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- Cape Town's famous koesister is becoming increasingly popular in little shops and takeaways.
- It used to be available only to home bakers, or people with a good koesister connection in the city.
- Not to be confused with the koeksister, the koesister is a delicious chewy cinnamon, cardamom, aniseed and ginger treat.
"Have you not had your koesister yet? Why are you so dikbek? (grumpy)" was a common refrain on a Sunday in Cape Town when food historian and cook Zainie Misbach was a child.
Not to be confused with the twisty crunchy syrupy koeksister, a koesister is a deliciously fragrant and spicy accompaniment to Sunday morning coffee.
With cardamom, cinnamon, aniseed, and dry ginger mixed into the chewy dough, it is finished off with a dip in sugared water, then smothered in coconut.
"We don't know how the name came about," said Misbach, famous for the Bo-Kaap Cooking Tour in Cape Town.
"But we do know it came from our people - the Malay," she added.
For as long as she can remember, Sunday mornings are for koesisters and a coffee, and this tradition is kept up in many parts of Cape Town, including Bo Kaap, the pretty heritage village on the slopes of Signal Hill.
Besides starting the day off on a delicious note, Misbach said the humble chewy dough-based product has helped many women provide for their families.
She explained that Saturdays are for making the koesisters and packing them in boxes for the next day.
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Early on Sunday, children run door to door delivering the orders in a plastic container, darting in and out of the alleys as kettles go on the boil in preparation. By 09:00, the children are usually back home, and it's koesister hour.
Misbach said when she was growing up, they were sent to buy the Sunday newspaper for their parents, made their parents coffee, and the house would settle in for koesisters and coffee in bed, reading the newspaper.
She joked that the women used to tease that they were sweetening their husbands up for the dreary Sunday tasks of cleaning the gutters or fixing the roof.
Back then, they were almost exclusively made at home and sold to neighbours, but since then they are increasingly finding their way into takeaway shops around Cape Town.
Misbach recommends The Delhi on Rose Street, Bo Kaap, for koesister first-timers, but warns to get there early before they are sold out.
The koeksister, on the other hand, requires a different kind of work with the plaiting, deep frying, dipping into a thick syrup and then chilling, and that is a story for another day.
