What's for Lunch? :-0

Cooking Porridge

Many of you know that I like to try new and different foods. So you can imagine I was excited about going to Uganda and finding something really weird to try......

Before we discuss what I ate, I thought I should mention the kids. We had the opportunity to serve children their snack at one of the local Compassion-assisted churches.  The children get supplemental nutrition, since poor nutrition is very often one of the barriers to the children getting out of poverty.  Poor nutrition leads to poor health, poor mental development, poor learning, etc.  Rather than getting a standard nutritional program that's the same for everyone, the program is tailored to the address the local nutritional deficiencies.  If they need protein, they get protein.  If they need something else, they get something else.  In this case, their snack was a porridge, served in an assembly line of plastic mugs.  Imagine cream of wheat made with WAY too much water, and some milk (see photo above).  It looked okay hot, but like it might turn into a gloppy mess if it cooled down.  (No, I didn't try the porridge....because they didn't offer me any....).  The children lined up very nicely to get their porridge.  No complaining, no whining that they wanted something else.  Every child calmly took their mug and drank it all down.

Porridge Mug Assembly Line

Now back to us adults....

  

All our lunches were prepared by area churches that ran Compassion-assisted child development projects.  So what we got was "the real deal," what the locals eat.  If we could avoid getting sick, the opportunity to eat like the locals was very appealing. 

Our first meal was great - just what I was expecting.  They prepared white rice, potatoes, matoke (a non-sweet very solid blob of plantain), a couple small pieces of beef (tough and with the bone in - but I know this beef was a very big deal), and a bit of cole slaw (I crossed my fingers that the cole slaw wouldn't "do me in," but I didn't want to offend them by refusing it).  The pink stuff covering the rice in the photo below is ground nut sauce.   Ground nuts are a staple food in Uganda - they're very similar to peanuts.  You can eat them roasted like peanuts, or in this case, you cook them in water and grind them up to make the ground nut sauce.  Very nice flavor....  Overall, a great lunch.

The next day, we ate at another church.  They prepared us a fine lunch, which you can see here.  Notice anything?  That's right - it's very similar.  White rice, matoke, potatoes, ground nut sauce.  Instead of cole slaw, we had turnip greens.  And, they added on a slice of avocado (YUM).  Also two small fried chicken wings.  Overall, very good.  We didn't say anything about having just had virtually the same meal at the other church - we didn't want them to feel bad.

The next day we again ate at the same church.  We had.....white rice, matoke, potatoes, ground nut sauce, and cole slaw.  I was starting to get tired of white rice, matoke, potatoes and ground nut sauce.  I wondered if the person in charge of the kids program was going to give someone a piece of her mind for repeating the same meal.  I didn't bother taking a picture....I already had one from the prior day.

The next day we again ate at that same church.  What do you think we had????  YOU GOT IT!  White rice, matoke, potatoes, ground nut sauce.   As I kept seeing what foods were available over the week, those same foods kept cropping up.  If you were lucky, you might get a few beans with your rice. 

I got the point - there's not a lot of choice around there.  They grow their food locally (often each family growing their own food), and there's not much else they can grow.  They can't afford to import different foods like we do.  So they eat the same thing, day in and day out. 

One night we went out to the local cultural center, and they served us dinner along with the show.  That was different, sort of....  We had potatoes (french fries), turnip greens, and goat kabobs. I was relieved to not have the matoke and white rice!  The goat was great! 

Goat Kabob dinner

Watusi Cow

It turns out goat is one of the priciest meats in Uganda.  This was surprising, because we saw goats tied up wherever we went.  But it turns out the most inexpensive meat is beef, so that's what gets eaten.  The cattle in Uganda (Watusi's) are different than what we're used to - they all (cows and bulls) have massive horns.  I saw a truck-load of these being driven down the road.  Horns everywhere - I was just hoping the truck didn't make a sudden stop or someone would get hurt.... 

Butcher Shop

Butcher shop scenes like this always made me question just how long they leave the beef hanging outside - I was envisioning it hanging for days, gathering flies.  So I asked Margaret, the project worker that accompanied our sponsor child Joyce (more on Joyce in a subsequent post).  Much to my relief, Margaret told me that at their village, they slaughter one cow a day, and sell it that same day.  The next day they slaughter another cow.  On a holiday, they may slaughter 3 cows.  But whatever is killed gets sold that same day. 

Joyce lives in a village of 15,000 people, each of which can eat from that day's cow.  To my American ways, one cow seemed a bit tight for all those people, especially considering the number of skinny cows we had seen!  I did some researching about how much meat you get off of a cow, and started crunching the numbers.  Here's how it works out - if Joyce's village had a McDonald's, this is what the average daily "Quarter Pounder" would look like (of course, they wouldn't have the cheese!):

Eddie displaying the Jack Fruit

We expected the fruit in Uganda to be quite good - and it was.  Watermelons, cantaloupe, pineapple were fabulous.  The most interesting (and luscious) fruit was something called a Jack Fruit.  It grows on (what else?) a Jack Fruit tree.  The inside of the fruit has light yellow slippery "pods" about the size of your big toe.  You squeeze out something that looks like an overgrown marble lima bean, and eat the rest of the pod.  It tastes like no other fruit we could think of - it was great!

 

Jack Fruit Tree