The Wanga Kingdom has held its first-ever cultural foods and drinks expo to showcase its cuisine.
Dubbed as 'Food and Drinks Tourism of the only Existing Kingdom in Kenya', the organisers displayed vegetables like dried termites (tsiswa), obwoba (mushroom stew), omurere and inderema, pumpkin leaves vegetable (lisebebe) and quail (isindu) and drinks such as busaa and herbal medicine among others.
Visitors during the event that took place at Eshiembekho shrine in Matungu subcounty on Saturday were also served busaa and herbal medicine used by the ancient Wanga community.
In December last year, the Inter-Regional Economic Network launched the first-ever cookbook for cuisines of people of Western Kenya. The book features 16 recipes of foods popularly prepared by natives of Western.
They include mushroom stew (obwoba), green grams and sweet potato (omushenye), dried termites (tsiswa), black nightshade (esufwa), beans and sweet potato composite (omushenye), smoked beef (shihango), jute and cowpeas leaves mixed (omurere and likhubi), free-range chicken (ingokho) and sorghum porridge (obusera).
Others are spider plant (chisaka), boiled narrow leaves (emiro), pumpkin leaves vegetable (lisebebe), dried fish (eshibambala), bamboo shoots (kamalea) and millet ugali.
Wanga King Peter Mumia II urged Kenyans to embrace indigenous foods to curb growing lifestyle diseases that have become silent killers.
“We have started something that is going to be big, showing the entire world what we eat and benefits of indigenous food to our bodies,” King Mumia II said.
Organisers intend to grow preference for the cuisines to international level in coming days.
The Wanga was the most highly developed and centralised kingdom in Kenya’s history before the advent of the colonialists in the early 1900s.
According to King Mumia II, the expo will facilitate the development of meaningful business connections in terms of cultural food production to other communities locally and internationally.
“The local foods are beneficial to our bodies and using them will also help boost the economies of rural areas and promote food security in the country during this Covid-19 pandemic time,” Kassim Mukoya, a member of the Nabongo cultural council said.
“The purpose of the day was to showcase the art of cooking and traditional Luhya food and we must encourage the younger generation to adopt this healthy living lifestyle,” Mukoya said.
He said the food was boiled, smoked or dried in the sun to avoid any use of modern chemical enhanced spices.
(edited by o. owino)