When you fall in love with the right person, you want to give all of yourself, holding nothing back. It’s like finding your purpose in life. Nothing else makes sense. It is the same story for Iquo Ukoh, whose steamy romance with food and nutrition has been on for decades. Together, they’ve been striking the right chords.
With a background in Nutrition and Dietetics, Ukoh’s love for food has never been a hidden affair. Things got even better with a job at Nestle, the world’s largest food and beverage company.
“I always referred to my experience in Nestle as a perfect marriage,” Ukoh tells me as I caught up with her via Microsoft Teams. “It couldn’t be more perfect”.
She was at Nestle for close to 35 years, starting out as a medical delegate, then nutrition advisor for Nestle’s infant nutrition business before ending up in marketing. Ukoh became Marketing Manager for Nestle, Nigeria, then Marketing Services, Executive Director, the role she held till she retired in 2016.
Ukoh is a grandmother, and like her, she believes food should be grand. So, she blogs about food and brings healthy twists to Nigerian and other West African Dishes. While working with Nestle meant she has always been with food, she never saw their involvement taking the current turn.
“Working at Nestle meant that I never left food because it is a health and wellness company. That’s what Nestle prides itself in. I was neck-deep in nutrition and food all along. But did I think that I was going to now step out of Nestle and do something of my own in food? Not initially. But as I was preparing to retire, it was clear that this was the direction. And indeed, I started my blog actually while working in Nestle. And that’s how it started,” Ukoh says.
1QFoodPlatter helps her push the maximum nutrition agenda, she claims. “Because I see a lot of gap in terms of people understanding what to eat, and the kind of choices they should be making, as far as food is concerned.”
Choices and wellness
Ukoh explains that 1QFoodPlatter is not just a food blog about recipes and creating recipes, but a platform where she subtlely educates people. “I’m passionate about that,” she says. “I believe strongly that there are so many things we can fix, as far as health is concerned, if we make the right choices…right choices of the type of food we eat, how we eat them when we eat them, what portions we consume of those foods, and how we combine the foods,” Ukoh says, adding “There are so many other things you need to change in the lifestyle, but nutrition is very key. So for me, 1QFoodPlatter is one platform where I do that.”
Ukoh had watched the way Nigerians craved “Oyibo food” almost uncontrollably. From burgers to pizza, they just seem not to get enough. Surprisingly, she says, people outside of Nigeria are craving “authentic local foods”. And rightly so, Ukoh believes our food is one of the best things Nigeria has. “We are healthier,” she stresses.
“And so the point was for me to continue to share those food and not just food from my tribe, but food across Nigeria … from the north to the south to the east to the west. So, wherever you are from, you’d always find something on my page.”
“And I get this comment all the time; Oh my goodness, I didn’t know, this was what my mother used to cook; this was what my grandmother used to cook. And so, you know, I’m finding that I have managed to at least bring us to that point where I’m seeing that we take some pride in Nigerian foods.”
… our food is a tapestry of flavours and textures.
Food and diversity
Ukoh adores the complexity of Nigerian food, saying that they reflect the diversity of the Nigerian language and culture.
“You know, for me, our food is a tapestry of flavours and textures. The colours, the flavour, complexity, the texture, the mouthfeel, it’s all a combination of that.
“Food is an expression of Nigeria; it reflects our diversity of cultures and languages. So, that complexity that you find in a plate of a Nigerian meal, for instance, you have pounded yam and edikan ikong, you have vegetable, meat, you have crayfish, Palmoil, kpomo you have all this. And you know, for an average, non-Nigerian, I mean that is really some complexity, but that’s what makes our food interesting,” Ukoh says.
Ukoh speaks glowingly of food, the way one would speak about a lover. While food is always close to her heart every time of the year, Ukoh says there is something even more special about food at Christmas.
