A Harare-based agro-food processor and culinary arts cook, Zororo Taruvinga of Zoro Nemugoti’s stand was a hit at the at the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF) as scores of people visited the stand to have a taste of her snacks and biscuits made from sorghum, millet, yam and sweet potatoes.
In an interview Taruvinga said her desire was to change the negative perceptions that people have on indigenous products and make them more appealing.
“My inspiration is making our African food look cooler because many people do not believe that indigenous food can taste nice and still remain healthy.
“African food is associated with being healthy so my goal is to bring some innovation to it. I want to celebrate the nutrition that we have in local food and show that it is not only the food that we buy from other countries that can look good,” she said.
Taruvinga said her desire was to bring the Zimbabwean grains that are always found in the bird section in supermarkets to people’s plates.
“We are bringing to you the things that are usually seen in the bird sections in supermarkets like millet and sorghum to your plate and we are hoping to have these in different airlines. Our goal is to make premium things with food that is coming from the bird section,” she said.
Taruvinga said they started their business in 2020 and it started as sauce range and they later incorporated other products to their range.
“The business started in 2020, a few weeks after the first lockdown when l had to quit my job in Botswana where l was working as a culinary chef. We started with the chilli sauces because everyone was farming during that time.
“We decided to utilise the land that we had in our village to farm tomatoes and when we realised that we had excess, we then started making our chilli sauces and we later incorporated other products,” she said.
Zoro Nemugoti has a wide range of products that entail a juice line, cookies, snacks and sauce made from various indigenous products.
“We have the juice line made with tamarins found in tropical areas like Mutare and we have cookies made from sorghum, millet and rice.
“There is a snack that we have that is made of wheat and we have chips made from yam, potatoes, beetroot and sweet potatoes,” said Taruvinga.
She said their goal was to provide healthy food for all age groups and they hoped that in the future they would work with various nutritionists.
“We are producing food that is healthy for every age group and in the future l see my brand on Amazon and different continents. l want to be associated with anything African and we want to see ourselves working with nutritionists in producing healthy African food,” said Taruvinga.
Last year in September Taruvinga dominated the annual Maputo International Trade Fair awards held in Mozambique.