Tourist Hub

The city of Durban is popular for having attracted millions of tourists over the years. It is one of the most famous tourist destinations of Africa. The city had been entirely developed into a tourist destination in 1970s but the major attraction of the city lies in its beaches. Durban acts as an access to national parks and the historical sites of Zululand and Drakensberg. The metropolitan is a business hub and boasts the busiest port of South Africa. Although, the city lost most of its tourism industry to Capetown in the 1990s, it nonetheless has something that Durbanites feel proud of. This is none other than the delectable dish known as Bunny Chow.

Durban has never been very popular for cuisines, although the city does have some excellent restaurants and cafes. Bunny Chow, Bunny, or Funny Bunny is a dish, truly Durban’s invention. This is one of the reasons why Durban is still welcoming local as well as foreign tourists. The dish successfully keeps the tour operators and airlines offering cheap flights to Durban. There lie many myths about the original invention story of the dish but the popularity of Bunny Chow is affected by nothing.

In the first place, to name the dish properly is very important, especially in front of the locals of Durban. What Durbanites like it to be called is what they themselves call it- Bunnies. If called as Bunny Chow in front of a Durbanite, you sound rather wired and alienated. This can lead a local to think that you are pretty much an outsider and cannot really respect the popularity of the dish. Hence it is to be responsibly called Bunnies.

A Bunny is made by filling any type of curry in a hollowed loaf of full or half bread. Different chefs create their own delicious recipes by making different types of curries or gravies added with meat. They also enhance the Bunny with different types of toppings. Some chefs add chunks of virgin while others tend to top it with different salads. A Bunny whose filling does not start from the bottom of loaf is called as Funny Bunny. The filling in Funny Bunny starts from the center of the loaf.

Bunnies are eaten in quite a tricky manner. First of all, the salad or virgin topping is eaten. A virgin chunk topping is eaten by many enthusiasts as a starter, the Bunny being the main course. It is against the mannerisms of Durban to eat anyone else’s virgin without permission or invitation. Coming towards the bread loaf and curry, it is eaten with fingers. The part of bread loaf, above the level of curry is torn, dipped in curry and eaten. As the level of curry or gravy falls, the loaf can be easily torn from above it. Tearing a piece of loaf below the gravy line can leak out the gravy and hence turn into a disaster spoiling the Bunny. 

According to some sources, the Bunny was first invented when Indian golf players were brought lunch from Grey Street. The lunch was curry brought in loafs of bread due to unavailability of containers. Hence the name “Bunny Chow” came up meaning; food from the shopkeepers. Some sources think that it was specially invented for the Queen by one of her chefs.

Whatever the myths and facts, the attractions of African cities are way more convincing to keep going, the tourists’ cheap flights to Africa.