Food, the most important necessity of any living organism in the world, has formed many relations and caused conflicts not only among humans but also among animals. To satiate the appetite, an organism fights, work and go to any extent which can neither be dreamed of nor can be expected.
While primitive humans used to eat raw, uncooked and tasteless food, advancement and progress enabled us to have delicious, well-cooked food.
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Every day thousands of people troop into bukkas to feast on different dishes such as rice, amala, eba and banga soup; forgetting that foods cooked at home ensures the best quality and appropriate quantity, while food cooked at bukkas, mama put etc are cooked for a specific purpose, aiming to ensure profit, which in some cases results in poor food quality or even unhygienic food resulting in food poisoning or what have you.
By cooking at home one can be assured that the food is well cooked, kept in clean pots, the ingredients are fresh resulting in a healthy and appropriate diet the common view of most people who eat in Bukas is that food that is served in highbrow restaurants don’t come cheap agreed they don’t come cheap but would one put his or her health at risk or even end up in hospital where you will be forced to part with the money you didn’t want to spend to eat in a clean descent restaurant.
Leadership Weekend spoke to Mr. Solomon Enenche an avid patroniser of mama Iyabo bukka at Byazhin in Kubwa village as to why he eats at road side bukkas this is what he had to say
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‘‘I am a bachelor I have been eating here ever since it opened, food at these other high brow restaurants is expensive how much do I earn that I will go there every day? mama iyabos food reminds me of my mother’s cooking when I come back from work late I just take my cooler and buy myself dinner without having to bother about cooking I know there is the talk about how unhygienic they are and how one can get food poisoning from eating in bukkas but that has never happened to me if I had a wife I won’t see the need to eat out. The main point is those fancy restaurants are expensive and who said one can’t get food poisoning from them either?
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Mr.Silas a school teacher says ‘‘I eat at these bukkas it’s the normal thing of life, I just try to look for a relatively clean one because I know of the danger eating contaminated food but I cant help it I have to eat and I cant cook for myself I don’t have much time to do that. To crown it I cant always afford to eat at these eateries every day.’’
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Mr. testimony a banker says ‘‘when I was transferred to Lagos some years ago, I don’t know if the place still exists, but I recall it use to be called ‘Iya Ghana’ off Allen Avenue, Ikeja that place was something else. It was located in a mechanic workshop it was a really dirty place, but we would queue up with plates every morning to buy food you would see working class corporately dressed people.
“In fact in those days, I would be dreaming of the food the moment I woke up to get ready for work but now an wiser eating in such places could end you in hospital besides my wife sends my lunch to me in the office I enjoy that because she does not work and my house happens to be close to the office’’
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Restaurants don’t come cheap to operate, going by the laid down regulations of government, these Restaurants have to meet certain standards such as decent and acceptable standards of hygiene before they can become operational which in turn cost money, in other for the owners to recoup their investment, their services won’t come cheap. As a result of the expensive nature of some of these restaurants, many people have been left with no choice but to eat at home before going to work or patronise bukkas for cheap affordable meals.
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Leadership Weekend went to a popular bukka at Utako village where food is cooked outside with teeming customers waiting to be served just beside the bukka building a dirty pool of water can be seen and nobody seems to be bothered by the sight and upon inquiry from the bukka owner Hajiya Salamatu as to why the food is cooked outside she says there is no much space as such they have to make do with cooking outside when asked if they maintain some form of sanitary standard she says they wash the floors and tables every morning before business commences.
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She says ‘‘we try to keep our surrounding clean the dirty water does not disturb my customers our major problem here is flies and we try to keep it under control by spraying kerosene on the floor patronage level is good some days we make N30,000 on days when we have poor sales we could make nothing less than N15,000 people must eat to live and places like ours cater for people who can’t afford to go to places like Mr Biggs or Tanterlizer this food business has helped me build a house in my home town and I am able to cater for my three sons since my husband passed away.’’
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According to mama Nkechi the owner of peace bukka in Dutse Alhaji, she says she saw the need to open her small bukka to cater for those who can’t afford to eat at expensive restaurants. She says “Abuja is indeed an expensive place where things are affordable only to the rich. Many were coming back home hungry after a hard day’s job because they could not afford to eat in conventional Restaurants.
“That was when I decided to set up a Bukka and since I and my son are running this place there has been no looking back a plate of rice and plantain will cost you about N200 pure water is free in my bukka for a poor man is that not enough? I hear to eat in those expensive restaurants a plate of food could go for as much as N1,000 to 1,500 not everyone can afford that many of my customers are civil servants, engineers, doctors, nurses and visitors who troop in to Abuja everyday”
Leadership weekend spoke to Sani Bello a medical practitioner on the dangers of patronising bukkas and this is what he had to say:?“A lot of people don’t care about the hygiene situation in any of these places. The cooks/owners of these places will have an open pot of food on fire and will be talking, thereby spitting inside it. They pick their nose, sneeze and blow their nose by the side, supposedly away from the food pot, but they’ll not think to wash their hands before continuing to cook.
“You have more control over the food you prepare at home, if you practice safe food handling while preparing meals, you are probably less likely to contract a food borne illness what a lot of people don’t know is you can contract hepatitis c from eating in those bukkas as such we have to be careful where and how we eat and be weary of how the food is being prepared’’