EXTREME STREET FOOD in GHANA!! Giant Roasted Rodent + Drive to Cape Coast | Ghana

Look at that. They got the organs, they smoke it, and you can eat it. It looks pretty delicious. It looks like a huge guinea pig, but it's a rodent. Look at that. Whoa. Good morning, everyone. I hope you're all doing well. This is David Hoffman from David's Been Here. Coming at you at 6.30 in the morning in Accra, Ghana. Right now, I'm starting my seven-day road trip across the entire country. Our first stop is Cape Coast. Cape Coast has a long history. Dutch, Swedes, Brits, Portuguese all colonized it. There's forts, there's food, there's markets. What we're doing today is we're taking the drive all the way down there. Four-hour drive. Long drive. We're going to have maybe some porridge breakfast. We're going to see the attractions along the way. And let's go. Let's get in the car. And this is the hotel I stayed at. Olma Colonial Suites. Love this place. It's like a bunker, right? Lots of different rooms. Eleven suites. I stayed in a two-bedroom. Love my time here. I'm going to actually stay here the last night because I'm coming from Tamale. I'm sleeping one more night. I have an entire day in Accra at the very end. Ben. Rock and roll, dude. Let's go. I am so tired because of the jet lag. I woke up at 4 in the morning. My mind is just off. What we're driving through right now is the Osu neighborhood. This is the best neighborhood, okay? Restaurants, bars, hotels. Obviously, my hotel is here. Oxford Street is here. That's where you can walk down. It's like the main street. It's not a pedestrian street, but it's the main street with a lot of vendors. Lots of restaurants. Lots of pubs. Yeah, we're about to exit the city. We're leaving really, really early because it's a four-hour drive. We want to get there before lunch. Hopefully, we do. We're going to make a quick stop for breakfast somewhere. We are in intense traffic. I didn't think we'd have so much traffic going out. I thought it was just coming in. But going out as well. Crazy. There's so many people in all these vans. They're like smushed in like sardines, man. Literally. This is like another market here. Wow. It's a never-ending market. It's like a sprawling market. What? Crazy. Isaac, you made it. Yeah. You're welcome. And just like that, the traffic opened up. I think all those trucks were all coming here to this market because after the market, that's it. We can go. But if you see all the cars coming into the city, crazy. People take two, three plus hours to get into Accra coming from the outskirts, right? And this bus, we commonly call them in Ghana, Trotro. Trotro. Okay. They're like packed though. Like they're full to the last seat. I mean, it's a whole house. It's a whole house. So many fans inside. Yeah. We've been on the road for about 90 minutes and we're still not out of the area. It's like traffic jam after traffic jam. I mean, if you really want to beat the traffic to get out to the Cape Coast, I suggest leaving like what, 5 in the morning? Because it's like just town after town after town, junction after junction, just vendors forever, people everywhere. Yeah. I mean, we haven't really seen a place to eat yet. We've seen a few, but we really want to get out of this and just, you know, hit the open road. You know, one lane highway. Unfortunately, that's how it is. And yeah, it's starting to clear up now. So we're almost there. We're almost out of the traffic jam. And man, what are we going to eat? Kenke? We're looking for waché or something traditional. Waché? Waché. Beans and rice. We exited all the traffic, all the chaos. We are here on the open road and it is very, very green. Even though it's dry season, it's very lush out here. This is the real Africa, right? For me, it reminds me of, like, I'd say Malawi. I did a huge road trip in Malawi, 22 days, and everything was like this. The big distances. Same thing here, you know. There's a four-hour drive to go to Kumasi, another four-hour drive to go to Mola, another eight-hour drive. And to come all the way back down, best thing to do is take a flight from Tamale. That's what I'm doing. But you can also drive all the way back down, which is like 15 hours, something like that, right? And yeah, I mean, we're just looking right now for a place to eat. We're going to probably have some wache or some kenke. Kenke? Sorry. Hard to say. Maybe some red red, right? Yeah. Yeah? What do you think? Wache is much more common in the morning. Also, if you want tilapia and bangko, you can have that in the morning as well, but I'm good with that. I've eaten it twice already. I'm going to have some wache. That is enough for you? No, come on. It's good, it's good. But sometimes the spice level, ooh, it gets hot. Last night, it was hot. You need to get all the tastes so that you have the blend of Ghanaian dishes. So what is this? Where are we going? The serious cascade works. Cascade works? Yeah. What's this? A coffin. A coffin? A coffin for burial. A coffin? Yeah, I told you Ghanaians, especially on the coast, they have some special culture about using forms according to the hobby or the profession of the deceased. So we're going to see some coffins. Wow, guys, look at these coffins. These are