She’s never really known Kenya, and Kenya has never known her. But Nereya Otieno hopes a pot of stewed greens will bring her closer to her father’s homeland.
Whenever I can feel myself going down—with either an illness, a case of the blues, or both—I make sukuma wiki. I’ve loved Kenyan stewed greens since I was a kid watching my father run our family stove. The name translates to “stretch the week” in Swahili, alluding to the domestic art of making food budgets last by transforming limited ingredients into filling meals. I lean toward sukuma wiki because it’s incredibly nutritious—rich in fiber, antioxidants, and many vitamins and minerals—but also because cooking it is an exercise in connecting to a place that always feels slightly out of reach: Kenya.
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