique is preparing for her African adventure by cycling through Cambodia!

Read about her adventures here.

Posted December 30, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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Game Over




It’s over. It’s strange to wake up and not be on the Tour d’Afrique 2011 anymore, and it will probably take a long time for everyone to really get back to the “real world”. That is, off course, for those who are really going back to their normal lives. Some decided to stay in Cape Town for a while; many decided they want to restart their lives in a completely different way now. Couples are formed, skills are discovered, professional links get established, and much more happens on the road and inside the Tour d’Afrique nomadic little world. Also, putting your whole life on standby back home and stepping away from everything for 4 months is a wonderful opportunity to think about your life and happiness and decide what you really want to do about it from here on in.

Our last night was unusual. After an long riders meeting where Tour Leader Sharita went over every detail about the finish line with everyone, an unexpected and fantastic sea food feast showed up in Kim’s kitchen. Many people stayed awake late celebrating with their friends - the last night and the last camping spot. A strange mix of anxiety, happiness, sadness, exhaustion and all kinds of intense feelings were in the air. People who had been serious and quiet and had gone to bed right after sunset for 4 months were now up drinking, laughing, zip-tying the sleeping ones inside their tents, hiding wheels, seats, helmets and everything they could find.


The last day on Tour was quite different from the previous TDA final days. Cape Town has just finished building a big network of cycle paths and our way into Cape Town would find us on one of its legs. Why not to throw a big event to receive the Tour d’Afrique riders and to promote the idea of using those cycle paths to commute in the city in a more fun, healthier and faster way than driving a car. We left the little spot by the beach where we had our last lunch as a big group.

There were cyclists from many different groups from Cape Town, TDA former riders and other people who learned about the event somehow and showed up ready for the “The Big Ride In”, as the event was named. No official numbers, but considering that our group was about  85 people and disappeared in the middle of that huge critical mass, I would say we rolled along Cape Town’s new cycle paths with at least 400 bicycles and a couple of dozen skateboards and roller blades. We entered the Green Park under applause for a long ceremony where the winners and EFIs received their medals and there was a final bike donation by TDA.


It’s been an amazing journey. It was hard, both for the riders and the staff, but it was the experience of a lifetime. It was challenging in many different ways. It was an especially hard TDA, but it was an especially good one. The group was fantastic. We got to really respect each of these individuals who decided to take part in this. I was sure to meet a bunch of very interesting people, and I certainly did.

The fact that so many TDA 2011 riders are registered or registering for other TDA tours is very rewarding for us. A few of the riders who were supposed to do only a short section of the Tour decided to keep going with us instead of going home, which is another rewarding fact. Others who did a long part of the Tour on previous editions and therefore knew what they were signing up for came back to finish the other half of the route with us in 2011.

What about coming back one day and repeating the same tour? “Would you do this all over again?” I asked a few riders on the end. “I don’t think so”, said most of them. “But would you ever recommend doing it to a good friend or a relative of yours?” “Hell yes!”
   


    - Cristiano Werneck
   

Posted May 17, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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Kimsie Wimsie - TDA Chef




From sand strewn beaches to the city lights of Beijing, Kim finds herself at home in the furthest of places.  There’s no denying that this here trip sits at the top of her list, which is not to say that there hasn’t been some fair competition.

Barreling up a steep mountain pass, riddled with potholes, chugging along at a snails pace only to arrive at the final destination in the cover of darkness, Kim found herself at the farm she would be staying at for the coming month.  Initially heading out in search of rural indigenous artists, Kimsie found herself living on a farm at the top of a mountain living amongst the Sierra Madre people of rural Mexico.  This life of farming became the spur to Kims love of fresh food from the ground, a dream that was first  realized in a world far far away.

Living on the top floor of a 27 story apartment building in the heart of Beijing, listening to the never ending hum of the city below.  Kim knew this wasn’t right.  What was keeping her there was the Kung-Fu she was studying, and what was taking her away was a dream of a different life.  Laying in bed one night, the city bustling below, and suddenly the image of herself in gum boots and a sweater on a farm and thought “That’s my life”

Back in Canada, it was clear what the mission was, and off to Everdale she went.  Everdale is not only a productive CSA farm but also an education centre where school groups from the inner reaches of Toronto would come out to.  Kim managed their CSA, farmed, and of course, cooked for the masses.

Preparing vast amount of tasty, healthy food has remained a passion of Kim’s to this day, a talent we appreciate daily here on TDA.  Serving up 10’s of thousands of calories per day to our team of hungry cyclists, Kimsie continuously out does herself with a new masterpiece each and every day.  

How are we ever supposed to go home and cook for ourselves now? 

