Category: Food and nutrition

I had a wonderful time during the just ended Easter holidays. We went to celebrate Easter in the village, we had an opportunity to eat a lot of traditional meals. Out of all the meals that came my way , I enjoyed Sadza with nyeve mixed with tsunga ( African mustards). I had never tasted the beauty of African vegetables since I was born.

The meal was mouth watering, that is why I am sharing the recipe.

Resources needed:

• half bundle – tsunga.
• a bowel ful of freshly picked nyevhe.
• one big tomato.
• one small red onion
• garlic leeks.
• basil leaves.
• salt.
• peanut butter.

preparations

1. wash all your vegetables and cut them into small pieces
2. in a medium sized pot add all your vegetables except garlic leeks and basil
3. Add half cup of warm water in the pot
4. turn on your stove and cook the contents on medium heat until the contents becomes tender, you can add water were necessary.
5. When you are sure that your vegetables are well cooked, turn on your stove to low heat , add salt and peanut butter to taste, apply peanut butter generously but not too much, leave it to simmer for ten minutes and add the garlic leeks and basil , mix well together and remove from stove, serve immediately with sadza.
6. Enjoy your African meal.

We are all happy that we have managed to see this new year, but it will be much better if we get into this new year very fit and fine. Everyone needs to be healthy but if we are to check around, more than 80% of the adults are suffering mentally, emotionally and physically.

There is a great role that we must play to improve our health. The moment you give up on yourself , is  the same time your health will drastically deteriorate. If you do not care for yourself, who else can do that for you? No one! Keep reminding yourself that you are the master of both your physical and mental health. 

I know, someone is saying this:

Ok, yes, I am the master of my health, so what should I do to enhance it?

Here are the tips for a better life:

• Change your mindset: One of the most important things to do is to change your mindset. For example, if you are sick, see yourself improving, not dying. So if this happens you will start looking at ways to improve your physical and mental health,

• Health diets:  one of the ways is to change your diet, yes it’s true, shift from unhealthy food to healthy nutritious food. This type of food is found in a balanced diet. Make it a point to include fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts and lean meat in your dishes so that you have a balanced diet. All these food sources must be in equal proportion. Some of the food sources that can help you improve your health are Microgreens and smoothies made from organically sourced fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds and herbs. It’s wise to prepare your smoothies at home so that you are 100% sure that you are using organic products.
• Exercising. There is no remedy that can beat exercising, and the best and affordable way is by walking. Make it a point that you walk at least twice a week. What surprises me is that there are people who do not appreciate that they are better off walking than driving. When you are walking, especially in a forest you will definitely experience the touch of nature and your mind will be relieved and even your thinking capacity can improve. During the just ended holidays, we spent some time in the village,this was a great opportunity to hike and experience a better environment in the mountains and forests. The sound of birds chirping brought a sense of peacefulness to us. Some people enjoy cycling, it also gives them peace of mind  and physical fitment since they will burn their fat in this process.
• Reading : Make it a point to read fascinating stories which can be fiction or even real stories. Reading can relax your mind and can also help you think outside the box. Nowadays , life has been made easy. You can listen to  audiobooks even if you are doing other things like walking or driving.
• Writing: This is a technique that I use if I want to fight depression and stress. I am an introvert so when I am writing, I write as if I am talking to someone . In my writing it seems as if we are in a dialogue with someone, even if I am alone. So what happens is I exchange words as if I am talking to a real person. So at the end of the day I get relieved and if I was angry with someone, my anger is relieved and I create peace in my mind and I also silently create peace with my offender. This technique has worked for me for a  quite long period of time. There are so many people who are always surprised when I do not react when there is need for  a serious verbal reaction. What they do not understand is that I react with a pen and paper, and I leave my anger on paper and I even ask for forgiveness on paper. This clears my mind and heart. At times instead of praying a verbal prayer unto God, I just write what I am thinking. So writing is important because it gives us an opportunity to think twice so at the end of the day we do not say things that are not necessary leading us to creating peace with the community around us.
• Games:  you can also enhance your mental health through games that you like  and playing them with people who appreciate your company. I like chess a lot so when I am feeling pressure, I usually go on my laptop, play chess for even an hour or I can even invite other people so that we can play together. This is very helpful to me because it clears my stress. So what I can just tell you  is look for a game that you can play alone with computer, which at times can shape your brains but at the same time renewing your mind
• Music: learn to select the type of music that makes you feel happy. Do not choose the kind of music that makes you cry. I usually do not want to listen to music or even videos that remind me of my dirt, miserable and painful past. If you listen to such music, it means you are trying to bring your past into the present and it’s very difficult to try and forget something that you deliberately invited in your mind so the best way to avoid past pain is to listen to such kinds of music that will make your blood flow with joy and happiness.
• Socializing with others. You can also be better off by just talking to people who appreciate your presence. This is a technique used by out goers. When you share your problems and happiness with others you get to know techniques that can be used to overcome certain problems.
• Being alone: There is a time in life where you do not need anyone around you and you will be at peace alone, when people try to come to you, you feel very lonely in the midst of a group of people. So this drains your energy and you can even feel like you are an outcast. So you end up feeling sick when other people are around, so the best therapy is to be alone even if other people can label you crazy. At times I find it easier to be alone than to be in the company of many people who do not add any value to my life. 

