Durban's most original dish: a white bread loaf, hallowed out and filled with curry. Invented as take-away packaging in the 1940s. Eaten without cutlery, standing at a counter.
About Bunny Chow
Durban's most original dish and South Africa's greatest street food, a half or quarter loaf of white bread with the dough scooped out and replaced with a lamb, bean or chicken curry; the scooped bread is used to mop the curry; invented by Indian immigrants in Durban in the 1940s; a UNESCO-adjacent treasure of South African Indian cuisine; eaten without cutlery at the counter of Durban's Grey Street curry houses.
Durban's Original
Bunny chow is Durban's most inventive dish: a half or quarter loaf of white bread, hollowed out and filled with curry. The scooped-out bread is used to mop up the sauce, and the loaf itself becomes the bowl. It is eaten without cutlery, by hand, at the counter of a curry house.
“Bunny chow is Durban's most inventive dish: a half or quarter loaf of white bread, hollowed out and filled with curry.”
A Packaging Solution
The dish was created by Durban's Indian community in the mid-twentieth century as a way to carry take-away curry without a container, the bread doing the job of a bowl and a spoon at once. That practical origin became a genuine culinary tradition. It is a clever solution that turned into an icon.
The Curry and Bread
The filling is a proper curry, commonly lamb, chicken or bean, spooned into the hollow loaf so the bread soaks up its juices. The bread must be fresh and slightly crusty, since a stale loaf collapses under the moisture before the meal is finished. The bean curry version is the vegetarian original and often the most flavourful.
Durban's Indian Heritage
Bunny chow is the clearest expression of South African Indian cooking, born in the curry houses of Durban and tied to the city's large Indian community. Eaten at a Grey Street curry house, the bustle of the place is part of the experience. It is a dish whose humble, practical beginnings became a point of real cultural pride.
What to Expect
The bunny chow arrives as a half loaf, the curry filling steaming inside the bread. A right hand guides the scooped bread, allowing the loaf walls to collect the curry.
Why Try It
Bunny chow is South African Indian cuisine's most inventive creation, a packaging solution that became a dish of genuine cultural significance.
Insider Tips
- Eat it at a Grey Street curry house in Durban, the atmosphere is inseparable from the dish.
- Bean curry bunny chow is the vegetarian original and often the most flavourful version.
- The bread must be fresh, a stale loaf collapses under the curry's moisture.
