It wasn’t one of the reasons I chose to move to Sydney, but its food has become one of my favourite things about this city. You can get almost anything you want here, but one thing we don’t have in abundance is Nigerian cuisine. And so my first three years in Sydney consisted of periods of longing for food from home, punctuated by the occasional food-filled trip back. And then came Covid.
With more time than I knew what to do with, no idea when next I’d be going home, and a mind addled by just how unprecedented the times were, I launched a project I called Jollof Sydney (now The Jollof Kitchen), offering a two-course finish-preparing-at-home banquet. The star of the show is jollof rice, a West African rice dish originating in what is now modern day Senegal and perfected by us Nigerians. I serve it with a spicy stew, sweet fried plantain, and coleslaw, along with Zobo - a hibiscus iced tea. And for dessert, sweet fried dough balls called puff puff. The meal is a sensory delight - full of savoury, sweet, tangy, charred, creamy, soft, fluffy and crunchy flavours. To get it in as many hands as possible, I needed a brand that was as big, bold, and inviting as the jollof banquet.
Enter Re’s Side Hustle support programme - an initiative through which Re supports its employees’ passion projects. In my case, the support came in the form of pro-bono creative and project management time, and I couldn’t believe my luck. Working with some of Australia’s best brand designers on my pandemic fever dream idea really was quite unprecedented.
Armed with my brand framework (I am a strategist after all) and inspiration in the form of Pinterest boards and Spotify playlists, we got to work. The result was a punchy, easy-to-use brand with a range of elements that’ll support expression not just on Instagram but new touchpoints too. Keep your eyes peeled (and fingers crossed) for The Jollof Kitchen food trucks.
