Tannie Evita truly everybody’s darling

Tannie Evita at the Capetalk studios on Monday

It’s a basic rule of publishing: know who you’re publishing for. At Randomstruik we are in the habit of identifying target audiences for every title we publish. With Evita’s Kossie Sikelela the answer seems to be that the target audience is alles en almal. Tannie Evita’s abundant fan base cuts across gender, language, age and cultural boundaries. It even cuts across party lines. Liewe aarde, she truly seems to be the most famous white woman in South Africa!

In the Capetalk studios on Monday and at her Woordfees book launch in Stellenbosch on Tuesday this eternal flame of Boere chutzpah dazzled friend and foe alike. As a close confidante to many of the flawed gods of government she explained that one eventually becomes tired of eating wors — even though her ageing Romeo Pik Botha is living proof that a little bit of wors goes a long way.

So there’s no wors in this cookery book. No wors whatsoever! You will find recipes for putupap and prawn kebabs, kabeljou and Koornhof’s Cape Coloured surprise, ostrich and Ouma Ossewania’s brandewynkoek, smoorsnoek and Shabir’s gold coin fricassee, roosterkoek and Winnie’s Stompie ragout.

And haai sjym, when Capetalk opened their lines on Monday Tannie Evita’s fans included posh totties and the hoi polloi in equal measures. There was a diabetic from Durbanville weeping tears of relief when she realised the book included recipes for her too. And a woman who told Tannie how she would shortly be moving from her shack to a house.
“I’ll have a kitchen for the first time, Tannie Evita. My children bought me a stove. But I don’t own a single recipe book!”
“My dear, then you must have a copy of Kossie Sikelela,” said the most famous white woman in South Africa, born Evangelie Poggenpoel of humble Boer origins in the dusty Orange Free State town of Bethlehem, and she gave one of her most dazzling smiles.