Food

At Steven Tito Academy (STA) we are given porridge to drink in the morning to help us stay focused. We are also given a free hot meal at lunch time. It is really important to eat well to keep your mind and body healthy. If we didn't eat we would be very tired and would not learn very much.

At 10:30 we all go to the kitchen to get our porridge. We each have our own cup. Jamila, our great cook, pours the porridge into the cup.

Drinking porridge

At lunch time we return to the kitchen. Jamila is there waiting for us. She puts our food onto metal plates. We have something different every day. Our favourite day is when we have chips and egg. We have to line up outside the kitchen and wait for our food. We always say thank you to Jamila for preparing our food.

Waiting to be served by Jamila.

We want to show you the food we eat here in Tanzania. On Monday, we had spaghetti with a tomato sauce. We always wash our hands before eating. It is very important to do this especially because we eat with our hands.

Ally and his spaghetti.

We eat everything with our hands.

On Tuesday, we had rice and chicken with a vegetable sauce. We call this meal wali kuku. The chicken is fried and cooked with salt. It tastes good.

Some of the girls enjoying their wali kuku.

On Wednesday, we had ugali with spinach, sauce and fish. Ugali is a dish of maize flour (cornmeal) cooked with water to make a polenta-like doughy side dish. It is very common to eat ugali in Tanzania. We roll the ugali into a ball and then dip it in the sauce.

We sit on the floor to eat. We take it in turns to sweep up afterwards.

We hope you enjoyed reading about what we eat at break and lunch. We are very happy to have this food provided to us at school.

Questions:
1. What is our favourite food?
2. What is wali kuku?
3. Why is it important to wash your hands before you eat?
4. What do you have for break and lunch? Do you get hot food given to you at school as well?
5. Have you tried ugali before?
6. What are some of the similarities and differences between food in your country and Tanzania?