Ugandan Food on the Farm

Here at the farm, we eat lunch as a community every day, Monday through Friday.  Each day, a different person is assigned chef duty, which means that they have all morning to cook food for 30 people.  For my first time as chef, I decided that I would make Ugandan food.  This involved making posho, something that I tried in Uganda but never was able to quite perfect.  So before the actual day when I was supposed to cook, I searched for recipes and found an explanation of how to make it properly.  The trick that I hadn't tried before was to steam the posho so it got more firm.  The only difference between "real" posho and my posho was that I used yellow cornmeal rather than the white kind that everyone uses in Uganda...  Here is the posho practice run:

What you need:

4 c. water

2 c. cornmeal

Heat cold water in a pot. The water is ready for the cornmeal to be added when it starts to give off a little bit of steam. Reduce the burner to medium heat before you add the cornmeal to prevent burning.  Add the cornmeal gradually, constantly stirring.  Shape the cornmeal into a round loaf with a wooden spoon.

Once the posho can form kind of a loaf, cover the pot and turn the burner to medium-low.  Let the posho steam for 20 minutes.

Now, when I made this for the whole crowd, I used 16 cups of cornmeal!  I already had tons of respect for Ugandan women, but I am even more impressed now that I know what it is like to stir a gigantic pot of hard-to-stir posho over a hot stove...  Also, the bottom of my posho burned when I made this giant pot.  When I made a tiny bit, there was no burning.  I am not sure exactly how to remedy that, but at least it was only the bottom layer that was burnt.  The rest was perfectly edible.

Another Ugandan food that I made was mandazi, a slightly sweet fried doughnut.  That was a fun food to make since I don't make fried foods very often, and it was a special treat.
This involves:

2 1/4 c. warm water
1 tsp. yeast
4 c. flour
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp. allspice
2 Tbs. vegetable oil
1 egg (or 2 Tbs. water + 1 Tbs. oil + 2 tsp. baking powder)
oil for deep frying

In a mixing bowl, combine the dry ingredients, then make a well in the middle and mix the wet ingredients together in there.  Knead the dough until it is smooth.  Cover the dough and let it rise for about an hour.  Divide the dough into about 25 pieces.  Roll them into slightly flattened balls and fry in hot oil.  Flip them over a few times until they are golden brown all over.

There was also a very large pot of beans cooked with onions and spices as well as cabbage cooked with tomatoes.  Cooking for so many people was quite the experience.  It was very satisfying to be able to feed so many people with food that brings back memories of life in Uganda.