A Naija Food Beauty Contest

Our people say that ‘Monkey no fine but im mama love am’. Such is love in the eyes of the beholder. A perception contaminated by geography, blood and genetics. They say that beauty attracts people to come together but character keeps them together. With food the beauty is magnetic but it is the taste that keeps you coming back for more.

Everything is a contest in today’s world. Television has cooking contests that are quite popular in the UK. It is a kind of X -Factor for the kitchen alchemists, who all fight like gladiators for the winning prize. Usually the judges on these shows taste the food to score it and we know how subjective that can be. Till Elon Musk or some other clever person invents an AI (Artificial Intelligence) food taster it will be biased judges for the foreseeable future.  It would be great to have food analysis apps attached to smart phones that can scan and pick up any contaminants accidentally, carelessly or intentionally added to the food. This would please that Naija cohort who have been expecting to be poisoned for twenty years so far and are still on hypervigilance mode.

Food can look beautiful but every man is a Judge in his own gastric court. Now the beauty on the plate has nothing to do with the smell or the taste. Some Food handlers  know how to design food artistically in ways that make you want to forfeit the meal and hand it over to the Tate gallery for displays. Some Food handlers from hell will revolt you. You know those odd people who think dogs, snakes and alligators are food. Once those nasty plates are seen it takes weeks to get them off the mind.

I find that sliced paw paw on a white plate is incredibly alluring. The bright colours seem to light up some area of the brain that brings satisfaction. I don’t particularly care if I eat that fruit or not but I find it attractive. If I were a judge on any food beauty pageant, paw paw will win hands down. Second will be those wonderfully shaped cakes I wouldn’t eat. There is really much to say about the virtues of looking and not eating. The feasting of the eyes is a great past time.

Every man should belong to a team of Judges that walk in packs looking out for gastronomy beauty. The buffet section at parties or in restaurants, with their long line up of food, look at each other then set their eyes on the Judges. ‘Would they love me?’ they ask themselves as we walk on by. Further down the line the moin moin looks sideways to the dodo and says, ‘fine food like me? Na dem dey rush us’. The Judges look and choose the best. The coconut rice suddenly finds its voice and starts to sing, ‘I’m a wonderful thing baby’ like a little kid from Sierra Leone with a Creole accent. But this is a beauty contest and the judges will decide who is finest.

That smooth round pounded yam moulded by hands gifted in geometry is a delight to look at. Fried rice looks good in a large silver dish. It has so many little bits of colourful edibles.  Next is grilled fish lying on its side at full stretch. The fish lies in state at its majestic funeral having lived a life well spent. Growing in size so that it is fit for the banquet where it arrives dead, spiced and fully cooked. It will rest in peace in someone’s stomach swimming with the Fanta. Fish is fine when motionless and at peace. The heaped up chicken is not a pretty sight. Neither is the stewed beef that always seems like it is attempting to swim in a dried up river.

Looks are deceptive and many get to their tables after being seduced by what they saw, only to be greeted by all the pepper in Kano as they take their first spoon. All na hustle. The food must attract someone. Sometimes in parties inexperienced people make comments about the wowo (ulgy) food. They shout to people who are about to sink a spoon into a dish, ‘I wouldn’t eat that poison if I were you. I wonder who cooked it?’

‘I did it. On my feet all night’ comes the reply from the chef who has been orbiting her creation wondering why nobody is taking a bite. It can be soul destroying to be rejected by people but such is life. That is why some hate competitions among school children as some would come first and others would come last. They try to protect kids from the harsh realities of life. These are the same kids who are sat in the car seeing mansions along the road while they make their way to their tiny flat. No one can be protected from the fact that all the fingers on the hand are of different lengths.

If one’s fried rice looks like Tuwo Shikafa wearing make- up, one’s pepper soup might win the prize. One man’s soup is another man’s poison so it works out well for all in the end.

There is a trend of escalating beauty on social media. Lagbaja said - wowo girls don finish for Nigeria. Everyone has long hair and finger nails and flawless skin. It might be flawed skin buried under layers of Mary Kay but no one is washing off the twelve coats of paint to check.

The same applies to food. It gets prettier by the day especially on Instagram. Food now has a team of people sorting out the photoshoot. Backgrounds, fine plates, shining cutlery and good lighting produce pictures of food one normally only sees in a dream.

I wonder if this escalating beauty is a problem. It can be irritating trying to eat dinner on a date with someone obsessed with photographing every plate that comes. The actions are intrusive but the photographer is hell bent on showing that their plate – betta pass my neighbour’s. There is a competition to show your food fine pass. A short twenty years ago, there were only two people involved in a dinner date. Now it is all the followers on Instagram, monitoring spirits on Facebook and the Ogbanje spirits on Twitter lamenting they are soaking Garri at home while slay ‘cuisine’ Mama is living it up.

Izzz like everybody is contesting in a beauty contest. The good thing is no one takes selfies with the food when it comes out at the other end. Halleluyah!