So not all these strategies can work for everyone but it’s my hope that one of these strategies might help you in your health conscious journey.

There is no one prescription that works for everyone but at times we need a concoction which can help us to be better as each day passes.

It’s my hope that one of these strategies has worked for someone or it is going to work for someone.Our motto this year is : 2023 best health and wellbeing for everyone .

Last week we were in the village and we had an opportunity to get into the forests, we enjoyed wild fruits. One of the wild fruits that we had an opportunity to eat are snot apples .

I love the sweetness of the fruit and for me it’s actually an African bubble gum. They have natural sweetness and they are eaten the way bubble gum are chewed, like bubble gums, the residue cannot be swallowed.

So the question is how do you eat this?

Open your snot apple and remove the seeds , so that you can take a piece at a time. So you can have something like this.

You can now eat the pieces and sow the seeds so that your grand children will enjoy snot apples in the future.

Snot apples are so sweet, when eating them you might think that someone added some sugar.

but there is only one thing that I loothe, it’s the texture that you get after chewing.

but the bottom line is:

Snot apples enhances my mood!

Every household need delicious meals which are nutrient packed and flavourful. Best meals are prepared by cooks wh have enough supply of fruit, vegetables, meets, nuts, seeds etc, but sometimes it can be very difficult to have 75% of these things in your kitchen. So a wise person must look for a way that is sustainable to ensure that you have a continuous supply of your food. So today, I would like to show your how you can grow your own leeks from the few that you get from your friends.

For your own information, I started with only three leeks but now I can feed my family for the whole year .

So let’s go into the garden,

you need :

• fresh tap water
• a small container with a lid
• One leek with roots
• a knife

so the reason why we have the leek is we want to prepare good food. So we are going to use the upper part for cooking and we are going to propagate the base part.

Here we go:

• Cut the leek, 2,5cm from the base, the keep the rest for cooking.
• now take your container with lead, drill a hole that will allow the roots of your leek to get through but the leek should not fall inside .
• fill in the container with 3/4 of fresh water
• We are almost there, gently push your root inside the lid , allowing the roots to be the water.
• The last thing is to take the container to a window seal
• Leave it like that for some time so that some shoots appears, you can have more than ten shoots depending on how big and health your base of the leek was.
• Wait for the leeks to grow tall, if they are about ten centimeters you can harvest and cook but today we want to grow more so
• Detach every shoot from the main stem then transplant in good soil that have enough well aged compost. water when necessary, but make sure you have chosen a good sunny spot which recieves enough daylight. Within some few months , you will be able to harvest your leeks and as you are harvesting, keep on repeating the process,

Your family will always enjoy taste food if you do this.

here is a link to the video. https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMFjCp9S1/

We are what we eat!

One of my colleagues was very low this morning, so I asked him what was going on with him and he could not explain, He said, “I feel like I am just depressed, I do not know what is going on with me, I am just low.” So I just joked saying, ” I think you do not need a doctor but you need to be careful when selecting food.” So he said “go on, maybe it might help me .” So I started telling him about how a balanced diet improves his mental health. He thanked me and confessed that for the past weeks he had never been taking a balanced diet. So This gave me an insight of how people suffer because of lack of knowledge. This actually inspired me to write this blog.

Many people experince mood swings due to a many reasons, but today let me concentrate on food as one of the causes of mood swings. Many people can be depressed only for a few hours then the mood can change again. This affects the person and all the people around him so it is better for us to manage our own mood through choosing healthy diets. We realised that many people appreciate that they are experiencing mood swings but do not understand what is causing this.