“You know, I would transport myself when my father used to take us to spend Christmas in the village. The family would kill a goat and there would be a frenzy of activities … men talking at the top of their voices drinking palm wine, the goat is slaughtered and then we make this soup, Afia efere ebot which people call white soup, it’s brought in, of course you know pounded yam accompanies it, this is set before the family. The men and the women gather, people are cutting pounded yam dipping in this bowl of soup and there’s a lot of bonding going on, children running around the place and what have you.
“So there’s something about Christmas and food. I find these days for many people, dishes they normally would find a bit cumbersome during the year are the kinds of things they prepare at Christmas, of course, for everybody,” Ukoh says, stressing that our food projects our culture, and it is one of the discussions she wants us to keep having, especially as food started becoming an important export. Ukoh started a podcast partly because of this.
“As we start to export our foods, I also want people to understand us, you know, via that route. People know a lot about Nigerian music, fashion. But the point is, when, when you come to Nigeria, and you see a bowl of soup, and you see different meats, and scenes like that in there, you should understand why we do what we do. So, beyond the food itself, the food culture, you know, the podcast is to help you understand me as a Nigerian better. So yes, the podcast is out there on the internet. So I want to believe that so many people outside of Nigeria, would finally get to understand us better besides what they know. We are not just about Jollof rice. We have lots and lots more about us, as far as food is concerned. And this is one reason why I’m doing this with my daughter. But also, it helps to understand perspective. An older generation with the younger generation.”
“We have lots and lots more about us as far as food is concerned. This is one reason why I’m doing this with my daughter.”
Mum vs Daughter on authenticity
In no disrespect to the efforts of young chefs who are beginning to make waves across Africa and globally, Ukoh encourages authenticity.
“We had a podcast and we talked about authenticity in our dishes; a very hot topic. If you listened to that podcast, you’d see that I didn’t quite agree with my daughter, neither did she agree with me about authenticity,” Ukoh says.
She recalls how her daughter Atim started her food blog. “She started Afrolems while studying in Canada, I think it was her third year and I visited once and she said she had some time on her hands. She likes to cook; is there something she can do with her time? That was how it started. I sat with her, brought my marketing game on and we got her a blog name. And she started catering in a small way, cooking Nigerian stew and selling to fellow students in the university, and then went on while still in school, catering to little birthday parties and all of that. I think she is more into food than I am if you asked me.”
When asked whether she looked forward to having a granddaughter also fall in love with food, Ukoh says she wouldn’t mind, “but I’m not a parent who would say I need ten generations to come out and do food. There are so many things to do in the world besides food”.
However, if her granddaughter ends up with food, there may be another addition to her podcast Nigerian Food Culture, one who would probably argue even more vehemently with Ukoh about authenticity. Ukoh would defend her love, regardless.
“Yes, absolutely, there’s room for modernization, but there’s room for using our ingredients slightly differently,” Ukoh says. “For instance, if we talk about ewa agoyin , my belief is that if it is ewa agoyin, then please make it ewa agoyin. However, if you then decide that you want to use beans to make something else, call it the name you want to call it, no problem, we will now adapt ourselves and eat it if we like it.”
She agrees that there’s a lot of fusion going on between local and continental dishes. “My perspective is always — yes, we can make progress. But let’s not lose our essence.”
My perspective is always — yes, we can make progress. But let’s not lose our essence.
She also wonders why people working in food seem to be keen to present our food differently. “Is it because we are ashamed of our food, or we just want to present our food to be more appealing to somebody else?”
Ukoh’s position: “Let me serve it the way I will serve it. If it appeals to you, it appeals to you. But again, it’s an ongoing conversation in that area.”
The nutritionist is committed to cooking Nigerian dishes the way she believes they should be cooked and also educating people about Nigerian cuisine. Apart from using social media, Ukoh is also working on a cookbook.
“It has taken me three years … three years of intensive work, travelling, research, and a lot more. To me, what I’m about to serve to Nigeria is more than recipes,” says Ukoh who promised to tell us more about her book closer to its launch.
It will be a great book, no doubt, but we do not know exactly what to expect. However, one thing is sure; it will be emotionally satisfying and have a great ending like most books about love.
