--- The Cook Up with Adam Liaw S2 airs weeknights on SBS Food at 7.00pm and 10.30pm, or stream it free on SBS On Demand. This week The Cook Up celebrates Refugee Week. Catch Rosemary in the 'in a nutshell' episode. ---
Food is a way for Rosemary Kariuki-Fyfe, a Sydney-based activist against domestic violence, to nurture togetherness.
Salmon, for example, transports her to the joyous experience of eating at a restaurant with her son.
"I used to try new restaurants together with my son every month, it was something my son and I decided to do together."
Rosemary often serves her lamb shank stew with mukimo Source: Adam Liaw
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Rosemary's lamb shank stew
Kariuki-Fyfe's son was in his early 20s when they started this tradition. For about nine years, when they had nothing else planned on a Friday night, the pair would hop into the car with no real destination in mind. All they knew was that at the final stop, they would eat something new, together.
"We would always use different routes that we didn't know, to see where they would take us," says Kariuki-Fyfe. "We used to drive and drive and drive and after two hours of driving we would stop at whatever restaurant was around and go in. Most of the time it was a pub, we'd eat, my son would have a drink and I would have a hot chocolate if I was driving that day."
I always cook a lot, the food makes people happy.
Kariuki-Fyfe's family, friends and neighbours also love it when cooks for them. Aside from the lamb shank stew she made for Adam Liaw on The Cook Up, her favourite things to cook are slow-cooked beef ribs, pilau made with basmati rice, and mukimo, a Kenyan dish made of mashed potato, corn and peas. "I'll also make what my friends call 'Rosemary's signature dish', where I take frozen spinach, put it in a pot, add onions, salt, black pepper and cream and let it simmer slowly. I cook this dish everywhere I go, even when I go away for a trip with friends," says Kariuki-Fyfe.
The spread heavily features vegetables, a nod to Kikuyu, the agricultural Kenyan town where she spent her childhood.
Pilau.
"I always cook a lot, the food makes people happy," says Kariuki-Fyfe. "I have these containers, so whatever remains, people carry home. Because many people I know don't have families in Australia, so we become family for each other."
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It is no wonder that her home is often filled with visitors. "Now that we are opening up again after the COVID lockdowns, everyone is saying to me, 'I'm coming to your place for a sleepover' and I told them, 'You have to be on the waiting list!'".
