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CHARITY KEITA
Ooh!
They exclaimed,
as they noisily
sucked marrow
out of the bones
I
had a dinner party the other
night. My guests were one of
those typical Nairobian international assortments: some
Kenyans, an Ethiopian and an
Italian/British couple thrown in for
colour (I’m kidding of course: Giorgio and Bella, no dinner would be
complete without your scintillating
conversation). My buddies Sheila
and Njoroge recently announced
their engagement (via WhatsApp,
is there any other way?) so we
had planned to make our weekly
dinner a celebration of the happy
news.
Let me provide a bit of background: we are a bunch of closeknit foodie friends. When we are
not eating food, we are probably
talking about it. We love food, we
love drink, we love to go out to
restaurants but above all we love
to cook and share the conviviality
that comes with eating together.
Every week, one of us takes it
MY LIFE
AS A
FOODIE
Born to a Kenyan/Malian diplomatic parents, Charity
Keita spent her childhood hanging out in kitchens in
the various countries her dad was assigned to. With
this knowledge came the great responsibility of
sharing her foodie knowledge with the world.
upon themselves to cook for the
rest of the group. We are not, may
I add, members of the Nairobi
Expat Food Lovers Facebook group
because when it was launched,
we all decided that we were not
comfortable being part of a foodie
group that defines itself by the
expat identity of its members. I
mean seriously, I get Nairobi Social
Expat - you’re new in town and
want someone to hang out with;
I also get Nairobi Expat Housing
- you want to have people with
similar life experiences to share
your living quarters with. But Nairobi Expat Food Lovers? Really? Is
the implication that Kenyans could
never be food lovers? The group is
at best discriminatory/elitist and at
worst racist.
But I digress.
My mission for the night was
to make a Kenyan meal with an
Italian twist. Everyone is always so
focused on international cuisine,
that they forget that with a bit of
imagination, our food too can be
adapted into something worthy of
world-class gourmets. After some
thought, I settled on a menu of Ossobuco (cross-cut veal shanks) and
Ugali, with a side of sukuma wiki
and those lovely Kenyan cherry
tomatoes that have begun appearing in my local veg shop.
So I proceeded with an Italian
style stew: brown the meat, fry
up the onion and carrots, stick in
a bunch of white wine, reserve a
glass for yourself, throw in a bay
leaf and let it bubble away for
however long it takes. For the ugali,
I