The type of food that we eat can also impact on our mental health negatively so let’s us all make it a point that we eat a balanced diet so that when our mood changes we do not suspect the food we eat.

A balanced diet consists of all food sources that will give the consumer all the necessary elements that will make his organs to function well. Therefore it is wise to eat different types of food in recommended proportion so that we do not hurt or disturb some of our organs.

Make sure you include whole foods in your meals, avoid overprocessed food . By so doing you are giving yourself a good mental health. Whenever you are witnessing mood swings, the first thing is to check if you are still taking a balanced diet. Include a lot of unprocessed fruit and vegetables in your meals. Your plate should have a rainbow colour so that you take the right quantities of different minerals and nutrients that support your organs.

We all want to live peacefully, so we have to be in charge of our lives. If we want a good mental health, it can only be so if we are doing activities that helps us to stay in good shape like eating a lot of good food.

It’s so exciting that many people are now health conscious but I know we still have others who lack information about how food can affect the functionalities of our body organs.

Our body can be subjected to many things that can affect our mental health so whilst you are eating a health diet seek medical attention.

This month’s activity is to help our loved ones to eat wisely because we are what we eat.

How boring and draining is it to order spawn from as far as Harare or South Africa. You think of the cost of transporting the grain spawn and the hustles of receiving such a heavy shipment. Today, I would like to make you forget about all these challenges by introducing to something new and fun especially if you are a hobbyist or you are just growing mushrooms in small quantities for your family consumption.

Did you know that you have the power to propagate your own mushroom from fresh mushroom stems? I know you are just saying, “come on”.

“Yes ,I have just said from from the roots “.

ok!

“We do not want to waste our time, let’s get started!”

things needed.

• Fresh Oyster roots
• Unwritten or unpainted cardboard boxes.
• A pressure cooker
• A clean transparent plastic zipper bag.

Procédure.

• shred your cardboard boxes so that they fit well in your pressure cooker. The quantity you will shred depends on the mushroom roots available.
• Pour some water that covers your shredded material in your pressure cooker.
• Put your pressure cooker on, allow this to cook for more than 30minutes. We are doing this because we want to kill all the unwanted organism that may compete with our spawn. This called pasteurisation.
• When well done transfer from the pressure cooker to a mesh wire to allow water to drip naturally, watch this, up until no water droplets comes out when you squizze the cardboard boxes, then your grow media is damp and moist not soggy.
• Now take your zipper bag which is clean , start loading a layer of pasteurized cardboard boxes. Then put some mushroom roots. on top of the roots spread more cardboard boxes.
• Repeat this process up until all your materials are finished.
• Zip your bag
• Poke, some small holes around your bag for proper air circulation.
• You can now cover this with something dark or put in a cupboard to prevent direct sunshine from reaching our bag.
• Leave this for about 6- 10 days.
• Keep on checking if there is no contamination. A contaminated bag can be dark brown, black, grey but do not mistake this to the grow media you have used . If it is contaminated, please throw away.
• A safe bag will become white with mycelium which will be spreading in the bag
• When the whole bag has been fully colonised, transfer it to a place that receives indirect light and mist spray twice or thrice a day.
• After 3days you will start to notice some pin heads forming, then you can try to poke bigger holes so that fruiting can take place well.
• Continue misting and giving enough air to avoid drying out and small fruiting bodies. Within five days from the start of fruiting you will start enjoying your mushroom fruits.

Nothing can limit you, you can also be a mushroom farmer and you can feed your family with heathy nutritious meals everyday. Next time, I will teach you how to propagate large volumes of grain spawn from mushroom roots

So my parting words are:

Enjoy every meal by taking your food from your garden.

chao

I do not understand why this fruit has been called smelly berry, I feel there has been unfairness in naming it. The fruit has a pleasant smell and it’s very sweet.

As I am writing, I am actually enjoying the fruit. It’s abundant this season. I make sure I buy a packet every day. The fruit is sold by vendors who collect them from villages. This fruit will make me think of my village, ooh my village and my childhood.

I grew up a fearless child who loved walking alone. I could go in the forest to gather smellyberries for my family.

Now I am grown up I do not have the time to go round looking for fruits ,I have to buy, imagine! The pain of buying something that you know it occurs naturally and the sellers are gathering them for free.

