The tricky thing about holidays is that they come back every year and every time they give us the strange impression that they are coming for the first time. Judging from the enthusiasm, high expectations and energy with which holidays are welcomed in Ethiopia; we can say that Ethiopians are not only a great food loving but also a great fun loving people. The fasting season of Lent lasts almost two months and the preparation for breaking the fast start a month or so earlier than the actual holiday.
Ethiopia is also a land of great religious and confessional varieties, with Christianity and Islam being the two religions with greatest numbers of followers. There are also other less known sub-faiths or sub-beliefs, all of which have similar emphasis on the importance of fasting or food deprivation as a way of disciplining not only the body but also the spirit and turning it towards spiritual meditations and prayers. Easter is therefore nowhere in the world celebrated with great pomp and expectations as it is right here in Ethiopia, one of the ancient lands of the great faiths.
One of the reasons why great holidays are welcomed with great enthusiasm is because of the ways they are celebrated with a variety of rites and rituals. Food is one of, or maybe the biggest of holiday rituals for many reasons. Foods served on holidays like Easter in Ethiopia is diverse, special, and tasty, consumed after two months of abstinence of meat and butter. Speaking of abstinence as part of the two-month rituals, meat, butter, milk and even fish are prohibited in most communities although fish eating remains to be controversial because some Christians are consuming it while others relegate it to the list of prohibited food items.
Ethiopian food culture is celebrated throughout the world for its variety, taste and for being highly nutritious. Let us take for instance the food item known as yetsom beyayenetu (fasting variety) which is composed of injera or the flat bread or pancake made of a super-food known as teff and is spread in the centre or around the tray on which we put wot (sauce) made from lentil, powdered chickpea or beans, vegetables like cabbages, tomatoes, beetroots, carrots, green pepper, chopped red onion or garlic. This is indeed the best vegan food highly appreciated anywhere in the world but Ethiopians have been eating for thousands of years.
In recent article entitled “Ethiopian Food: 20 Traditional Dishes to Look For in Ethiopia” and posted on a blog page, the writer shares their appreciation of Ethiopian traditional foods in the following lines, “Has a meal ever made such an impact that it’s become forever seared into your memory? The colors, the presentation, the way the bread felt on your fingertips. It made such an impression that you still think about it twenty, even thirty years later.
That’s what happened with me and Ethiopian food in the early 90s. I had it for the first time at the Red Sea restaurant in Washington, DC and I’ve been thinking about it ever since.
It wasn’t just the taste of the food that made an impression on me. It was the whole experience. From the way the colorful stews were served together on a large pancake to the way you ate them with your hands using small pieces of injera, I was mesmerized from start to finish. Injera was especially fascinating for me because I had never touched nor tasted bread with that kind of texture. At the time, it was truly a unique experience, one that obviously had a lasting impact on me.
I enjoyed that Ethiopian meal so much that I wound up having it again a few days later, at a different restaurant. Unfortunately, Ethiopian restaurants have been few and far between since then which is why I’m planning a trip to Addis Ababa to enjoy Ethiopian food where it’s really from.”
Food variety in Ethiopia is astonishing. Remember that we have more than 80 ethnic groups, and if each ethnic area has one variety of food the total food diversity is mind-boggling indeed. It is however a sad fact that only a few of them have made it to the top of the national food preferences: Kitfo and Kocho from the Gurage, raw and roasted meat from the Amhara, Oromia and southern Ethiopia, barley and wheat from Oromia, teff and honey from Amhara…etc. The list is long indeed and one cannot cover all the foods in such a limited space because every area of the country, big or small, has its specific variety of food.
Holidays, particularly like the end of the major fasting season of Lent (or Fassika in Amharic) may be a good or bad occasion for revisiting the well-established Ethiopian dishes that have won both medical notoriety as well as praise. The number one Ethiopian food item of choice is of course meat with butter, followed by the inevitable doro wot (chicken stew) and everything that goes with it.
Ethiopian holiday foods are not only loved for their taste. They are also loved because they are highly nutritious as many of them are protein-based and consumed with great appetite to make up for the protein deficiency food lovers were forced to endure in the last two months of Lent. The sudden shift from vegan to protein foods is also another challenge to the body because of the overload or fat-loaded food items. If the ongoing food inflation in Ethiopia is having any positive impact on the food consumption patterns, it is the fact that oil and butter are very expensive in this season, forcing consumers to limit the amount the items they purchase for the holiday.
