Waru has become such an important aspect of our culture that we’ve even made them part of our language for those moments when we feel just a tiny bit envious of someone. While potatoes have, for the longest time, been associated with central Kenya and the cuisine hailing from this part of the country, it has to be said that potato love is really a Kenyan thing.
Starting at the Coast, we encounter the first form of this wonderful tuber: viazi karai. This street-food is one scrumptious snack whose vendors are always sure of a ready market. Boiling the potatoes, filling them with the sour chili paste, and dunking them into an egg-flour batter is part of the process to the magic. The spices in the batter and the deep-frying of the potato until it’s golden-brown make viazi karai a favorite of the seafaring population.
Moving from fried potatoes, it is clear that Kenyans love their mashed potato dishes. And in Eastern Kenya, each variety of the starch is paired with legumes into the tastiest meals. Here we find a potato labor of love named Wukunu. What makes this particular waru meal such a labor is the fact that the njahi (black beans/dolichos) have to be dehulled before they’re added to sweet potatoes and mashed. Dehulling the beans takes hours from the time one starts soaking them to the process of actually removing the skin from each bean. Yet the end product is well-worth it. And the work it took to prepare this meal is honored as a reserve of special occasions in decades past.
A hop, skip and step away in Western Kenya, when one wants to take a break from the usual ugali combo, they cook up Mushenye. Just like Wukunu, sweet potatoes are part of the party, but rather than njahii, beans and maize are incorporated into the mashed potatoes for that feeling of fulfillment.
In Central cuisine, potatoes are liberally included in every meal. If you don’t bump into one at some point, you haven’t dipped far enough in the stew. For the people in this area, mukimo is the reigning potato dish. With the wholesome tastiness of the pumpkin leaves, the dish attains its iconic bright green color. Green, or fresh maize gives that final heartiness that crowns Mukimo with its soul-food status.
Due to the fact that potatoes need a good source of water to grow as they should, the more arid parts of Kenya enjoy different starches from the potato. But for the communities more inland, the potato remains to be the best thing after sliced bread.
Now it’s your turn. What do you love about potatoes?