beautiful. So right next door, they have the workshop where you can see them. Well, right now they're not working on it, but you can see where they actually make the coffins, right? So the carpenters here are making the coffins, and this is the coffin. So that one's like a cell phone, a Samsung coffin. Crazy. This one, really beautiful. I love the color. This one is like... Oh, this is for the royal family, this one? Yeah. But that one's wild. This is for a repairer, proper home repairer. That's crazy, dude. And if you look down here, you see the chili. The chili? Somebody who has a chili farm or who earns his life through chili farming or chili business. And here, usually we have a cascade in the form of a cacao pot. For somebody who has a cacao business or who has a larger cacao plantation. But here, it's the case that they don't want it to be in the whole form of a cacao pot, so they put the symbol of the cacao pot on it. Okay. So some have the symbols, others are completely shaped to be it, right? So the pepper over there, I don't even know what that is. That's a crab? Crab. That's a crab coffin. Crazy. And that was a house. Yeah. For carpenters or messengers. This is amazing. So this is the tradition out here on this coast, right? Yes. This is really unique, man. Wow. So beautiful. They're pretty, man. These are really, really nice. And what does it say there? It doesn't say anything. It just has like swords. Whenever you see the sword, it means that particular cascade is for the royal family. Okay. Yeah. So he opened the casket so we could see the inside. It's beautiful, right? Really nice. Comfortable. Person's dead, though, so... Yeah. Man, this is very, very beautiful. Like, I want a coffin like this when I die. Something very unique. Mine will be a camera. Yours will be camera. Yes. No, man. No, it's your hobby, your profession that determines the shape of the casket. The shape of the casket. It's amazing. So the way it works is when you come here, you say, hey, I want to buy a coffin. You can either tell him exactly what you want or you can look through the album, right? So he has here many different pictures of other ones he's done. So many unique ones. They're all very different. Again, it depends on what you did as a profession. So if you're royal family, this. If you're a chili farmer, right? If you're a guy selling cell phones, you got this one. If you're like a cow guy, he has this one. So they make it specifically for you, right? And over here we have animals, different animals. So we have a snake. And here we have a dog with five heads. And this is for kids. So these three are for kids. Obviously, they're very small. This is really, really different. It's incredible. It's impressive. I mean, very unique, right? Very unique to Ghana. I've never seen anything like this in my entire life. I've been to 81 countries so far. And it's the first time I see custom coffins like this. I've seen coffins that are custom, but never something like this, like a chili or a cell phone. This is awesome. Well, guys, let's continue this road trip. I'm starving. I need some wachay. Ben, that was so different, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very different. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fantastic coffins. This is the culture here on the, like down the coastline, right? But now it's also spreading across the entire country. Okay. Yeah. All right. Let's do it. We're gonna get some coffee. Finally. I haven't had coffee in five days, man. Right here? We're gonna also get two egg sandwiches. Two. Three. Three? Two. One. One should be 50 pesos. We're gonna look for a wachay, but instead this lady's making like egg sandwiches, breakfast egg sandwiches. It's one of my favorite things for breakfast. You know, egg sandwich. She like presses it nice and crispy. It's gonna be so good. She also adds some peppers as well. Wow, this is good. And this is like in the middle of the street, guys. Right here. It's been a minute since I had a cup of coffee. I need this. Oh, yes. Wow. She's boiling the water. She's adding a little bit of milk. That's actually condensed milk, right? Oh, man. It's gonna be very sweet. All right, I'm gonna try coffee. Super hot, though. Oh, it's good. Mine, no sugar, no milk, straight. Nescafe, right? Instant coffee. Oh, it's good, bro. It's good. I haven't had coffee in so long, I forgot what it tastes like. Joking, guys. Oh, yeah. All right, man. Cheers. Street food. Breakfast of champions. Got a nice egg sandwich here. Why don't you add some cabbage, some green peppers. Cheers, dude. Nice. Simple, right? So that's some fluffy white toast. In the middle has some eggs, right? Two eggs per with cabbage and peppers and onions. But it's not too spicy for me. I like it when it's very spicy. Do you see that spice? My friend, you have any spice? Anything hot? All right, so we made it spicy now. Ready? A little bit. A little bit? No. That's not like yesterday. No. Yesterday in the market, I had a chili that almost killed me. My face turned red, my eyes were dripping. But I was not expecting you to, you know, just chew it like that. At one go. I mean, I just love spice, right? You like spice? You eat anything. We already started the