Food

I have had many requests for details on what the cuisine here is like so at long last here goes...

The main staple dish for most Kenyans is Ugali, this is a rather horrible tasting and textured mixture of flour and water steamed, hence why it is the staple dish- it is cheap. I have tasted it but since have simply said honestly that I dont like it as there has been no occasions where it is the only thing served and Nancy is very understanding!
It is served with Scumawiki, a kind of boiled green vegitable similar to cabage but discusting.
OR it is served with Vegetable Salad, a really yummy combination of cooked shreded cabage and carrot which I personally could eat an entire plate of! (there must be some kind of spice or something used but Im not sure what)
Otherwise there is alot of Rice cooked with onion garlic and often some masala spice or something
we eat 'spaggetti' tastes more like noodles and mashed potato alot at the house, sometimes green vegetables are mixed in with the mash, or peas or sweetcorn.
Chapatti -my new favourout thing...
Matoke a mixture of mashed potato and mashed sweet and under ripe banana very good actually
beans, both green and the small ones often mixed with sweetcorn (called maise here)
meat: mainly beef, as is not expencive, in stews or with the beans not seen any chicken, pork or terkey like we eat at home. Otherwise fish is common, we have had it fried and steamed.
The main way of cooking is on the hob, of when the gas is not working (it only comes on in the evenung anyway) on a coal BBQ type affaire- for many people always this way as many people- most of my nurse friends at NNH included, dont have a kitchen, they live in one room and cook outside. Poople therefore even if they own one, are not accostimed to ovens.
Lard is used in GREAT quantities (kenyans arent ones for the low fat option!)

Snacks:
no chocolate here really, you can buy t but is is expencive (ok the same as back home but comparitively expencive- a small mars bar costs 80KSH, the same as 16 Mendazies)
people tend to eat Mendazies- fried dough in a triangle shape -soooo good, or Dot Coms- a different type of dough in a sphere shape and more crispy rather than soft. these are sold and made by the side of the road.
Steamed or BBQd maise eaten in the same way as corn on the comb (for that is what it is) with salt instead of butter.
Sandwiches are seldome eaten, you cannot buy or order them anywhere though people might have them at home, on sliced bread, people dont have loaves from the bakery. Not really big on cakes, you can but dry sponge in the supermarket as you can biscuits but not fresh anywhere.
Chapatti is also eaten as a snack
boiled egg
Sugar cane can be bought and sliced buy the side of the road too.
FRUIT!! it is everywhere here banana, pinapple, mango, pawpaw, these different type of plum thing that are very nice...

Tea- a very different affaire to back home- water is boied on the stove (kettles dont seem to exist here) milk is added in equal quantities to the water, sometimes pasturised but often dried. Mixture is boiled, copuous amounts of sugar are added and brough back to the boil then tea granules are put in a sieve and the mixture is sieved through it several times. The whole thing is then poured into a plastic thermos flask, even when it is in the house or hospital.
Coffee my oh my dont go there it is rank