Rahamat Azees Prepares For Arrival of Guests At Restaurant.
Malik Azees Preparing For Opening.
On the morning of Sunday, August 4th, 2019, Mama Z’s African Supermarket & Restaurant held its grand opening at its new location in the Meridian Plaza Shopping Center that is located on 16th Street and Meridian Avenue in Oklahoma City. All the members of the Azees family, including parents Olawale and Rahamat Azees, who own and operate the establishment, were in attendance, and while they and their older children seemed anxious in the way that new business owners often are, they also were obviously proud of the fact that they had transformed a formerly unoccupied structure into a place that was hosting customers and preparing food for them. The guests included members of the Oklahoma City Nigerian community who were dressed for religious services, and many of them saw fit to help the family by loading soda cans into refrigerators and entering the kitchen area and asking if they could be of assistance in a way that was a reminder of the cooperative nature that is found in many immigrant communities in the state and nation. Visitors to the kitchen observed the telegenic Rahamat Azees stirring a large cauldron brimming with an orange liquid that was destined to be poured into a waiting armada of silver containers and be eventually transformed into the West African delicacy popularly known as “moi-moi.” The menu explained that moi-moi consists of “ blended boiled beans mixed with peppers, onions,” and would be served with either “beef, boiled eggs, or fish.” The Sunday edition of the New York Times published on that date contained a favorable review of a recently opened Nigerian restaurant in the borough of Brooklyn, “Brooklyn Sura,” and it was explained that sura is a street food consisting of thinly cut meat, coated grounded peanuts and a sauce of varying degrees of heat that originated in Nigeria and is popular there. That article generated several responses from readers, one of which interestingly advised that “Nigerian food is the next big thing. Count on it”. The Mama Z’s menu offered a “Suya Platter” and advised that it consists of “ grilled beef shank garnished with grounded roast peanuts, pepper and Nigerian suya sauce.”
A heading on that document was titled “Soups and Swallows,” and the latter item does not entail the birds such as pigeons that are eaten in Africa but rather starches such as pounded yams and wheat, and a recent book about Nigerian cuisine asserted that “swallow is to Nigerians what baguettes are to the French or spaghetti is to the Italians.”
There was a large television screen that featured a rerun of an English language comedy that was popular in Nigeria several years ago, and later in other parts of Africa and was titled “ Papa Ajasco” that brought smiles and laughter from some of the attendees, and it was explained by one guest that the show’s popularity was based on the humor it generated as well as the important life lessons it sought to teach to viewers. And it seems probable that Mama Z’s African Supermarket And Restaurant will become a symbol of Oklahoma City’s diversity as well as the welcome it extends to immigrants.
Against the Grain 