COPPERWhat is the national dish of Zimbabwe?
The national dish of Zimbabwe is sadza, a stiff dough of white maize meal cooked in two stages: a thin porridge first, then more meal beaten in until the mass is firm. It is rolled into balls by hand and dipped into a relish of stewed meat, greens, beans or sour milk. It has no official status, but it is the country's staple.
What is sadza?
Sadza is the Shona name. In isiNdebele the same dish is isitshwala. It is made from finely ground dry maize, called mealie meal, which Shona speakers call hupfu and Ndebele speakers impuphu. Families buy it in shops or have their own maize ground at a mill, and Pearlenta is the most popular brand of meal in Zimbabwe.
On its own sadza tastes of very little, and that is the point. It is the starch that carries the rest of the meal. Zimbabweans eat it at lunch or dinner, often every day, and one Zimbabwean food writer sums up the standard plate as sadza nenyama nemuriwo: sadza with meat and leafy greens. It is also one of the first foods given to babies, usually at around six months.
Is sadza officially the national dish?
No law or decree names a national dish of Zimbabwe. Sadza is the one given in travel guides such as Bradt's Africa Overland and on Wikipedia's list of national dishes, and Zimbabweans themselves describe it as their staple food. No other dish is a serious rival.
Its history is shorter than people expect. Maize is an imported crop in Zimbabwe, grown there only from about 1890. Before that, sadza was made from mapfunde, finger millet. Maize has since become the chief source of carbohydrate and the most popular meal, and Zimbabweans strongly prefer white maize meal. Yellow meal is eaten in hard times, and it is nicknamed "Kenya" because it was once imported from there.
Habits are shifting slowly. Lunch in the cities is often sandwiches or the previous night's leftovers, and young Zimbabweans increasingly prefer rice. A local favourite is rice cooked with peanut butter, served with thick gravy, vegetables and meat. Sadza remains the staple most households eat at lunch or dinner.
How sadza is made
Sadza is cooked in two stages, and our sadza recipe follows them with exact amounts:
- Start cold: 100 g of white maize meal is whisked into 400 ml of cold water until there are no lumps. Starting cold is what prevents lumps.
- Make the bota: 400 ml of boiling water and a teaspoon of salt go in, and the mixture bubbles for 10 minutes into a thin porridge.
- Thicken: 150 g more meal is added a handful at a time, beaten hard with a wooden spoon after each one.
- Steam: the pot is covered on low heat for 10 minutes so the meal cooks through. Undercooked sadza tastes raw and chalky.
- Turn: the mass is pressed against the side of the pot for 2 to 3 minutes until smooth, glossy and pulling away cleanly, then scooped into rounds with a wet spoon.
What is eaten with sadza?
Sadza is traditionally eaten with the right hand, without cutlery. A piece is rolled into a ball and dipped into the relish. In rural areas some families still eat it from a communal bowl. The usual relishes are:
- Nyama: stewed, grilled or roasted beef, goat or chicken, or oxtail and cow hooves (mazondo).
- Muriwo: leafy greens such as collards, chomolia or pumpkin leaves (muboora).
- Kapenta: small dried lake sardines, also called matemba.
- Sour milk: mukaka wakakora in Shona, amasi in Ndebele, often sold as "lacto".
- Beans and okra: nyemba (sugar beans) and derere (okra).
- Madora: mopane worms, an edible caterpillar.
- Boerewors: a long, spiced beef sausage of Afrikaner origin, barbecued and served with sadza.
Other dishes to know from Zimbabwe
The thin first-stage porridge is a dish in its own right. Called bota in Shona and ilambazi in Ndebele, it is the usual breakfast, flavoured with peanut butter, milk, butter or jam.
Biltong came from Afrikaner cooking and is now a popular snack across Zimbabwe. Beef silverside is cut with the grain into strips 2 to 3 cm thick, cured with salt and malt vinegar, coated in toasted coriander and air-dried for 4 to 7 days.
Mapopo is papaya candy: the fruit is cooked in sugar with lime to the hard-ball stage, 121 to 130 °C, then rolled into small balls and dusted white with sugar.
Maize porridge under other names is the staple of the whole region: nshima in Zambia and Malawi, pap in South Africa. Compare them in our articles on the national dish of Zambia and the national dish of South Africa.
All three Copper recipes are on our page about the food of Zimbabwe, and the neighbouring kitchens are in our guide to Southern African food.
The recipes
- Sadza🇿🇼 Zimbabwe · 30 minutes
Biltong🇿🇼 Zimbabwe · 5 days and 4 hours
Mapopo🇿🇼 Zimbabwe · 3 hours and 40 minutes
Questions people ask
Is sadza the same as ugali or pap?
Yes, it is the same kind of stiff maize-meal dough. It is called ugali in East Africa, nshima in Zambia and Malawi, pap in South Africa, and sadza or isitshwala in Zimbabwe.
What is sadza called in Ndebele?
Isitshwala. Sadza is the Shona name.
What is sadza eaten with?
With a relish: stewed meat, leafy greens (muriwo), beans, dried kapenta fish, okra or sour milk. It is rolled into a ball by hand and dipped into the relish.
Was sadza always made from maize?
No. Maize was introduced to Zimbabwe around 1890; before that, sadza was made from finger millet, called mapfunde.
What is the difference between sadza and bota?
Bota is the thin porridge from the first stage of cooking, eaten for breakfast. Sadza is what you get when more meal is beaten in until the mass is stiff.
Keep reading
- Traditional food of Zimbabwe: 13 dishes to know
- What is the national dish of Angola?
- What is the national dish of Botswana?
- What is the national dish of Eswatini?
- What is the national dish of Lesotho?
- What is the national dish of Malawi?