   -- Adele Woodyard

Posted May 04, 2011 by Adele Woodyard
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Schwalbe tires – TDA Stamp of Approval




The heart of the bicycle has always been its wheels.  They are, and have always been, where the rubber meets the road.  Early bicycles had simple wooden wheels with wood or leather strips tacked to the circumference of the wheel.  The pneumatic tire was a tremendous development, allowing for higher speeds, much greater comfort, and dramatically improved traction.  Ever since the pneumatic tire was developed, the bane of all cyclists has been a punctured tire.  Nothing can stop the fun of a good ride as quickly as a flat tire.  The fastest racer can be brought to a stop by a tiny thorn, and repairing a puncture while on tour can be a time consuming ordeal. 

Flats are a fact of cycling, but the frequency of flats falls with the selection of a fine tire.  Since leaving Cairo, I have ridden exclusively on Schwalbe Marathon tires, and have suffered from only one flat tire.  I have three sets of Schwalbe tires with me on tour.  For the off road sections I rely on the Marathon Big Apple.  With a width of 2.35 inches, it has ample volume to safely run at low pressures.  This improves traction and comfort by softening the ride on rough and loose surfaces.  On the road, I have two sets of Marathon Touring tires.  I run a set of 40mm wide Tour Plus tires on the rough pavement, and a set of 28mm Marathon Tour tires on the smooth asphalt.  That’s one nice thing about Schwalbe tires; they have a line of tires that can do it all.  Whether you are running 26”, 700c, or 29” wheels, there is a perfect touring tire for whatever adventure you are going to undertake.  Their tires are easily the most popular among our cyclists.  When we loaded our trucks in Cairo I segregated our tires into two piles, one of Schwalbe tires and one of other brands.  The Schwalbe pile dwarfed all the other brands put together.  The riders who chose Schwalbe tires chose wisely.  My experience as an employee of the tour is that those riders have fewer flats.

I have seen a lot of good equipment, and some absolute disasters while working with The Tour d’Afrique.  My personal recommendation for riders on tour is to buy Schwalbe Marathon tires.  I wouldn’t ride anything else on Tour.  Their tires deserve the Tour d’Afrique Stamp of Approval. 

Posted April 27, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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Mathias, our Madhatter, Mountain, Medic.




Feeling as a child that every other family vacation must be way cooler than yours, is evidently a feeling which escapes none.  Growing up in Entlebush, in the foothills of the Alps, Mathias Hediger spend years of his childhood trudging his way through yet another family mountaineering trip with his two brothers and sister.  The foundation of what is now central to his livelihood and lifestyle,was learnt from his father, a talented mountaineer with numerous first ascents.  Whether he could realize it at the time, this was the beginning of a life in the mountains.

After finishing school, Mathias spent two years learning carpentry and apprenticing in his father's wood-working shop until he had to serve his time in the Swiss Army.  Having the mountaineering background that he did, Mathias was quickly pulled aside as a mountain specialist.  Spending more time with the mountain guides hired to train him got him thinking that maybe that this might be the job for him. 

Wasting no time in following that dream, Mathais headed straight for Andermalt, one of Switzerlands biggest resorts to become first, a ski instructor, and then a mountain guide.  Guiding and teaching in the Alps for a number of years, his work came to take him overseas.  First to Norway, Sweden, and then to the USA, India and New Zealand.  New Zealand turned out to be more of an adventure than planned. The snow turned out to be insufficient that season so Mathias headed out to sea.  Finding himself working on a fishing boat headed for the Antarctic was just the beginning of his ocean bound adventures.

Upon returning home to find he would have to wait a year before beginning his paramedic school, he wasn’t about to sit around and wait.  Within 24 hours of hearing this news, he was on his way. Mathias spent the next two months, co-captaining a 2 month, 2 man sailing trip, his co-captain was a paraplegic.  The trip had to end slightly short due to medical reasons with his sailing partner but Mathais continued to work and play on classic yachts until it was eventually time to head home.

Keeping Mathias in one place was never never an easy task however. Where was he within 2 weeks of finishing his 4 years of paramedic school?  Working for the largest, private air rescue company in Namibia. 

Now back at home in Luzern, between running his own private mountain guiding business and working as a paramedic, Mathias also works for Air Zermatt helicopter rescue company operating in south western Switzerland.  There he works not only on mountain rescues but also teaches these skills as a part of a Diploma in Emergency Mountain Medicine.

Here on tour we’re not sure what we’d do without him.  If we’re lucky enough to not need stitches from the ride, he’ll have us in stitches laughing in no time.  Managing the tour's medical needs, both big and small, working endlessly at times to put us all back together, you will still be hard pressed to find him without a smile on his face. 

If there’s anyone getting voted off this island, it is most certainly not this ducky.

Posted April 24, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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A Very Funky Ferry Ride across Four Countries in 500 Meters




Officially the pontoon ferry across the Zambezi River at Kazungula, about 75 km west of Victoria Falls, that the Tour d’Afrique takes each year, is the crossing between the Zambia and Botswana borders. In fact the midstream point of this sometimes treacherous ride marks the only spot in the world where 4 countries meet, namely Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. In doing so a ferry passenger “visits” all 4 countries as the ferry struggles and smokes from one side to the other during the 10 minute crossing. At one point the boat does an upstream push towards an island that is in Namibia before drifting downstream to the other side. Moreover the landing on the Botswana side happens on a spur that is actually Zimbabwean soil – the Zimbabwe border fence just happens to have been moved very slightly east so that once off the boat traffic can proceed unhindered over the last 400 yards to Botswana border control.  

