Dibi

Dibi is Dakar's definitive after-dark meat feast: chopped mutton or lamb grilled over a wood fire at dedicated late-night shops called dibiteries, then hacked into pieces and served on butcher paper with raw onions, a mustard-vinegar sauce and kaani chilli.

The dibiterie is a specific institution — a small shop with a wood grill, a butcher's block and usually no seating, open from evening until very late. The word comes from Wolof and the format is Senegalese, though the technique connects it to the wider West African grilled-meat culture of suya and choukouya.

The meat is grilled in large pieces and chopped afterwards, which is the opposite of a skewer tradition and the defining feature of this family of dishes. Grilling whole keeps the interior moist; chopping afterwards distributes the fat and the char through every mouthful and lets the vendor season it on the board.

The onion sauce is made separately and is not a marinade: sliced onions cooked down with mustard, vinegar, stock and pepper into a sharp, loose relish. It is spooned over the chopped meat at the moment of serving, and its acidity against the fat is the whole balance of the dish.

Mutton or lamb — shoulder or leg, in large pieces, bone-in where possible. Senegalese dibiteries use the whole animal and different cuts are sold at different prices. Fat is left on.

Dijon mustard is genuinely the mustard used, a French colonial inheritance. Onions in quantity, white vinegar, black pepper, and a stock cube — Senegalese cooking uses them unapologetically. Kaani, the chilli paste, on the side. Tapalapa or French bread.

On butcher paper with the onion-mustard sauce over it, raw onion, kaani chilli and bread, eaten with the hands standing or sitting on a bench. It is late-night communal food and a dibiterie order is sized for sharing.