It's late on Friday night, and I've just finished cleaning up after hosting a dinner party of 10 ladies in my home. The girl currently living below me (Rachel, from the UK) had a birthday today, and she wanted to throw a party. There were a few hitches in that plan, though. A) Her apartment only has 4 chairs in it. B) She has no oven. C) She can't cook. So I gladly offered to come to the rescue! Though I wouldn't want to do it every day, I really enjoy hosting a party from time to time. We talked it over early in the week and decided on a menu of lasagna and cake.
In America, if I wanted to make lasagna for 10 people on Friday night, what would I do? I'd go to Kroger or Cub Foods on Friday afternoon and buy a box of Stouffer's frozen lasagna. I might pick up a salad in a bag, some dinner rolls, and either a box of cake mix or a bakery cake to go with it. I'd get home, throw the lasagna in the oven, set the table and SHAZAAM! - ready to party!
Not so in Kenya. No, my preparations began on Wednesday!
Wednesday: Go to the market to pick up produce. Then go to the "western" supermarket (called Nakumatt) to get things you can't get elsewhere - wheat flour, pasta, tomato sauce, cheese (I found cottage cheese there for the first time ever! Hooray!), ice cream, etc. Look for birthday candles. Nakumatt doesn't carry them, but the man you ask knows a place where you can get them. Drive there. No, they don't sell them, but the woman working there is sure of a store that has them. It's right next to Nakumatt. Drive back. Buy candles. A bittersweet victory.
Thursday: Make the pasta sauce (from scratch). Make the cheese filling (from scratch). Grate the mozzarella cheese to go on top (who grates cheese anymore?). Layer the lasagna together, cover and refrigerate. Take a shower because you're too hot to stand in the kitchen for one more minute. Bake the cake (from scratch). Make the frosting (from scratch). Bake another cake because the oven is temperamental and burned one layer to a crisp while under-cooking the other layer. Cool the cake. Take another shower. Frost the cake and refrigerate. Wash the dishes by hand.
Friday: Wash the rest of the dishes from the night before which you left because you were too hot to finish. Make a batch of bread dough (from scratch). Knead it. Take a shower (kneading is hard work!). Form the dough into dinner rolls and let it rise. Make a cream sauce for creamed peas (from scratch). Put the rolls in Allison's oven upstairs (I learned my lesson from the cake fiasco yesterday!). Run back down to put the peas in the oven downstairs. Run back up to take the rolls out. Put the other half of the rolls in the oven (because ovens are too small for all the rolls at once...). Run back down to treat and filter enough drinking water for 10 people. Run up to take out the second pan of rolls. Put the lasagna in the oven upstairs. Take the peas out downstairs. Make juice. Run down to the corner kiosk and buy sodas (in Kenya, it's not a party without soda!). Take out the lasagna. Set the table. And the guests arrive...
As I stood back and looked at the table, with the lasagna, dinner rolls, creamed peas and birthday cake on it, I thought to myself, "Is this it? All that work for this?"
I'm happy to say that everything turned out delicious, evidenced by the fact that none of it remains. The girls ate it all, and that's a good feeling. What's even better, we had a great time. We ate and talked and played games and laughed... It's nice to know that you've made someone's day - especially their birthday - really memorable for them. We enjoy good food in the US anytime we want it, but a special meal like lasagna is a rare treat here. (And it's no wonder, considering the time it took me to prepare it!) But when I saw the girls laughing and eating, and when I saw Rachel smiling and enjoying herself, I thought to myself, "Ah, so that's it! All that work for this."
When was the last time a plate of lasagna made your day? That's one of the beautiful things about living in Kenya. Every day is a gift, and an evening with friends over a special meal followed by a hilarious game of "Taboo"... well, it seems like a glimpse of heaven.
2 comments:
Hey Jill...I'm getting a little burned out on cooking myself and I just did the math to explain this. My oldest son is 31, and IF I cooked dinner every night for the last 31+ years, I would have prepared 11,315 dinner meals. Only dinner. Let's not count breakfast or lunch (or homemade baby food). So maybe 10,000 meals is a conservative estimate. I totally sympathize with your heroic efforts!!
Barbara, I see I have no reason to complain!!! You're a saint!
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