Nafissa Camara

Comments Off | January 17, 2013

Cuisine: Senegalese and French

Nafissa was born in Beauvais, small (at the time) French town 80 miles north of Paris, in 1955. Her mother, who is French and her father who is Senegalese (and was among the first sons of African veterans of the two world wars to get scholarships to study in France) met in High School. Her parents separated when she was a toddler, and she grew up watching and helping her mother and grandmother cook traditional French cuisine.

Growing up in the mid 50s and 60s, she and her older sister were the only children of color in the town and in the family. She was dreaming about Africa, and started looking for her father, and eventually found him when she was 15 years old. She was already cooking all of her family dishes by herself, including jams, and desserts, when she discovered her African family in Dakar, Senegal. Her Grandmother Nafissatou, whom she was named after, was ecstatic to finally see her and taught her the language and the techniques of Senegalese cooking, including her special little secrets picked up from Mauritania and her Fulani nomadic background.
The variety of smells, spices, colors, and techniques blew Nafissa’s mind, and she instantly fell in love with her, and the food. Her grandmother taught her how to make her own peanut butter on a stone and how to make “Attaya,” the Senegalese and moorish tea ceremony. Senegalese food became one of Nafissa’s passions and her own children grew up eating Thiebouyap and the poule au pot, french cheeses, and fatayas.

After Nafissa’s grandmother passed away, she went back to France to become a nurse and got married to a man from Cameroon, eventually moving to the country and living in Yaounde for 4 years. There, she learned how to make a few Cameroonese dishes, including Ndole, braised fish, fresh basil sauce, and Yucca paste. Following their divorce, she went back to Senegal where she volunteered as a nurse, and worked in a restaurant on the side to raise her children. It was here that she also started working more on her art as a painter/muralist.

Nafissa came to America from Senegal to exhibit her art with other African artists, selected by the American Cultural Center in Dakar. She stayed in New York, where she finished raising her children, painting murals, and working as a care giver for the elderly, as well as a nanny and French tutor. In the city she had to make her own version of fried chicken and maccaroni and cheese. Her son became a fan of burgers, but always added her spicy condiments. She ultimately created a start up business, Nafi’s Hot Pepper Condiments, selling her spicy condiments as well as her own version of a traditional West African peanut sauce, and other milder sauces. Nafissa is a proud member of the Hot Bread Kitchen small food business incubator, in Harlem. She looks forward to developing her business and honoring the legacy of my grandmothers and mother with its success.