Guess what I did this year! I went to my village , I gathered a bucket full of black ripe tsubvus/hubva as they are called in my mother language. Here comes the problem, how to preserve.

I have found so many ways that I am using Tsubvu in my kitchen. So here are some of the ways.

• Make smellyberry smoothies
• Make smellyberry porridge
• make smellyberry yoghurt

so if you want to try this you can write to us and learn how to extract smellyberry pulp from it’s stone seed.

If you can easily access Tsubvu I tell you do not just eat the fruit with out adding value, be explorative, innovative and ambitious do not be rigid imagine new recipes, currently as I am writing I am imagining a black queen cake made from smellyberries.

Even though smellyberries are packed with phytonutrients, eating them raw will temporarily blacken your teeth, fear not it’snot permanent. A quick brush of your teeth will make them white again, that is why I recommend value addition.

Do not eat too much lest you will suffer from constipation. I wouldn’t like you to blame our African wild fruits. Only a few is okay for the day. Eating too much will make you have problems also when trying to empty the bowel so quantity matters.

cheers!

hey my friends! It has been long. The month of April was packed with a lot of adventurous activities.

yes, I mean what I am saying, We have just started growing our brown oyster and it’s so amazing that the results came perfect. We had our first flash in the last quarter of April. Can you imagine the joy that befalleth us when we harvested our first mushrooms.

Oyster mushrooms are very delicious, and packed with health benefits. They are the perfect choice for vegetarians. So if you are a vegetarian and you in Manicaland, we are here for you. We have the freshest mushroom. It is very easy to start your mushroom farm. All you need is your substrate, spawn, grow room, a perfect environment, yes it’s simple.

Next week I will be introducing you to a new journey of mushroom farming and I am quite sure you will like it.

So fo now stay put. I am here to just share my happiness with you my friends.

Guys! I am harvesting and harvesting and, this is my month of giving, l am just giving out because I have plenty fresh mushroom at home.

For now just chill waiting for an exciting journey of mushroom growing, I promise, I will be your companion in this journey. Protein alternatives are the way to live chao.

The month of January was an exciting one for me. I spent much of my time in the village. I had the privilege of tasting a lot of wild fruits that I had long forgotten about. Among all the wild fruits that I consumed, I favoured the wild custard Apple .

Those who grew up in the village may not understand why I like them most.This is because the fruits occur naturally in Zimbabwe and there is no limit in eating them as long as supply is available .Therefore abundance may cause people to undermine the value of things they have.

Custard wild apple grows naturally on a bushy tree, when unripe, it will be green in colour. Ripened custard Apple is yellow in colour. This fruit is sweet and has a soft texture. I grew up eating a lot of it but I did not enjoy it the way I did this year.

I guess it was because of the way we prepared it that changed the whole story.

prepare your fruit like this.

• Remove the outer skin and all the seeds
• Add this to your fruit salad, try this I tell you, your taste buds will feel another thing
• If you do not like this, you can also blend mangoes, wild custard Apple, banana to come up with a creamy juice , you can even put some plain yoghurt in your smoothies.

After trying this recipe, if you are in Zimbabwe you will always find yourself in the forests searching for custard Apples.

besides the natural sweet taste, you are also going to enjoy lots of health benefits the fruit is packed with vitamin C, magnesium and potassium. The fruit promotes heart and eye health.

so exploiting wild fruits allows us to enjoy life at lower costs.

This season okra is abundant in Southern Africa. I really know by this time noone is craving for it because it’s readily available. I know there is someone who is saying, “I nolonger want to hear about okra again”, but I tell you not after reading the whole text. If possible you must read faster so that you quickly reach to the recipe. If you try it, you never stop it again, you will always keep your oven busy.

So let’s start baking okra.

You need

• Young and tender pods sliced length wise into chips
• Some few drops of white vinegar
• Spices e.g black pepper
• Salt

Eveyone knows that okra is slippery so how can we turn it into a snack.

Simple dip the slices of okra into vinegar for more than 20minutes, there after wash with fresh running water.

Pat until dry.

Add 3 teaspoons of olive oil and mix together with your favourite spices.

EnSure that this well mixed in your okra.

Turn your oven on and in a non stick greased baking tray add your okra.

Then bake until golden brown and crunchy.

Serve your okra snacks, if needed you can season with salt but I like it without salt.

This is delicious I tell you, you will never forget me and you will always befriend your oven.

Try this recipe and experience the magic of plant based diets.