Kimberly Grieves
Jaimie Aller
March 14, 2014
Nutrition

 Lack of knowledge:
– What is it like to be Nigerian here in the United
States?
– What are the family and friendship ties that you keep?
– What changes when moving to another culture?
– What is unique?

 Located on the west coast of Africa on Gulf of Guinea
 Religions include Christianity, Muslim, and
Indigenous
 English is the primary language with over
500 native languages used in rural areas
 Over 250 ethnic groups:
– The larger groups are the Hausa, Yoruba, and
Igbo
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 Decisions based on seniority and is patriarchal
 Extended family members are considered to be guides
 Males are considered important due to their rights to inheritance
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 Children are considered important due to the responsibility they have to their parent

 Follow traditional Muslim and Christian holidays and eating behaviors
 Food is a common gift if you are invited to someone’s home such as fruits, nuts, and chocolate
 Eat with your hands but never the left because it is considered rude
 Children are usually breastfed through being a toddler
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Traditional Food Habits of Nigeria http://ae86levin.catch-the-future.com/22/food-of-nigeria

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Like anywhere, “eating habits depends on a person’s ethnic group and social status.” (2)
Nigerians are becoming Westernized with their food culture in some areas….,” City dwellers are familiar with the canned, frozen, and prepackaged foods found in most Western-style supermarkets. Foreign restaurants also are common in larger cities. However, supermarkets and restaurants often are too expensive for the average Nigerian; thus only the wealthy can afford to eat like Westerners.” (1)
The rural, not so much, there’s less wealth and a more traditional diet is eaten with traditional preparation as well.
There are, however; many different regions and therefore many different traditional “plates”(1) of food.
They eat always with the right hand and traditionally not with utensils unless it’s rice.
The more urban areas use utensils but still with their right hand only.
There’s not a lot of homes with refrigerators (more urban and wealthy that will have these).
Food is included in all special occasions. It is actually considered rude not to share a meal with visitors whether it’s an event or just a friend coming over.
There is far more alcohol consumption in the South because in the North, there is a higher populous of Muslims. The alcohol consumed most frequently for those who do drink is palm wine. Described as tart in taste. It can be distilled more and made into a liquor that tastes much like gin.

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While the cuisine varies tremendously throughout the country of Nigeria the basics are the basics.
The basis of the diet is grains, vegetables and fruit.
Meat and dairy can be scarce in some areas, so the diet is based on resources available.
These few staples usually accompany a stew of some sort. These stews are palm oil based.
Palm oil is made from ground palm kernels and is red in color.
The stews are served with one variety of a vegetable mashed paste much like a dough in consistency made from mashed corn, yams or sweet potatoes.
The basics of their foods can tend to be very spicy, of course this depends on your flavor preferences.

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Some use their fingers on the right hand, others use utensils to eat.
It’s very family style setting, as in all the foods will typically be eaten from a central plate.
Some families will eat around a table while others will eat on a mat on the floor.
Most Nigerians bless their food before partaking.
As a guest you would be expected to try anything that is served.
Dinner is the big meal during the week while Lunch is on the weekends.
In some families the men eat separately from the women and children.
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, Ed. Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 2. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2000. p1312-1324. COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah
"Nigeria." CultureGrams Online Edition. ProQuest, 2014. Web. 4 Mar 2014.

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Breakfast
Maize Pap~ A cereal, most common, mixed with sugar and or milk. It has the first basic ingredients of custard. It can also be made with millet instead of corn.
Lunch
Mashed brown beans & sweet corn, with fried/boiled plaintains and sweet peppers, or mixed vegetables with fried rice and goat meat on a stick.
Dinner
Steamed Mixed Vegetables (potatoes, carrots, peas, spinach, etc.) served with a variety of meat stew.
http://issuu.com/contemporarynigeriancuisine/docs A Taste of Nigerian Meal Planner. Web Feb25 2014.

