Ugali

Ugali and cabbage. It is more typically eaten with kale (Sukuma wiki)

Ugali is an East African dish (also sometimes called sima, sembe, or posho) of maize flour (cornmeal) cooked with water to a porridge- or dough-like consistency. It is the most common staple starch of much of Eastern and Southern Africa. When Ugali is made from another starch, it is usually given a specific regional name.

Ugali with beef and sauce

The traditional method of eating ugali (and the most common in the rural areas) is to roll a lump into a ball with the right hand, and then dip it into a sauce or stew of vegetables and/or meat. Making a depression with the thumb allows the ugali to be used to scoop, and to wrap around pieces of meat to pick them up in the same way that flat bread is used in other cultures.

Ugali and sukuma wiki

Ugali is relatively inexpensive and is thus easily accessible to the poor who usually combine it with a vegetable stew (e.g. sukuma wiki in Kenya) or meat stews and makes a filling meal. Ugali is easy to make and the flour can last for considerable time in average conditions. Maize from which the flour is obtained is hardy and will grow reliably in dry seasons. For these reasons, ugali is an important part of the diet of millions of people of Sub Saharan Africa.

In Swahili (both in Kenya and in Tanzania), it is known as ugali.

In Kenya, it is also known as kimyet in Kalenjin, ngima in Kikuyu, kuon in Luo, Obusuma in the Nyole dialect of the Luhya tribe, and obokima in the Kisii language (Ekegusii).

In Uganda, ugali has several regional names including posho.

Similar foods

In South Africa, cornmeal mush is a staple food called mealie pap; elsewhere in Southern Africa it is called isitshwala or bogobe in Setswana or sadza in Zimbabwe, nshima in Zambia and Malawi, and "Oshifima" or Pap in Namibia. Fufu, a starch-based food from West and Central Africa, may also be made from maize meal, in which case it may be called fufu corn. In the Caribbean, similar dishes are cou-cou (Barbados), funchi (Curaçao) and funjie (Virgin Islands). It is known as funche in Puerto Rican cuisine and mayi moulin in Haitian cuisine. Ugali is also called obusuma in Luhya, which is in western Kenya.

See also

Food portal

• Cornmeal
• Fufu
• Kalenjin
• Kimnyet
• Mămăliga
• Nshima
• Obokima (Kisii)
• Obusuma
• Sima
• Sembe
• Tuareg Food

External links

• Congo Cook Book
• Kenya Recipes