Sadza ne nyama

Ingredients

• Maize meal500 g
• Beef — on the bone, in pieces800 g
• Onions2
• Tomatoes4
• Collard greens400 g
• Garlic4 clove
• Peanut butter — for the greens2 tbsp
• Vegetable oil50 ml
• Salt and pepperto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Brown the meat, add the onion and garlic and fry until soft.

   15 min

2. 2

   Add the tomatoes, cover with water to the same level, season and stew for an hour and twenty.

   85 min

3. 3

   Shred the greens fine and stew them with tomato and peanut butter for fifteen minutes.

   20 min

4. 4

   Slake a quarter of the maize meal in cold water and stir it into a litre of boiling water.

   8 min

5. 5

   Cook that thin porridge for ten minutes, stirring with a wooden paddle.

   12 min

6. 6

   Rain in the rest of the meal a little at a time, working it hard for fifteen minutes to a stiff mass.

   17 min

7. 7

   Turn the sadza onto plates with a wet spoon and serve with the meat and greens.

   6 min

About the dish

Sadza is cooked in two stages: first a thin porridge from part of the flour, then the rest is rained in and worked until stiff. All at once it lumps.

Finished sadza should hold its shape in the hand without sticking to the fingers. That is the test: pinch a piece, roll it, press a dent into it, and you have a spoon for the sauce.

The beef stews long and plainly: onion, tomato, salt. The flavour comes from the meat and the time, and Zimbabwean cooking uses little spice.

Worth knowing

• — The paddle has to be wooden and strong. Sadza thickens until a spoon bends, and working it is physically hard.
• — Stir continuously and in one direction. A pause makes a lump, and lumps in sadza read as inexperience.
• — It is eaten by hand: pinch a piece, roll it into a ball and press a dent into it to make a spoon for the sauce.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

640 kcal

Protein

42 g

Fat

24 g

Carbs

66 g

More from Zimbabwe

• Muriwo unedovi — Collard greens stewed in peanut butter with tomato. The side to sadza in every household.