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Suya~ Like a kabob, meat on a stick
Tropical Fruit Salad
Roasted Corn
Tropical fruit such as pineapple, papaya, coconuts, oranges and bananas.
Zobo~“Fruit Punch” made from boiled leaves, sugar and flavor of choice.
Bush Tea with cakes
Beer, Wine, Palm Wine, Water, Minerals (pop)
Fruit Juice and Smoothies

 Akara ~ Bean cakes, fried bean cakes made with raw ground black-eye peas put into a batter with onions, tomatoes, eggs and chili peppers.
 Egusi ~ Hot fiery soup made with Egusi seeds (pumpkin seeds can be substituted), also can include okra, hot peppers, onions, any type of meat or poultry, palm oil, leafy greens, tomato past and salt.
 Chin-chin ~ Fried pastries made from flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, butter, sugar and eggs
 KuliKuli ~ Peanut balls made from roasted peanuts (called ground nuts in Nigeria), peanut oil, onions, salt and cayenne pepper.
 Okra Soup ~ This is much like New Orleans Gumbo.
 Yam Fufu ~ boiled yams, pounded in a mortar and pestle and served with meat or fish stew and vegetable or okra soup.
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, Ed. Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 2. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2000. p1312-1324. COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah

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With wedding of course there is dancing and a great feast!
There is something in Nigeria also called “child naming ceremonies”.
The Ibo’s parents host the event and the Grandmothers traditionally prepare the dish that will be served. Modern practice is all the women in the house take part in this.
Kola nuts are the Ibo’s greatest symbol of hospitality and are served with Palm Wine.
After they have had enough to drink, the new mom has her mother serve rice, garri, yams or fufu, soup and stew made with fish and other meats.
After the meal, more drinking and then names are offered by family and more drinking and the names offered are reviewed.
The actual naming ceremony takes place using, Kola nuts, water, pepper, oil, salt, honey, and liquor. All these food items have significant symbolism.

 Kola Nuts: Good Fortune
 Water: Purity
 Oil: Power & Health
 Salt: Intelligence & Wisdom
 Honey: Happiness
 Liquor: Wealth & Prosperity
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, Ed. Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 2. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2000. p1312-1324. COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah

Countries and Their Cultures, Ed. Carol R. Ember and Melvin Ember. Vol. 3. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2001. p1624-1642. COPYRIGHT 2001 Macmillan Reference USA, COPYRIGHT 2006 Gale
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, Ed. Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 2. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2000. p1312-1324. COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah
"Nigeria." Culture Grams Online Edition. ProQuest, 2014. Web. 4 Mar 2014.
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Nigerians, like people in many developing countries, suffer from widespread disease and a poor health care system.
Malaria, HIV/AIDS, parasitic infections, and childhood diseases are rampant throughout the country.
Widespread poverty also contributes to the poor level of health care, as many people shy away from modern treatments that are too expensive. So, the private clinics are too expensive for most.
Corruption at all levels of government makes it difficult for health care funding to trickle down to the average Nigerian.
Underfunding and neglect have left many clinics and hospitals in poor physical condition and without modern equipment.
Pharmacies, both state-run and private, regularly run out of medicines. Patients looking for cheaper remedies often turn to blackmarket vendors, who often sell expired or counterfeit drugs.
Like all Africans and African Americans the Nigerian people also are susceptible to sickle cell anemia, which is an abnormal, hereditary variation in the structure of hemoglobin (protein found in the red blood cells.)
There is less than one physician for every one thousand people in Nigeria.
The best care is available at medical colleges.
Facilities and care are inadequate in rural areas, and infant mortality and maternal mortality rates are high.
Only 39 percent of births are attended by skilled health personnel, and nearly 14 percent of all children die before they reach age five.

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Both Western and Traditional medicines are used in Nigeria
Western medicine is self explanatory.
Traditional medicine is called juju .
Traditional medicine is used mostly by rural peoples because they don’t trust Western medicine.
“Doctors” of juju use herbal & plant remedies in their treatment.
Statistically in Nigeria these homeopathic remedies work better than modern medicine and have less if not any side effects.
The countries health providers are trying to find a way to combine the 2 medicines to be able to provide the more modern techniques when absolutely necessary.
Countries and Their Cultures, Ed. Carol R. Ember and Melvin Ember. Vol. 3. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2001. p1624-1642. COPYRIGHT 2001 Macmillan Reference USA, COPYRIGHT 2006 Gale

