During our time here at the children’s home, Rebekah and I have made an effort to introduce some new foods into the kid’s diet. Their diet is limited mainly due to their own choosing; I find Ugandans rarely willing to try new foods, or willing to try a new way of cooking foods. Of course, there always are, and ever will be, exceptions to this general finding, but I maintain that generally speaking, the Ugandans I interact with are new food scaredy-cats.
Tonight we brought lemons. Dinner was rice and beans with avocado; a nice meal. We like lemon on avocado, so we thought the kids might be willing to try. Each child received a lemon slice and the reactions were hilarious. Some loved them, but were totally unwilling to mix the lemon and avocado together. Others couldn’t spit fast enough. Of course, the reactions were accompanied by the appropriate sound effects, unfortunately yours truly is not skilled enough to transcribe the sounds. It was noisy.
Perhaps I should rewind a bit. The first new thing we introduced at meal time was black pepper. Yes, I am serious; black pepper. Rebekah wanted them to smell it before trying it; I saw the potential for them to sneeze all over our food, so I vetoed that idea. Just a dash on top of posho did the trick. The young ones learned the hard lesson that when poured onto food, black pepper is in fact hot, just as their aunts had warned them. Now our black pepper container is passed around at each meal time, the children having the freedom to decide if today is a “pepper day” or not. On a whole it is liked.
Secondly we introduced powdered ginger. Sprinkled on top of posho beans it is a surprisingly welcome change in taste. Again the kids made faces but were willing to try a dash sprinkled on the side of their plate. It was a hit among a good number of them; so much so that it has mysteriously disappeared. Tonight Rebekah was invited into the circle of trust by Santos; it is craftily hidden in the kitchen- TOP SECRET.
Two weeks ago we introduced cucumbers. I was thrilled at the treat Bekah had brought home from the market; the kids were skeptical. Eating uncooked vegetables (if that was in fact what the suspicious green thing was) is rarely done here. [Can I just highlight how kids across the world seem to have an inborn negative attribution bias against fresh veggies?!] We sliced up the beautiful cucs, and gave each kid a slice. Sprinkled a bit of salt and black pepper and then took a bite all at the same time. Edson thought we were trying to kill him. He actually was shocked that I would give him such a horrible thing to put in his mouth. Some kids only ate the inside part, not the peel; others excitedly asked for seconds. I really enjoyed my slices.
Tonight Jethro offers cucumbers to anyone who would like some; Bekah and I enthusiastically placed our order. Ever the showman – goofball, he carries a covered dish into the main hall and announces that unfortunately he was mistaken, there are no cucumbers left. Not like there were any cucumbers to begin with… but it was a funny dinner show. After returning his props he comes to sit with me and I ask him in a serious tone, where my cucumbers are. He proceeds to tell me a rambling story about a lion and a desert and a food shortage and throws some songs in there for good measure. In between laughing and shaking my head, I tell him how much I like cucumbers and how excited I was about having them tonight. He replies, “Even me! I like cucumbers, you see, they look grumpy, I mean, scrunchy, or, you know.”
Yes, I do know. I like cucumbers too, even the grumpy looking ones.
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