We were watching the walla wasalla (You cruise, You loose) from South Africa and they were making a watermelon leaf and pumpkin vegetable dish. It sound good – and looked good – but we missed the name of the dish. Sounded like “African Mocolho Sauce”. I Googled it but nothing was found. Instead, I found this recipe which really sounds good. They say you can substitute pork, chicken or beef for the lamb, but lamb is traditional. You be the judge. The South African recipes can be found at Chirundu. It is hosted by Chirundu Jason.

Traditional South African Sosaties Recipe
Source: Chirundu Jason
In Zimbabwe as kids, we often called them skewers, here in the UK they call meat on a skewer a kebab. They call a braai a barbeque (BBQ) but what ever the name, it is hard to beat the traditional South African Lamb Sosatie on a real charcoal or wood braai!

Lamb Sosaties on the braai
Below are the ingredients and the method to making the perfect Lamb Sosatie for the braai. You can use 0ther types of meat like chicken, pork or beef, but lamb always seems to taste the best.

Lamb Sosaties Recipe

Lamb Sosatie Ingredients, To make traditional South African Lamb sosatie you will need:
2 lbs Lamb (boned shoulder or leg of lamb)
2 large Onions
¼ c Olive Oil
4 cloves of Garlic
1 T Curry Powder
1 x t Turmeric
1 x T Brown Sugar
4 crushed Bay Leaves
1 x T Lemon Juice
2 x Lemons, cut into small wedges
½ c Meat Stock
¼ lbs dried Apricots
1 x Green Pepper, cut into bite size pieces to fit onto the kebab
Butter
Skewer sticks

To make the Lamb Sosaties, first cut the lamb up to 1½” cubes, slice one onion into wedges (for the skewer – you could use shallots) and the other chop finely, peel and crush the garlic. Heat the butter in a saucepan and sauté the chopped onion, garlic and curry powder for a few minutes. Add the turmeric, lemon and meat stock, bring to the boil.

The put the meat in a non-metal bowl with the bay leaves at the bottom. As soon as the marinade comes to the boil, pour it over your meat mixture and then allow it to cool and place in the fridge to marinade overnight.
The next day when you are ready for the braai (barbeque), skewer the meat, apricots, green pepper and onion wedges (shallots) onto the sticks.
For the sauce, pour the leftover marinade into a saucepan, add some butter and salt and pepper to taste, bring to the boil and serve warm with the sosaties and lemon wedges.

The best way to cook the sosaties is over a hot braai (barbeque) turning them as you go, but you can also cook them under a grill.

As a variation, and if you like hot food, why not try adding crushed chilies, more garlic and some peri-peri to the marinade.

Good luck and let us know how it came out for you. Cheers!