Mr. Alex Mwaura
Mr. Alex Mwaura is a Kenyan national with over 28 years experience in the hospitality industry as a chef. Trained as an apprentice in the famous Kenya Utalii College in Kenya, Alex Mwaura has been a member of the opening team which has opened five Southern Sun hotels in various countries.
When they started Southern Sun Ikoyi Hotel in 2009, Alex and his team took deep rooted researches and experimented on approaching authentic Nigerian cuisines from various angles which is now paying dividends that is witnessed every Sunday during Sunday Brunch hours.
This has made Southern Sun Ikoyi Hotel dining , a one stop choice for all families, friends and associations.
ON what he has discovered about eating culture in Nigeria
When we arrived here, we had a serious cultural shock because everything was 100 percent new out of the Nigerian food. Whatever we were seeing were completely new and we made sure we first of all understand the culture and food. The best way to do that was to do a proper research on Nigerian food. Basically, it is not available anywhere else but in Nigeria.
We ended up looking for elderly people who understand the meals from different perspectives because we realised that the younger generation we had was so much into buying ready-made food than doing the actual cooking.
So we decided to go to people who understood the real cooking and that is why we ended up having original recipes. These recipes have helped us to be consistent and we are developing them as time goes on, and adding new traits to it.
For instance, there are meals that we realized that the oil that was used originally was far better than the oil in the market today. So, went and looked for the original oil to enable us have original meals on the table.
The other thing we looked at was the presentation. For instance porridge yam is put in one big bowl and everybody comes spiking with spoon, we thought we could do better, and we started packaging it in smaller quantities, the meat cut was also chunky to us, we decided to go with smaller cuts that will be easy for one to eat.
The fact is that you can have as much food as you want, we are not restricting one to one chunk of meat. People are appreciating it, now you don’t have to struggle with your chunk of meat like before.
From our perspective and the basic culture of eating here, the buffets are the most appealing. We put a lot of efforts to produce it. It has also given us space to explore food from different parts of the country, and this has pulled different clientele because they will definitely find something that appeal to them when they come.
We also have international clientele who we carter for with international dishes which we have also invested a lot of time to train the people we have to be able to produce such food. Of course, our Nigerian clientele are also well-traveled, they appreciate continental food too.
On Nigerians and dishes
We talk to our clients a lot. Our chefs go one on one with the guest inside the restaurants, and this has really helped us. My way of running the kitchen is making it interactive with the clients and you are able to get direct feedback from the clients. And by doing this, you are also able to introduce new dishes to the clients and to give them a trial. One of the things we are doing is that when we have a buffet, we make a few dishes out of our continental food and pass around for tasting, this has also paid dividends because people come back to say there is one dish I tasted one Sunday and I will like to have it for a meal. This has also boosted our clientele a lot.
On a Nigerian food he will recommend to a Kenyan
That is a tough one because basically Kenyans don’t eat pepper. It is an additive used in very small quantity. The pepper that we know is the green chillies, and rarely find anybody having one piece in a meal. Mostly it comes as a big shock for a Kenyan when they visit Nigeria.
Popular meals
You will find most of them eating chicken and chips. Later after awhile, you find them appreciating other meals like the pepper soup, bitter leaf soup and so on. But one of the most popular meals that any Kenyan will come here and enjoy is Suya.
Kenyans have a culture of eating meat any time, breakfast, lunch and dinner. To them, Suya is much more closer to what they are used to having. From the North, we also have Tuwo Masa, which is a staple food in Kenya. It is called Ugali, it is an every day meal with meat in Kenya.
On the type of Nigerian food foreigners go for
The first thing most people even western guests start with is Suya because they can recognize the meal. One thing about food is you first of all eat with your eyes before you taste the food. So, it becomes very possible for someone to make a direct choice of what to eat by just looking at it. You can easily identify what Suya is by mere looking at it.
Beyond Suya, many non-Nigerian guests go after jellof rice. It is not as spicy for those who are not used to spicy food. But once guests stay here for a while, especially if they are experimental, they go for other meals.
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