Well to do Ethiopians who afford to eat meat and butter in great quantities are also facing health problems like obesity, that often leads to hypertension and even diabetes if they are not moving around enough or exercising to ward off the negative effects of their indulgences. These days, too many overweight people are parading in the streets with their big bellies and sweating bodies because even in traditional Ethiopia, looking overweight or fat was a sign of prosperity or richness, so much so that even poorer citizens were making efforts to look rich by letting whatever belly fat they had grown bigger. Traditionally, fat bellies brought respect and appreciation from many members of the society and poorer people look at them with envy as sources of inspiration.
Many people opine that fasting foods are good for fighting the negative effects of galloping inflation is having on many family budgets. Fasting foods are cheaper, healthier and easily available for the average citizen. Many people would like the fasting season to be extended a little bit until inflation starts a downward spiral. It is a pity that the laws of economics are not made of good wishes.
Many people are forced to eat less than usual in these inflation-hit times when food prices are frighteningly rising and staple foods like edible oil are fast turning into luxuries. Eating less may be a good idea for personal health or for the better management of family budgets but who has the guts to control their appetites by sitting in front of mouth-watering delicacies particularly on holidays like Easter when foods are on the imaginations of most people? Eating less than usual may also serve as a temporary device for lowering our expenses. There are even some people who suggest another option: what if we deprive ourselves of edible oil in our foods until menace of inflation is over? This is simply an unacceptable option that may even infuriate many food lovers because eating anything without edible oil or butter may mean to them nutritional doom and gloom in this holiday season.
Ethiopia is of course highly endowed with agricultural food products but the problem is that we are not producing enough food or we are consuming more than we are producing. In other words, population is growing faster than food production. Some economists or demographers estimate that we are producing almost as much amount of food when were 80 million people although we are now 120 million.
Go to the urban as well to the rural areas and you will be shocked by the momentum with which population growth is taking place. Almost every other young woman has a baby in her arms or on her back. Teenage mothers are proliferating everywhere and you get the impression that having a baby might have become the new social fad. The notion that children are gifts of God who will be taken care of by the Creator seems to be still going strong.
Having babies is not a bad thing in itself; but having too many children can be detrimental to many low-income families as well to the country that is struggling to feed itself in the midst of conflicts, climate crisis and economic embargo. To make matters worse, government has no practical plan to stem demographic growth as the Chinese did thirty or so years back and achieved miraculous economic development.
Getting children you cannot feed and clothe properly can bring about psychological torment to the parents. Having a limited number of children may provide better chance for them to be raised properly, with adequate food and clothing, education and work opportunities when they grow up. It may be time for government to start thinking about these issues before they get out of control. Family planning has a long history in this country but since it has never been practiced vigorously and with the future in sight, it has never managed to stem demographic growth or create a certain balance between food production and consumption as many modern economies do.
The above thoughts might be indigestible on holidays like Easter when eating good food is on the mind of most people and worrying about inflation or the number of children in the house quite secondary or irrelevant. As a rule, Ethiopians are a very resilient people and they have the capacity to withstand any challenge including food shortages simply because they are God-trusting people who firmly believe that things will certainly change to the better sooner or later.
Looking back at recent history, there were indeed times when even more serious food shortages hit the country and the government of the Derg warned that people should be prepared for the worst. This line of thinking is unacceptable these days. Government has the duty to feed its people and this is the fundamental reason why it is elected. Yet, government alone is not duty-bound to feed the people unless they should decide to produce enough food for themselves and for their families.
The younger generation of farmers is particularly entitled to go back to the land and produce food. There is no occupation as respectable and as profitable as working the land to produce food. Nowadays, many young people seem to be caught up in the web of unrealistic dreams of better lives by going into the urban areas and getting jobs that do not exist for that matter. This is obviously one area of the challenges of development, policy makers need to study and come up with urgent and effective policies. They need to talk less and do more to make changes in our agricultural system. There is no country in the world that has prospered by ignoring food production and farm work. These are the things most of us should think while making preparations to celebrate the Easter holiday.
BY MULUGETA GUDETA
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SUNDAY EDITION 24 APRIL 2022