AIDS
 Aids has killed so many in Nigeria.
 In 1999 the World Health Organization and UNAIDS estimated that 2.7 million Nigerian adults were living with AIDS or HIV and ~1.7 million had already died by the end of that year.
 The primary way of transmission in Nigeria is through heterosexual relations.
 Tony Hauser captured one image of a grandmother surrounded by her 17 grandchildren, all orphaned by AIDS. Says Hauser,
"The middle generation has been devastated by HIV and AIDS so you meet grandmothers who care for five, ten, twenty grandchildren." http://www.photosensitive.com/hiv-aids-pictures.php
Countries and Their Cultures, Ed. Carol R. Ember and Melvin Ember. Vol. 3. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2001. p1624-1642. COPYRIGHT 2001 Macmillan Reference USA, COPYRIGHT 2006 Gale

 Polio effects Nigeria on higher levels, especially in the destitute North. (3) There have been free clinics to the public that have been under attack, sometimes all the people in the clinics will be shot. In one story in February last year in Kano, 2 clinics were shot up and then set fire before the attackers left. While they have yet to figure out who the offenders were, “the blame has fallen squarely on a local terrorist group known as Boko
Haram. It is known that Boko Haram is opposed to polio vaccines on the mistaken grounds that it is a Western plot to sterilise children and control population.”(4)

 Crust:
– 2 cups Flour
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1 Stick butter
1 plantain
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1 tsp Baking Powder
½ tsp Salt
 Filling
– 2 fried plantains
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2 eggs
1 onion
– 1 red pepper
– Dash salt
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 Tastes like a hearty pie
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There is a sweetness from the plantains but the rest is very filling and more of a meal than traditional pie
Salt and baking powder aren’t necessary in this recipe due to them not always being available

 Grown in Tropical climates
 Considered a vegetable style banana
 Helps to create the savory taste
 1 Cup serving contains
– 3.5 grams fiber
– 716 mg potassium
– 16.8 mg vitamin C

 Crust
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1 Cup Flour
½ Stick butter
1 plantain
½ tsp baking powder
¼ tsp salt
 Filling
– 2 fried plantains
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4 egg whites
1 onion
– 1 red pepper

 Original
– Calories:180.58
– Protein: 3.67
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Carbohydrates: 22.92
Sugar: 3.32
Fiber: 1.27
Fat: 8.52
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Cholesterol: 35.86
Vitamin C: 11.67
Calcium: 30.35
Potassium: 176.32
 Modified
– 104.97
– 2.94
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14.59
3.35
0.99
4.12
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10.18
11.67
16.88
154.90

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Remember that they are family oriented so you may be counseling the entire family or the head of the family rather than just the patient
When first meeting with the patient the greetings are the most important so don’t rush the greeting
Work with them on a trip to the grocery store and how to prepare and then keep food

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1) Countries and Their Cultures, Ed. Carol R. Ember and Melvin Ember. Vol. 3. New York: Macmillan
Reference USA, 2001. p1624-1642. COPYRIGHT 2001 Macmillan Reference USA, COPYRIGHT 2006 Gale
2) Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, Ed. Jeffrey Lehman. Vol. 2. 2nd ed. Detroit: Gale, 2000. p1312-1324. COPYRIGHT 2000 Gale Kwasi Sarkodie-Mensah
3) http://ae86levin.catch-the-future.com/22/food-of-nigeria Web Mar 1 2014
4) http://indepthafrica.com/nigeria-terror-hits-health-care/ Feb 16 2013. Web 27 Feb 2014.
5) http://issuu.com/contemporarynigeriancuisine/docs A Taste of Nigerian Meal Planner. Web Feb25 2014.
6) http://www.motherlandnigeria.com/food.html Web. 1 Mar 2014
7) http://www.photosensitive.com/hiv-aids-pictures.php Web 2 Mar 2014.
8) "Nigeria." CultureGrams Online Edition. ProQuest, 2014. Web. 4 Mar 2014.
9.) Ama, Okechi. Friday, February 7, 2014. (970)310-3762.
10.) Law, R. Olaniyan, R. (1987). Nigerian History and Culture. (1:28). Journal of African History.
11.) Kwintessential. (ND) Nigeria-Language, Culture, Customs, and Etiquette. www.kwintessential.co./uk/resources/global-etiquette/nigeria.html.