Serving it local with a smile

Shirley Genga

Her refreshing smile and unrelenting verve are loud. Hate them or love them, they define her and form part of the virtues that pull many to her weekly TV show — Let’s Cook. Four years and still counting, Susan Kamau is arguably Kenya’s most celebrated chef extraordinaire who, besides hosting the show also owns a cooking magazine, a cooking club and has written a successful book on recipes, with another on the way.

When you first meet her, you are likely to appreciate just how passionate she is about cooking. Susan’s biggest goal in life is to teach Kenyans just how healthy and wonderful our traditional foods are. This, she says, is like bringing sexy back to our traditional meals.

Susan Kamau, a celebrated chef and host of the TV show, Let’s Cook.

"That I have travelled across continents has helped me appreciate our food the more. I now realise how healthy, easy to prepare and readily available local foods are. Unfortunately a lot of Kenyans tend to believe that foreign meals are the way to go," says Susan.

Her passion for food began at an early age and was inspired through watching her mother prepare meals.

"Although I grew up on a farm in rural Nyeri, my mum made sure she exposed us to different foods from diverse cultures. We not only ate traditional dishes like githeri and ugali but also dishes like mushrooms, various types of vegetables, spices and fish. I appreciate having grown up on a farm because I learnt how to slaughter goats, chicken and cows, an art which is beneficial in my line of work," says Susan.

So deep was her love for food that in high school, Susan opted to take home economics. The knowledge she gained would later influence her decision to enrol for a degree in Hotel Management at the United States International University.

Susan secured her first job at the age of 19, at Nairobi’s Hilton Hotel.

First job experience

"Getting the job was not easy. I had to camp outside the personnel manager’s office for several days before he agreed to see me. He was concrete that there were no vacancies available. But after I insisted that I was willing to work for free, if only for the experience, he hired me."

Susan would work there for a year and a half without pay, in every department at the hotel before calling it a day. And she is grateful for the chance she got. "I trained in the kitchen where I learnt how to prepare pizza and other exotic foods; at the poolside where I learnt how to roast meat; at the front office, I learnt about housekeeping and room etiquette, laundry, cleaning rooms, how to make beds and about creative room layouts," she recalls.

Armed with diverse experience, Susan hit the ground running and secured herself a job as a receptionist at the Mcann-Erickson Advertising in Industrial Area. By the age of 21, she tried her hand on business — while still holding her job.

Off to the UK

"It was a small in-house kiosk. I approached my bosses and told them that we needed some in-house food. So I traded in my job as a receptionist and started cooking lunches for a staff of about 60 employees. I got a mkokoteni (cart) to bring the items I needed early in the morning. It was hard work; I would do everything. It helped because I would later find myself engaging in a lot of difficult jobs, including being a waitress, baby sitting, cooking pies in pubs, selling cosmetics, teaching English and tending to senior citizens — all of which moulded me towards life’s goals," says Susan.

After running the business for about a year, Susan was soon married and moved to the UK with her husband. She worked in a pub and learnt how to cook pies and other British dishes. Three years later, they moved to Pennsylvania, USA where they would stay for six years. It was here that she studied for a degree in management while running a catering business on the side.

"I supplied food stuffs such as chapattis, samosa and mandazi to different restaurants. I also catered for small parties on an African menu, meals such as ndengu and rice. They loved and adored our food. During colonisation, we Africans were made to believe that our food is not good enough and that is why majority Kenyans think everything foreign is good. The more wealthy Kenyans get, the less they eat our very nutritious traditional meals."

While in the US, Susan also met many people from all over Africa especially at the African Student Association. Each year, member students met for an annual party and cooked meals from their respective countries. Susan seized the opportunity to learn how to prepare dishes from all over Africa.

From the US, Susan and her husband moved to Japan for about four years. She soaked herself in their culture and learnt a lot about Japanese foods and their spices. She also completed a postgraduate degree in Culinary Arts.

In the late 1990s and after 13 years of travelling, it was time to return home, settling in Thika town. She would then put her skills and extensive experience to good use.

"I opened a restaurant in Thika town called Mambarita, which served Pan-African dishes. The restaurant was great and got good reviews in the dailies but Thika was just too slow for me and I figured I had to move to Nairobi. I closed down after a year and a half despite sinking all my savings into it hoping to open another restaurant in due course.

In 2000, Susan and her husband were divorced — an experience that left her utterly devastated. "I was in my 30s, living in my parents house, broken and had no clue about how to make myself whole. As I went through my depression, I kept questioning whom I really was. When a woman gets married, her marriage becomes her identity. After crying until I could cry no more, I turned to God. I knew there were only two ways to get out of my pit — either die or bounce back. I decided that I would make it and be a success." It was during this trying moment that the idea of the cookery show was born.

Breaking ground in TV

She then wrote a proposal and presented it to the station. However, getting to talk to the managers was not an easy thing, but she was determined to do it. Although she finally managed to get through, the show never saw the light of day until four years later.

So when an opportunity to manage Tamambo’s restaurant opened up, Susan jumped to it and gave it her all.

"I kept my self busy working 16 hours a day. That helped me deal with my divorce; it was more like a healing process. Even though I loved my work, I still believed that one day, my proposal would come through," she says.

Another year passed and nothing came of it, but she did not give up. She would work at Tamambo’s for two and a half years before pursuing new projects. "I loved the job but my feet were itchy and I needed a new challenge".

After four years of waiting, Nation TV finally responded and Let’s Cook was aired for the first time in 2004. "My dream was finally becoming a reality and it felt as though I was being reborn. I became that Susan who loved challenges and was not scared to be different. That Susan of high school, who wore blue nail polish and had life surging out of her, had returned with a bang. In fact, many of my friends never recognised me. It was as though I had died somewhere along the way and never known about it. But God had given me a second chance to start on a new slate and I did not owe anyone an explanation for my change."

A year to remember

In 2005, she started a cooking club and in 2006 wrote and published her first book, Jikoni Magic. In the same year, she began a consultancy company. She says 2007 was a good year. "I not only got pregnant at 40, but also started a magazine, Kenyan Kitchen," says Susan.

She is currently in a relationship with the man who was her first boyfriend. Back in the day, John, as she simply calls him, attended a Catholic high school that neighboured, Loreto Convent Msongari, where Susan schooled. The couple’s little girl is one year and seven months old and they plan to marry in future.

Susan advises in conclusion: "Life is what you make of it, if you can dare to dream, uphold the prerequisite discipline and treat those around you well, then there is nothing you cannot achieve".

It is not over yet and Susan is still dreaming big. She will be releasing her second book later in the year and plans to return to school for her doctorate degree.