Whether we’re pairing it with a tasty wet-fry, mayai-kitunguu-nyanya, or traditional vegetables cooked with cream, we love our ugali. So ingrained has this food become in our culture, that most do not realize that it has only been part of the Kenyan diet for a few hundred years.
Maize landed on the continent at around 1500 A.D., but before that Africans farmed sorghum, millet, and other small grains which needed far more care, and yielded far less. The tragedy was possibly the fact that these indigenous crops weren’t filling and so barely two hours after eating, our people were hungry again. Through barter trade and the influence of colonization, our people would be fed and paid in the pearly white grains, which they would take home and grind into fine flour, or mix with some other grains for a hearty meal. By 2000, just 19 years ago, maize had become Africa’s most important crop. This phenomenon is illustrated in the fact that, in Malawi, they started using the phrase “chimanga ndi moyo,” a phrase meaning “maize is life.”
But let’s talk about the product that has made us love maize…. Ugali! Today, it is eaten in many different forms all over Africa, the maize meal pure or mixed in with other plant flours. The same is true of Kenya. Though the most familiar form of ugali is the white, steaming-hot doughy cake served in most eateries, we can find it in a wide variation of colors and consistencies throughout the nation.
For the tribes of Western Kenya, the adherence to sorghum and millet as cereal staple remains strong, thus giving their ugali the brown color they know and love. This ugali brings rich earthiness to the crisp popcorn taste of the maize, while increasing the nutritional value of the meal. A Cushitic community of Kenya enjoys mixing in millet flour as well as sour milk as they prepare their ugali. Gurda is the title this group has given to their unique ugali. With the tartness of the fermented dairy, gurda adds a tantalizing zing to every meal of the Burji tribe of Northern Kenya. The Mijikenda bring the final creative twist to this ugali story with their special recipe. They incorporate mashed green bananas into their ugali flour; they call this vinolo. The tiny specks of the bananas’ seeds color the ugali in a fascinating way, as its flavor and consistency compliment the stews which usually accompany vinolo.
What’s your favorite way to enjoy the signature Kenyan food? Are you that guy that can’t look up from his/her plate when ugali is served? Anything special you add to the flour as it cooks? Let us in on the secret.
