Malagasy cuisine

Malagasy cooking is rice-based and unspiced: rice at every meal, stewed meat, leafy greens and vanilla in the sweets.

Malagasy people eat more rice per head than almost anyone, and the Malagasy word for eating literally means "to eat rice".

Madagascar supplies roughly eighty per cent of the world's vanilla, yet local cooking uses it sparingly — mostly in baking and drinks.