This legacy from the colonial scramble for Africa has had a very colorful history. For the past 60 years the four countries have laboured to reach agreement over the construction of a bridge. Given the relatively limited width and depth of the river this would not require a particularly challenging engineering design. But they continue to fail, most recently because Zimbabwean President Mugabe insists on huge payments for use of “his water.”
 

During the Zimbabwean War of Independence, the “rebel” ZANU-PF fighters used the ferry to smuggle arms into then Southern Rhodesia. In response the Prime Minister of the pariah Rhodesian state, Ian Smith, had his air force bomb and sink one of the ferries in mid-stream, in order to discourage this practice. More recently, in 2006, a ferry flipped while carrying a brand new Volvo semi trailer cattle truck, which incidentally was built in South Africa by the father of TdA Tour Leader Sharita. 16 people died, trapped under the wreckage while other clung to the banisters on the top side and didn’t even get wet. Until recently one could still see the wreck of this boat and the truck on the Zambian shore.
 

There are up to 3 pontoon boats in operation today, one that carries passengers, cars, regional buses, as well as tourists on excursions from Vic Falls to Chobe National Park. For these customers the wait to cross is typically no more than an hour. The other somewhat larger pontoons, 1 of which is often out of service, slowly shuttle one of the literally hundreds of transport trucks lined up on either side across the Zambezi. Google “Kazungula ferry” and you’ll find that this crossing is now best known for being the major bottleneck in the southern African transport network. One of the reasons for this again involves the notorious Zimbabwean regime of Robert Mugabe. Many trucks travelling between South Africa and the copper mine belt of northern Zambia and the DRC’s Katanga province used to cross at two Zambia/Zimbabwe borders – the bridges at Vic Falls and Siavonga . But when Mugabe raised the tariffs on trucks transiting through Zimbabwe by astronomically, the trucking companies decided it was cheaper to pay their drivers to wait as long as several days at Kazungula and avoid Zimbabwe altogether.
  All we can say is wow … and good luck to all who clamber aboard. This is indeed a most fascinating and funky ferry.  


   --  Written by Brian Hoeniger with Consultation from Tjisse Kamstra (Owner, Livingstone Safari Lodge)

Posted April 18, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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Another great dinner




Another great dinner on the Tour d’Afrique 2011 that deserves to be shared. Tonight, Kim and Ferdi’s every-pot-in-the kitchen-used menu for the day. Stuffed apple and pineapple roasted Pork, corn on the cob, broccoli and cauliflower with a creamy parmesan and oregano sauce, honey glazed carrots, roasted potatoes and for the veggie option, garlic baby potatoes and peppers with soya meat stir fry.

Stuffed Apple & Pineapple Roasted Pork

At home                                    On the road with TDA

1 kg of pork roast                      20 kg of superior pork roast
4 spoons of barbecue spice          2 packages

20 ml of Worstershire sauce         400 ml
1/2 cup of olive oil                         2 cups

4 tablespoons crashed garlic        2 bottles

2 tablespoons of parsley              1 box
1 tin of pineapple rings                6 tins

1 tablespoon of rosemary             1 box

1 tablespoon of thyme                6 tablespoons                   

½ tin of apple slices                     6
tins
1 package of streaky bacon          12

10 baby potatoes                          4 kg

2 to 3 cups of red wine                   2 bottles

1 package of roast gravy sauce     30 packages
   

Preparation


Start of by taking a knife to the pork, making as many holes as possible. Put roast to one side.


Mix the barbecues spice, olive oil, worstershire sauce, garlic, parsley, thyme and rosemary together. Stuff the pork with the pineapple, the apple and the bacon strips in the already made holes, not forgetting to add a little bit of spice as you go. When it is stuffed to its capacity and can take no more, rub the remaining spice mix all over the pork. Place the pork roast on a bed of potatoes in your oven pot,  add the juice from the pineapple and apples, add a little bit of water, cover and bake it in the oven at 180 degrees for about 3 to 4 hours, adding water when needed.


Gravy: When pork roast is cooked, to your satisfaction, remove from pot with potatoes and add about 3 to 4 cups of wine, depending on the amount of liquid left, together with one package of roasted meat gravy. Reduce the sauce and serve!  

TDA method


Same as above, larger quantities needed. Loads more stuffing and poking, bigger pots and a hotter fire.


PS: Don’t forget to start the fire before you start the poking. Put pot on coals, bring to the boil and then reduce heat at the bottom and add coals on the top of lift, creating our very own bush oven.

Cooking time: 5-6 hours

Posted April 15, 2011 by Tour d'Afrique Ltd.
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