It's been quite a while since I've been to a supper club. When I first moved to London back in 2013, it was all the rage to go to supper clubs. One of favourites is still the amazing White Room Supper and so when I received a lovely email to ask if I'd like to come down to an East African supper club by The Culinary Discovery Club and Colline’s Kitchen in partnership with Yellow Zebra, I couldn't resist. Plus it meant I had a legitimate excuse to leave my desk at a reasonable hour for once.
I've travelled quite extensively but actually I'd never been to Africa until March and then it was to Morocco so very much Northern Africa and often misrepresented as a Middle Eastern country. So I was really intrigued to try what East African food was like. My friend Helen is Eritrean and together we'd had Ethiopian food as at the time that was the closest we could find in London (although I believe there are some Eritrean restaurants south of the river now). But that was about the extent of my East African food knowledge (so basically none).
The supper club was hosted by Yellow Zebra Safaris’ which organise a range of luxury Safaris all over East Africa. They employ former professional safari guides, camp managers or people born and raised in Africa, ensuring clients speak to the true industry experts. Plus sat opposite me was Shona who works in the UK office who whilst she grew up in Africa, in fact was born on a mid flight! Yep, you can read about it here! Crazy.
They'd just launched their Tanzania experiences that week too which sound like the absolute dream as that includes the Serengeti National Park.
But back to the food. For starters we had Matooke and Luwombo, which is a Ugandan/Rawanda meal made from steamed green bananas and plantains, spicy mushrooms all cooked in a banana leaf. We actually assembled this ourselves and learned how roll and secure the banana leaf for stewing.
For mains we tried Mchuzi wa samaki which is a traditional spicy curry from Tanzanian/Kenya made of salmon and hake, served with brown rice. It was interesting as it wasn't spicy like you might think. Having been used to "spicy" meaning, hot and burning your mouth, this was more a slow mixture of flavours that sort of just leave a small tingle. The fish was also delicious and melting.
The dessert; Mandazi was pretty awesome too. Ugandan coconut doughnuts served with chocolate and caramel sauces.
I'd never experienced East African food properly before and it was delicious and you can really taste how fresh, organic ingredients is used. I'd definitely recommend checking out the supper club for something a little different and hopefully I'll one day get to try this food again but actually in Africa.
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