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Kenyans are known for their penchant for nyama choma, Swahili for “roast meat”, and it is said that they take advantage of any gathering to partaking this favourite pastime.
It is in this vein that four young entrepreneurs led by Palisa Mawema opened a new restaurant in Tynwald on Friday last week called the Braza Choma.
The restaurant’s administrator Nicole Dzikiti said they wanted a restaurant where people can gather to eat uniquely prepared smoked and grilled meat.
“Baraza in Swahili means a public meeting place and choma is roasted meat. We are offering a place where people can come and eat a variety of grilled and smoked meat from your beef, pork, sausages that is prepared in a very unique way.
“We do not add anything to the meat except that when we smoke it we use wood that adds flavour to the meat and it is served with a variety of starches, mainly white sadza, sadza rezviyo and sadza remhunga and salads.
“We are open three days a week, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. On Friday we are open from 6 to 9pm and on Saturday and Sunday we open from 10 am to 10 pm.
“Prior to opening this restaurant we were only hosting weddings and events in our pavilion and we were using these facilities to cater for those events and we decided that since we already have them why not use them for a restaurant and Baraza Choma was born.
“The restaurant is cited in a way that it does not interfere or disrupt other activities such as weddings,” she said.
Apart from the food the restaurant also offers full bar facilities. Dzikiti said as entrepreneurs they were already looking beyond the restaurant project as they seek to grow their business as well as create employment.
“We want to make our meat available all over the country starting with Harare. We are planning to pack it in vacuum sealed packets that will be sold in all leading stores.
“All that customers have to do is simply buy the meat and heat it up in a microwave and it is ready to eat.
“Our primary shop will be here at our offices. We will be open every day of the week. In line with this focus we are also actively looking at breeding our own livestock. We are currently relying on different suppliers for our meat,” she said.
Dzikiti said that they are also planning to introduce a farmers’ market to complement their restaurant business.
“We know that most people want fresh vegetables but are not prepared to travel to Mbare Musika to buy these so we are planning to bring the farmers to them by providing facilities for them to come in and sell their produce and our customers can buy their vegetables while they eat,” she said.
Online Reporter