A little video - fast food (not impala)

A look at Malawian food - This link takes you to a short CNN video about "fast food" in Malawi. Sorry but there is a 20 second advertizing clip that plays first. Just wait and the real one will come up. All of the foods it shows are very common here. The nsema the video shows is THE staple food that the people eat usually twice a day along with a variety of side dishes that they call "relish". Nsema really reminds me of cream of wheat porridge both in flavor and texture and they do eat it, just like the video shows, with their fingers. You take a piece and form it into a ball, play with it for a while, then grab a bit of "relish" for flavor and pop it in your mouth. There is often a mixed vegetable dish of some sort but the bulk of the meal is nsema. They use a lot of tomatoes, cabbage, and various relatives of spinach or swiss chard for the vegetable dish. Most of the people do not have electricity or water in their homes so most cooking is done over a little wood or charcoal fire and the water is carried in large containers on the heads of usually women or girls from the neighborhood tap or borehole pump (depending if you live in the city or out in the country).

You will see that most houses have a little porch on the front. Often that is where they will cook. Sometimes they have a little separate "kitchen" where the cooking is done. The shelter of the porch is very important especially in the rainy season. Pretty well all houses are built up on a bit of a platform and if you had been here for the past couple or three weeks you would see why. It can rain here so hard that in a matter of seconds there is water running everywhere.