Spaghetti + Ugandans = Failure?

In a land of rice and beans…or matoke and groundnut sauce (which is an interesting purple color and tastes similar to watered down peanut butter)…or rice and g-nut sauce…or matoke and beans… it seemed logically that my Ugandan family would have been as excited for something new as I have been for the past three weeks. So this past weekend Cyndi and I decided to share a little American food with our Ugandan family. Interestingly enough, our “American” food consisted of Mexican quesadillas, Italian spaghetti and French bread. The only thing remotely American we made was no-bake cookies.

The inspiration for quesadilla’s came from my lovely sister, Sarah. It wasn’t long after moving into my home that I learned Sarah had never tasted cheese. In my American home, that is borderline sacrilegious. So on Friday, I promptly bought some cheddar cheese for her to try. It was after further examination of this cheese, which looked and smelled nothing like our cheddar, that Cyndi and I decided maybe we should make quesadillas. This way if the cheese was nasty, we’d at least still be able to enjoy eating a little chipati. It was unbelievably fun making our quesadillas for a pre-supper snack that night. Joyfully, they turned out much better than I thought they would after taking a smell of that odd cheese. Mama Toto told us if they had the money to afford cheese, she’d make them every day. It cost 2,500 shillings…$1.25.

On Saturday, Cyndi, Sarah, Kevin, and I headed to town to do a little shopping for the meal Cyndi and I were going to prepare for Sunday night…American/Italian spaghetti. After a mad search of Mukono on Saturday afternoon, looking for anything remotely similar to the things necessary for marinara sauce, we were more than ready to give our family a taste of American, and ourselves a taste of home.

Sunday, I awoke eager with excitement. Not only would I be cooking and eating spaghetti for supper, I would also be attending my first Catholic service with my family. As a Protestant, this was already quite an interesting experience. It was made even more interesting, however, by a random man walking into the church half-way through the sermon, talking loudly in Luganda. Being that I don’t speak Luganda, I have no idea what his purpose was, but all it took was for a male member of the congregation to stand up and walk towards him for the man to quickly turn and leave.

Following church, Cyndi and I happily set to work preparing the no-bake cookies. Never have they smelled so wonderful. Yay for gooey, chocolaty goodness! For Cyndi, no-bakes are a family favorite. For me, no-bakes remind me of my younger sister. Making them was interesting for the both of us, for we love our Ugandan family…but at the same time it made us long for the people we love so much back home.

Preparing the spaghetti…I don’t even know where to begin. Thinking back, a part of me wants to cry from embarrassment (for I usually do know what I’m doing in a kitchen) while the other part of me just wants to laugh hysterically.

First, my family likes to eat around 9pm. This means when they are preparing the 5-7 different dishes we have each night, they have to start cooking no later than 6pm to get it all cooked in time. When Toto told us we should start preparing at 6, Cyndi and I looked at each other in panic. If we started preparing our food at 6, we would have been eating at 7:30 at the latest. So we attempted to do everything as slowly as possible. It was actually quick comically. For as I was attempting to slow the process of cooking the spaghetti sauce, I was only able to accomplish basically burning the onions, peppers, and garlic I was trying to sauté. The picture of Sarah and me was taken during the burning process... After adding the tomato paste, I had to keep removing it from the heat and putting it back on so it would stay warm, but not burn.

Step three: spaghetti noodles. Being that I come from a family of 6 and am used to cooking meals for them, you would think I would know how many noodles it would take to feed 7 people. However, Cyndi talking it my ear did little to assist me in this process. After boiling a large pot of water, which took almost an hour to accomplish over our little wood fire, I added two packages of spaghetti noodles to the steaming pot. Unsure if that would feed our family, for Ugandans love their seconds, I called Cyndi into the kitchen for her opinion on the amount of noodles. Ten minutes and two more packages of noodles later, I was attempting not to laugh hysterically as I attempted to stir the heaping pot of noodles. When I asked Sarah for her assistance to move the food to the table, the shock in her eyes when she spied the mountain of spaghetti in the pan was almost more than I could take.

After a prayer for the meal, Cyndi explained a little about the American meal we’d prepared then scooped up a large helping for Toto, complete with a steaming slice of crumbling garlic French bread. Then each of our siblings came forward…taking very small portions in comparison to their normal supper experience. Cyndi and I, however, both piled our plates high with the delicious smelling food. As we ate, Cyndi noted we had barely made a dent in our enormous pile of noodles, joking we’d be eating the stuff for the next week and a half. Embarrassed by the fact that we could afford to buy that many noodles for one sitting while my family couldn’t afford to buy that much in a week’s time, it was then that I realized Joshua and Kevin weren’t really eating the spaghetti sauce. Apparently Cyndi and I hadn’t thought to ask if anyone didn’t like tomatoes…oops. Thankfully they loved the garlic bread. My brother, Sam, made me feel much better when he took a very large helping of spaghetti and sauce. I’m not sure if he actually liked it or if he just felt sorry for us…but it made me feel better none-the-less.

By the time Monday night rolled around, I was so ready to return to our predictable rice, beans, and cabbage supper. Not that I didn’t enjoy eating American food and being able to share that with my family…but I was more than a little relieved to know that no one would be going to bed hungry.

Maybe Cyndi and I will try cooking for them again someday. Before we do, though, I know we’ll be sure to check if anyone else hates tomatoes.