Tom asked me a good question about Ugali. In response I include here a flowchart that I used in a C programming class yesterday.
The maize meal is white and makes a kind of sticky lump slightly more stodgey than mashed potatoe. Some people laughed at me for putting “add salt” in the recipe, but the on-line recipes I have seen for it include salt. Some say add a blueband margerine to the water before the maizemeal goes in, to make it taste good and help stop it burning and sticking to the pan.
When you eat Ugali here you describe the meal as Ugali with whatever… meat stew or Sukuma Wiki (green vegetable) or whatever, not the other way round as would be the case in England. And, traditionally, it is eaten with the fingers, pulling lumps off and kneading into a little thumb pot which is used to scoup up stew.
By itself it is tasteless and has an odd texture, but with a rich stew, it is delicious.