About my Blog

Lessons in the pot of a Kitchen Rookie. Here are simple recipes to play around with ranging from different cultures in Africa through Europe to Asia, cooking and kitchen tips. Find out secrets that make an ordinary meal extra ordinary. Entertain yourself with the different stories of my life and join me in my small and humble kitchen.

A meal for a Sister on her Birthday

Today is my sister Farida’s birthday. When we were little, you could lure my sister into your van as long as you had anything beefy.
I remember once when she appeared with a torn skirt all soiled with mud and my mum who was such a clever woman she knew her daughters too well for us to even lie to her and get away with it. My darling mother remembered that
  1. She kept roasted meat in the kitchen
  2. She last saw Farida go into the kitchen and not out
  3. There is no door out of the kitchen, except for the one mama sat next to
  4. There is a window in the kitchen that one is able to jump through
…Bingo…
That explains my sister’s appearance. My sister went into the kitchen to pinch a piece of roasted beef and got stuck trying to climb out the window. I will make sure all her future kids get to hear this story and tell them what a crazy kid their mum was.

 In Uganda when meat is roasted, grilled or dry fried in a masala, we call it Muchomo. So today am making a chicken muchomo, French beans salad and mashed potatoes in honor of my sister’s 20—something really old birthday.
Happy Birthday Farida and May you live to eat more and more of muchomo in your lifetime. xxx

One from America's Culinary History

I don’t always go out so much in huge groups, not that I don’t enjoy it, I do , I really do but I find myself taking in and watching a movie or documentaries or chatting away on a game of cards.
I have a global collection of friends. At any moment I know I took a walk through someone’s mind anywhere in the world.

Sugar Nut Squares

I always thought that everyone knew everything I knew, I kind of had this idea that what I know is not so out of the ordinary, like I thought duh!!!! Everyone knows cassava but honestly am not sure if an Australian in Melbourne who has no idea that Africa now has a new state would know about cassava, I still doubt that the middle aged African in the deepest Bungatira village (my Grand papa’s village home) is aware that even the Scottish don’t patiently line up for food during rationing that is if they even know Scotland exists.