Did you know: This odiero made us eat nyama mwitu

David Hopcraft with a herd of eland and an ostrich in his farm - the game ranching ltd near Athi River 1981  Photo: Courtesy

Commercial game meat in Kenya was virtually unheard of until the late Chris Seex and Martin Dunford opened what was to be called Nyama Tu in 1979. It is now the flagship Carnivore Restaurant off Lang’ata Road. Carni’s game meat menu coincided with a third generation mzungu Kenyan - David Hopcraft- pioneering the rearing of wildlife as an ecologically superior alternative to ng’ombe tumbukiza and roast goat ribs.

If you take a drive down Mombasa Road from Nairobi, you will come across Acacia Camp inside the 20,000 acre Swara Plains Conservancy where Prof Hopcraft oversaw the beefing up of zebras, giraffes, wildebeests, ostriches, antelopes...over 3, 000 of them. It was at the then Hopcraft Ranch where the game meat supplied to Carnivore was sourced.