Flying Termites, Delicious and Rare
Tracking down a taste of happiness
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Flying Termites, Delicious and Rare
By Lutivini Majanja
Whenever it rains, and termites fly out of their hills, someone in my Kenyan circle will make a comment like, “Oh that’s tasty food you know, you can eat them.” But hardly ever do I encounter Nairobians who eat termites now, and in the city. Instead they have stories about childhood visits to rural areas where these insects are a common snack. The creatures are featured in a bedtime story where Tortoise demands that a debtor return his kumbikumbi, flying termites. Unlike mabuyu (baobab candy), simsim (sesame cookies), or groundnuts, fried termites are only common in rural areas. There are plenty of termite mounds to be found in Nairobi, but their inhabitants aren’t a popular city snack.
My most significant memory of eating these winged, protein-packed insects, is being five or six years old and, in gumboots and raincoat, accompanying an adult to the termite hill outside our house, where we captured the termites in a blue enamel teapot placed upside down on their hill. Because I panicked when some flew out of the teapot while others escaped the rain outside flying into the lit kitchen and circling the lightbulb, I was sent to my bedroom. They were as big as bees with wings like wasps, scary even if they didn’t buzz. In my bedroom I could hear and smell the air change when she dry-fried these termites on a flat pan we regularly used for making chapati. Sprinkled with salt, they crackled and sizzled in their own fat, filling the house with their distinct meaty, nutty aroma. Though we’d captured so many of them, what we had was just a little more than two fistfuls of tiny, crunchy treats. We were so happy.
I’m caught in this nostalgia when, over 30 years later, I try to find a place in Nairobi that might sell edible termites. Restaurants and online food marketers embrace local cuisine now much more than they used to. Kienyeji’s, an online store and restaurant that offers traditional cuisine from Western Kenya, reports that it can only supply termites in the rainy season: this year’s is delayed in all east Africa, so we wait. It’s the first week of May when my batch is delivered, pre-fried and ready to eat. There’s just one disappointment: My 300-shilling batch weighs no more than 150 grams. I open the bag and take in the familiar oily, crunchy texture. This batch is smoky, so I suspect it’s been prepared over an open wood fire. There’s the hint of soil. I pinch small quantities, miserly, uncertain about the next time I’ll have them. I’ve tried already to make a second order, but Kienyeji’s say they are already out of stock, and the rain’s disappeared. 🇰🇪
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