day, man. Nice, simple. Is that 1.50 for this? The egg, the bread, also 1 chili. So it's basically 3 chili for the egg, 1 chili for the bread. That's 3 chili, 50 pesos. Plus the coffee. So roughly like $1. Yes, something like that. $1 per person here to eat. This is an experience, huh? Eating on the side of the road on the way to Cape Coast. I couldn't wait anymore. It was like 9.30 in the morning, I was like, dude, I need to eat now. I don't know, if we wait too long in Accra, the traffic is going to be more serious. Because today is Saturday, most of the people in Accra, they are going to their various villages for funeral. Oh, so they're all leaving too? They're all leaving. Wow. Some will come back this afternoon, some will return tomorrow Sunday evening. Okay. Damn, I'm boiling out here. It is hot in Ghana. Really hot. This is your winter. It's hot, not only that it's hot, but the humidity is very high. So you sweat a lot. Yeah, I'm from Miami. So I'm used to this, you know. You always have super high humidity. I'm just not used to being outside all day, you know, with the humidity. Ghana is delicious, easy. Filling meal. Easy, affordable. Simple. That's all I really want, you know. For me, I'm not very picky. Obviously, clean. This is clean. Everything there is clean. The coffee, obviously, is clean. I'm a little iffy with the cup, but whatever. I take Pepto every day. I've noticed. Okay. Yeah, so this is not a big coffee company. Yeah, so they have cacao. They don't have coffee beans. That's why you guys are more into chocolate, right? All right. We still have a few hours to go. Baking out here. So my friend, how much do I owe you? 24? 24. 24? Yeah. I think she's charging me extra for the filming. 24. So I'm just going to give her 25. Give her one extra. All right. So that's basically what? Five bucks. That's one thing that will happen here in Ghana is that if you're filming, taking photos, they're going to ask for money. Obviously, if you feel comfortable, tip, but you can't be tipping everybody because then you go broke, straight up. I mean, every single person is asking for money. Honestly, I'm paying for the food. I give her a little extra tip for letting me film. That's sort of how it works here. You know, sitting down there, me and Isaac were like boiling. The heat, even though it's overcast, I mean, it's muggy. It's humid, super hot. Once you get in the car, you know, the wind is hitting us. It feels so good. Plus, a lot of water. If you run out of water, don't worry. There's always somebody selling water on the roads. Whenever you come to like a, you know, a red light or a stop sign, there's always people selling water, selling snacks. That's the best part about the road, right? People selling everything. Friends of mine, family, they won't do this. They won't eat on the streets every day, all day. But unfortunately, on the road, there aren't that many options except rest stop restaurants that open around 11, always for lunch, right? So, if you're doing an early road trip, I suggest bringing like a packed breakfast or buying like how we did it there. You can also take that to go, right? Get the sandwich, put it, take it in the car and keep going. You don't have to like stop and eat. It's just literally on the road like we did. But yeah, sort of how it is here. Pretty good though. I enjoyed it. I'm down to eat every day, everywhere. Give me food and I'll eat. On Accra Cape Coast Highway, please take a rest for five minutes and enjoy the fresh coconuts. Yeah? Yeah. Let's do it. What's up, man? How you doing? Alright, let's get a coconut. So, yes, this is my fresh coconuts. It's very good in the morning. Thank you, my friend. Okay. And it helps fight malaria. Yeah, it helps fight malaria fever? Yeah. Oh, that's good. Mmm. Oh, I'm going to drink like ten of these, man. It's refreshing. Wow. And if you want, he'll cut it open for you and give you the tender coconut, right? Now, I'm going to cut it into two. Delicious, huh? Shows that he has really enjoyed the coconuts. So, he just cut open my coconut, right? And then he gives you, you know, they cut a piece of this, right? A piece of the coconut. And that's used as a spoon. So, you just go in, get this, get the flesh, the tenderness, right? This is so good. Oh, yeah, right there. Mmm. So, this is... My favorite part is this, man. Tender coconut. Mmm. It's so like creamy. Wow. Everywhere I go in the world, I find coconuts. India, Miami, Brazil. It's like non-stop. So, you get all that, put it on a spoon, just like this. So, you'll find kids like this selling coconuts throughout the whole road. But at this point, you'll see like one, two, three, I see four different stands already. Mm-hmm. Mmm. So good for you, right? And you said it fights malaria, huh? We do eat this part of the coconut as well. Oh, yeah? It's a medicine. Actually, it's also good for those who are having diabetes, those who are having heart problems. It's healthy. I agree. You said it's two per, right? So, six for three. So, roughly $1.20 for three coconuts. They'll cut it for you. You drink it. They'll cut open so you can eat the inside. Amazing, my friends. Hey, thank you. Thank you. All right. Let's go. All right, guys. I gotta show you this. This is