braai, verb
/ˈbraɪ/
- Forms:
- Formerly also bry.
- Origin:
- Afrikaans, DutchShow more Afrikaans, from Dutch braden to roast, grill.
a. transitive. To grill (meat) over a fire, usually in the open air. Also absolute.
1941 A.G. Bee Kalahari Camp Fires (1943) 36They had made a more than usually splendid fire, and perhaps it was the beauty of this that made them ‘braai’ the bones instead of leaving such process to the boys.
1970 Evening Post 17 Oct. (Suppl.) 6Braai (grill) over glowing coals until brown on one side then turn and grill other side which is thickest, until brown and cooked but juicy.
1974 E. Prov. Herald 16 May 1Delegates and guests forsook the cuisine of the upper floors for good old ‘pap en vleis’ braaied in the hotel’s parking basement.
b. intransitive. To hold a barbecue.
1963 M.G. McCoy Informant, Port ElizabethWe all braaied for lunch of course.
1973 M. Philip Caravan Caravel 28A group of men were getting their barbecue fires going. ‘That’s what we must do, Dad,’ said Peter longingly. ‘We must braai often. We hardly ever do it.’
1983 G. Silber in Sunday Times 28 Aug. (Mag. Sect.) 18People come to Bapsies to braai and sit on blankets and dop and buy their kids orange Mirandas and purple candy-floss and shrivel-wrapped hamburgers.
To grill (meat) over a fire, usually in the open air. Also absolute.
To hold a barbecue.
- Derivatives:
- Hence braaied /braɪd/ participial adjective, of food: grilled over an open fire; braaier /ˈbraɪə/ noun, one who braais; braaiing /ˈbraiɪŋ/ verbal noun. Also attributive, and figurative.1973 E. Prov. Herald 7 Feb.The Oudtshoorn Golf Club has invited the Free State vleisbraai champions..to compete..in a Vleisbraai competition against local braaiers.1977 Sunday Times 27 Feb. 15‘Braai-ing’ is a lifestyle with certain old familiar problems: nowhere to sit where ants can’t get you, nowhere to stand where gusts of smoke can’t sting your eyes.1978 Z. Roos in Darling 1 Feb. 82I think chicken pieces for a braai must be precooked for success. I know lots of expert braaiers don’t agree.1978 Sunday Times 19 Feb. 5No wonder..that Johannesburg braaiers were upset..that an uitlander from England had been asked to help judge the Southern Transvaal championships.1984 Reader’s Digest Jan. 42Altogether there were 3 600 entries, including many braaiers with their own home-made boerewors.1984 Reader’s Digest Jan. 43Those who never seem to manage braaing without a Guy Fawkes display of pyrotechnics.1988 G. Spence in Sunday Times 10 Jan. 56Stories abound about how he spent weeks as a kid camping on riverbanks and feasting on braaied cane rats.1989 S. Johnson in Laughing Stock Sept.–Oct. 10My eldest brother, erstwhile repository of braaiing traditionalism, sheepishly snuck a ‘Blitz’ beneath his ailing coalbed.1993 Flying Springbok Apr. 123The outer layer toughens slightly and, with the heat of the coals, crispens and traps in the tender flesh. The technique is great with just about any braaied fish.
Copyright © 2020 Dictionary Unit for South African English.
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