Malagasy food to try · Madagascar

A light zebu-beef broth with leafy greens (brèdes), including the tingling “paracress” flower that makes your lips buzz. Always served with rice.

Pounded cassava leaves slow-cooked with pork (or zebu) and garlic — dark, rich and deeply comforting.

💡 Good to know: Ask for the zebu version if you don’t eat pork.

A soft rice porridge with greens (and sometimes a little meat) — what many Malagasy eat in the morning.

Little round rice-flour cakes cooked in clay moulds over charcoal, sold at dawn on street corners. Perfect with coffee.

Chicken simmered in coconut milk with tomato, ginger and garlic — the taste of the coast.

Zebu beef simmered until tender in its own sauce. The zebu, with its hump, is a symbol of wealth and ceremonies.

A dense sweet of ground peanuts, banana and rice flour wrapped in banana leaves and cooked for hours, sold in slices.

Lasary is a crunchy vegetable pickle (achards); sakay is the fiery chili paste. A small spoon of each lifts any dish — careful with the sakay!

Water boiled in the pot with the toasted rice crust — a light, smoky drink served with meals instead of tea.

Rum infused for months with fruit, spices or vanilla — every bar has its own jars on the shelf.

Most of the world’s natural vanilla comes from the north-east (the SAVA region). Bourbon vanilla pods make the best souvenir.

Lychees around Christmas, mangoes in the hot season, and small sweet bananas all year — cheap and delicious at every market.