crazy exotic street food here in Ghana. This is like a rodent on a stick. It's bush meat, basically. These are hunters. They go out. They catch rodents. This looks like a big rat or like a guinea pig. Similar. Most of the animals you see here are hunted mainly in the night. Sometimes they use the dog. Sometimes they set traps in the bush. And sometimes also they go in the night or daytime with guns. When they bring these animals here, they first try to sell them fresh. And if at the cost of the day they are not able to sell all, then they smoke it. And they then sell it to the people passing by. I personally wouldn't eat this. This is bush meat, right? Obviously, people here see as delicacy. I wouldn't do it. It's just way too exotic for me. You know, this is like a big rodent. So, what's it called? A grass? Grass cutter. Grass cutter? It's of the porcupine family. Oh, yeah. I mean, it resembles porcupine, right? Very spiky, very spiny. Long tail. Look at that. Hanging by his feet. So, this is where the dog bit him, right? Right there. And this one, I don't know how they caught him. But I guess with a trap, right? And that's it. So, you can buy it like that? Yeah. Smoked? Smoked. And you just take pieces and eat? When you buy it roasted like this, you take it home and you can make your soup out of the meat. The smoked meat. So, these are the grass cutters. Smoked, right? Okay. So, they defer it, right? Or take off the, I guess it's like a, almost like a porcupine, right? It's very spiny. And look at that. It's got the organs. They smoke it. You can eat it. Looks pretty delicious. Looks like a huge guinea pig. But it's a rodent. Look at that. Whoa. This is wild. Crazy. Now, this is the fun part. Trying to cross the street. So many people. So many cars, man. Here we go. Exotic street food in Ghana. You've seen it. Now you know. Would you eat it? No way. We're going to have it on our trip, eh? Yeah? Yeah. Uh-oh. All these grass cutters or small antelope, squirrels, rabbits that you see along the highway from Accra going to Cape Coast are hunted from the farms and not from the reserves or the parks. Yeah, so they're all coming from their farms, right? Their area. They're not coming from parks. People get confused about that. They think that they're poaching. They're actually not poaching. They're hunters, right? They have to make a living. They're eating that as well. So, you know, if they get hungry, they have their own food, right? Right. All right. Let's go to Cape Coast. And this is another intersection, junction, town, market. It is Mankasim. It's what? It's Mankasim, a victim of the Fanti. Oh, yeah? Yeah. Mankasim. And here you see them selling bread. They got squid. They come up to you with, you know, the box in the head and they have like bread and the fried squid, right? So, it's a mix. And they also have something else here. You said kenke? Yeah. They sell kenke. But this kenke is referred to the tribe. So, we call it Fanti, Fanti kenke. Fanti kenke. And what's the difference? The difference is that they wrap this one in the banana leaves. Oh. And so it can last for more than two weeks. Wrapping it in banana leaves gives it more flavor, too. So, we've been stuck here for like ten minutes. What's happening here, dude? We gotta push everybody. We have the big car. Let's move. We are at Abanzay now. And Abanzay has Fort Amsterdam. Initially built by the British and named Fort York. And during the Anglo-Dutch War of 1640s, the Dutch were able to capture it. And they renamed it Amsterdam. That's behind you, right? Yeah. Yeah, unfortunately, it's like off to the left. It's almost like ruins, though, right? So, we're getting close to Cape Coast? We're like right there? In about half an hour, we'll get there. So, the drive is a four-hour drive. But if you do multiple stops like we did, it'll take five to six hours. For us, it's almost been six hours. But we're stopping a lot, right? The same thing is gonna happen when we go to Kumasi. We're gonna stop multiple times to see things. So, the four hours almost doubles. But it's okay. It's worth it. It's the experience that counts, right? And right here, as you can see, many vendors selling Fanti Keke. So, it's their type of keke. It's wrapped with banana leaves. So, it's extra delicious. And, yeah, guys, that was the journey to Cape Coast. We are literally 10 minutes away. You know, we stopped multiple times on this four-hour journey. We turned it into a six-hour journey. We stopped. We had some breakfast. We had an egg sandwich with some spice. We had some instant coffee. Then after that, we kept going, and we stopped for some coconut. You should definitely stop for some coconut. I only get two or three of those every single day. It's so refreshing. Perfect for this weather because it's so hot outside. And then after that, we saw the road in the grass cutter. Grass cutter. If you're brave enough, you can eat that bush meat. I'm good. I don't want it. I might try it later in the trip, though. Maybe. Well, guys, I hope you love this video. If you did, please give me a thumbs up. Leave me a comment below. Subscribe to my channel for more awesome travel content. I'll see you in the next Travel Food Adventure in Cape Coast, Ghana. Let's go.