Culture
Eben Safari Tours Team2 min read
Rwandan Food: 15 Dishes and Drinks to Try
Simple, fresh and seasonal, with some of the best coffee you'll ever taste.
Eben Safari Tours Team2 min read
Quick answerMust-try Rwandan foods include brochettes (grilled skewers), isombe (cassava leaves with peanut sauce), ibihaza (pumpkin with beans), matoke (cooked green plantain), sambaza (small fried fish from Lake Kivu), ugali, and drinks such as ikivuguto (fermented milk), urwagwa (banana beer) and Rwanda's specialty coffee and tea.
Dishes
- Brochettes – goat, beef or fish skewers, often with grilled plantain
- Isombe – pounded cassava leaves cooked with peanut paste
- Ibihaza – pumpkin cooked with beans
- Matoke / ibitoke – green plantain, steamed or in stews
- Sambaza – tiny fried sardines from Lake Kivu
- Tilapia – grilled whole, often from Lake Kivu or Lake Muhazi
- Ugali (ubugali) – maize or cassava porridge
- Agatogo – plantain stew with meat or vegetables
- Beans – a staple, cooked many ways
- Rolex – an omelette rolled in a chapati, borrowed from Uganda
Drinks
- Coffee – bright, fruity and often award-winning
- Tea – from the high estates around Nyungwe
- Ikivuguto – thick fermented milk
- Urwagwa – traditional banana beer
- Akabanga – Rwanda's chilli oil, used by the drop!
The local buffet
At lunchtime, try a local buffet: pile your plate once with rice, beans, plantain, greens and stew.
#food#culture#coffee
Written by the Eben Safari Tours team
We are a Kigali-based tour operator, guiding travellers through Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania since 2015. Our guides trek with the gorillas, drive Akagera and climb the volcanoes every week, and we update these guides whenever rules or prices change.
