Excerpt from the Settlers’ Guidebook: Mealies, anyone?

WHAT an important stable the humble mealie, either fresh or ground into mealie meal, must have been for the farming folk in Early 20th Century Kenya.

There is a whole chapter dedicated to this foodstuff in its various guises in the Kenya Settlers Cook book and Household guide.

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There are maize escalloped – cooked grains stripped off cobs then baked with egg and milk – mealies baked with tomato and maize meal puffs – sugary puffs served with ‘any pudding sauce’ as desert..

There is a recipe for maize sponge muffins made of mealie meal, plus two recipes for mealie meal biscuits and a rather delicious looking maize brown bread. For this you would need a pint of buttermilk, a half cup of mealie meal, a half cup of sugar, a half teaspoon of bicarb, two cups course brown meal, a cup of flower and half a cup of syrup or treacle

Mix dry ingredients. Warm the syrup and add to buttermilk mixed with bicarb.Stir this into dry ingredients and bake in a well-greased bread pan in a moderate oven for one and a half hours.

I have to admit I have a much easier microwave corn bread that takes me about ten minute – and the corn comes out of a can.

Other interesting Kenyan mealie delicacies include green mealies and creamed chicken, boiled mealies, green mealies au gratin, green mealies a l’Oeuf and even green mealie custard.

The Kenyan housewife would also use mealies or mealie meal in omelettes, soup, waffles, cake, doughnuts, drop scones, rock cakes,dinner rolls, pancakes, salads and fritters. There is even a recipe for a mealie pie – how is that for ingenuity!

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