country Essentials · 12 foods
Zimbabwe Essentials
A considered first route through Zimbabwe: the foods that carry its everyday habits, celebrations, ingredients, and memory.
Explore all Zimbabwe foods →THE
ESSENTIALS
The complete shortlist
12 foods to know.
Each selection includes the reason it belongs here—so this is a guide, not just a pile of names.
Malawi
Sadza
Isitshwala
Maize meal beaten stiff enough to roll in the hand — and if a spoon arrives, you have been misjudged.
Zimbabwe
Muriwo uneDovi
Greens collapsed into a spoonful of peanut butter until the sauce turns russet.
Zimbabwe
Dovi
Chicken stewed thick with peanut butter, emulsified rather than oily if it has been done right.
Zimbabwe
Madora
Amacimbi
Mopane caterpillars dried and fried with onion, sold dry by the cup and eaten whole.
Malawi
Kapenta
Matemba
Lake Kariba sardines netted under lamps at night and dried on racks, then fried with tomato.
Zimbabwe
Mazondo
Cow trotters cooked until the tendons turn sticky, eaten with the fingers at a braai.
Zimbabwe
Road Runner Chicken
Huku yemumusha
Village chicken called road runner for how it lives, and stewed long because of it.
Zimbabwe
Mutakura
Dried maize and groundnuts boiled together for hours with nothing but salt.
Zimbabwe
Maputi
Field maize popped dense and chewy, in bags at every bus rank for small change.
South Africa
Mageu (Mahewu)
Mageu
Mahewu - the fermented maize drink Zimbabwe shares with its neighbours under the name mageu - remains the working field's refresher.
Botswana
Chibuku
Opaque sorghum beer sold still fermenting, so you shake the Scud before you open it.
Zimbabwe
Mazoe Orange Crush
Mazoe
Mazoe valley orange cordial that Zimbabweans abroad have posted to them.