First Lady hailed for promoting traditional dishes

Philemon Jambaya

ASSISTANT EDITOR

One of the winners at the recently held traditional meal cookout competition, Rejoice Gundura, has hailed the First Lady Amai Auxillia Mnangagwa, for coming up with an idea that could transform cooking into a big industry.

Gundura, 31, who hails from Masvingo, hogged the limelight at the national cookout competition held in Nyanga on May 25.

She presented pumpkin sadza, where pumpkin seeds were roasted and ground on stone to make powder, which was mixed with sorghum and served with road runner.

“Some of us did not go to any cooking school but this programme has transformed us a lot as we can now make a living out of selling traditional dishes,” says Gundura.

She has been a regular competitor over the years and she now owns two traditional restaurants in Masvingo town.

“With this competition you improve your creativity and cooking skills. Now we can understand what is gastronomy.

“I also think Amai Mnangagwa’s initiative will improve the uptake of traditional dishes in Zimbabwe,” added Mrs Gundura.

The traditional meal cookout competition was launched by the First Lady in 2019, before she handed the programme over to the Ministry of Tourism and Hospitality Industry.

The cookout competitions are aimed at promoting gastronomy tourism and the uptake of traditional dishes.

This year’s finals were held in Nyanga where winners reaped huge rewards.

Amai Mnangagwa was the guest of honour.

To spice up the event, Amai Mnangagwa had a kitchen, which prepared various traditional dishes including millet sadza, roadrunner, goat stew, traditional rice, and roasted beef.

Zimbabwe will host the first-ever Africa Gastronomy Forum in Victoria Falls in July.