bokkem, noun

/ˈbɔkəm/
Forms:
bokking, bokkomShow more Also bokking, bokkom, bokom, bokkum.
Origin:
DutchShow more Dutch bokking, bokkem smoked herring.
Especially in the Western Cape: a salted, dried, and sometimes smoked whole fish, usually a small mullet (see harder); the flesh of a fish prepared in this way.
Note:
Occasionally called Cape biltong or fish biltong. See also biltong.
1866 L. Pappe Synopsis of Edible Fishes 19They (sc. mullets) make good table-fish, but are more frequently salted or smoke-dried (Bokkoms) like the Herring.
1891 H.J. Duckitt Hilda’s ‘Where Is It?’ 92The small dried and salted herring commonly called at the Cape ‘Bokom,’ is very good when done this way.
1910 D. Fairbridge That Which Hath Been (1913) 82He has a good appetite now — though he is still lean as a bokking.
c1936 M. Valbeck Headlong from Heaven 33She eats snoek and bokkoms and what not before she goes to bed.
1945 H. Gerber Fish Fare 16The term bokkems was originally applied to salted and air-dried harders, but now many other kinds of fish are prepared in the same way.
1955 A. Delius Young Trav. in S. Afr. 99After a hearty breakfast of oatmeal porridge, eggs and some dried salt-fish called bokkems, Dick went out.
1969 J.R. Grindley Riches of Sea 68Some harders and maasbankers were hung to dry as ‘bokkoms’ in the wind and sun on lines stretched between posts near the fishing villages.
1970 H. De Villiers in S. Afr. Panorama June 8Some people call it ‘Cape biltong’, but as a rule it is better known as bokkem — delicious dried fish which is peculiar to the Western Cape Province...I met an expert on bokkems...‘Here we concentrate on haarder, stumpnose, steenbras, elf (shad) and “doppies” (small silver fish). Bokkems are also often made from marsbanker.’
1990 M.M. Hacksley (tr. of E. van Heerden) in Lynx 183There were some farmers a man simply did not work for if he could possibly help it. They were the sjambok farmers who paid you nothing but bokkems and mealiemeel and trouble.
1993 [see harder].
a salted, dried, and sometimes smoked whole fish, usually a small mullet (see harder); the flesh of a fish prepared in this way.
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Dutch
bokhorinkie, nounn.Bokkeveld, nounn.
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