Hello, my fellow Hippies! This is a great time to be alive as a young African, despite all that’s happening. The voices of the African Youth are being heard and I am optimistic that a wave of progressive change is imminent. As my African-American friend, Yaz, would say “Africa, Your Time Is NOW!”
However, because I believe we all still need a bit of lightness in our lives, let me give you small gist about how, me, Kobe, chef extraordinaire fell my hand when I tried to impress this beautiful Kenyan sister from Nairobi, with my cooking. I tell you, till today, some of my friends have not stopped calling me KD (Kamounia Disaster).
So it all started when I was invited by my friend, Enzi, to play a DJ set on Friday at his hangout at Labadi Beach, Accra. This invite came a day after our law firm just closed out the biggest acquisition deal for a client, which we had been working on for months.
You can imagine I was ready to turrrrn up! My ginger was high, my playlist was fire and my swag was on point … or so I thought. Friday came, I had played my set and as I was hanging out with my friends, when this fine woman walked up to us (turns out we had friends in common), and said she loved my playlist. Chale, you suppose see as my head dey swell. So we kept flirting and I eventually said, “If you think my playlist is fire, then you need to see me in the kitchen. My cooking game is even ‘doper’”.
Knowing that I had piqued her interest, I waited knowing she’d say yes. What she said threw me. “For real? That’s how you guys always think that cooking rice and stew is enough to impress the ladies, eh? What’s your pièce de resistance?” she said. Feeling like a badass, I asked her what her favourite thing to eat was, and she said “Kamounia”.
Guys, I had never heard of a Kamounia in my life! But what did I do? I opened my mouth and said “Kamounia? Is that it? That’s simple. Why don’t we have dinner tomorrow night and I’ll hook you up with your fave?”. Every time I tell this story, I say, some spiritual forces must have been at work that day, for me to talk this nonsense.
I got home at 8am the following morning, took a 2-hour nap and then went to do my research. As it turns out, Kamounia, is a beef and liver stew popular in Sudan and Tunisia, made with cumin and parsley and mostly eaten with rice. So after all this babe’s insult, it’s still rice and stew she wanted me to make for her? Tsk tsk!
Anyway, I got to work, I worked my arse off trying to make the perfect “Stew”. By the time she arrived, I was feeling like the “Black Michel Roux”. We had a little bit of banter, and might have even shared a cheeky kiss (but a gentleman never tells), now it was time for food. I served it the way I had seen most recipe blogs serve it. I was excited and the night was going well, so by that logic it could only get better.
She took one look at it and said “I take back my cynicism. Boooy, you can really throw it down in the kitchen. I can’t wait to taste it!”. I was smiling like a weirdo, at this point. We started eating and I noticed she stopped talking, she started breathing weird and things started popping up on her face like a breakout. I was worried and lowkey started panicking, what was going on here.
“Did you put Turmeric in this?” she asked. “Yes I did. It’s obviously a key ingredient for Kamounia” I said, knowing fully well that I had no clue what the heck I was saying. She looked at me, opened her mouth like she was going to say something, closed it again and finally said “I’m allergic to Turmeric. It causes me to breakout and it affects my breathing”.
As my Nigerian peeps would say, SEE ME SEE WAHALA!!! It was a simple date I wanted to have, not to kill someone’s child. In my haste and panic, I started clearing the dishes (like the deed wasn’t already done) and that’s when I spilled the leftover Kamounia on her and all over the floor.
Hippies, lets just say at that point I just sat down and said sorry. I didn’t even bother trying to do anything else, the night was already a disaster. Long story short, I offered to take her to the doctor but she said it wasn’t that serious. Guys, let me tell you, the rest of that night, I left that stain on the floor. I couldn’t even look at the nonsense… till now I want to erase all knowledge of that Stew from my mind.
Anyway, we met up a few more times after that, I redeemed myself and we’re still good friends till today. But she never lets me forget “KD”, when I start bragging about my cooking …lol.
Okay guys it’s been a long story, hope you learnt a lesson from this… if you’re making food for someone…ask, ABEG, YOU GET ALLERGY? Till next time, have a great weekend, be safe and don’t forget to block out the noise and preserve your mental health!