Traditional Beer · Sorghum
Ingwebu (Sorghum Beer)
Photo: SpesBona / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
Fermented sorghum beer of this style has been brewed in this part of Southern Africa for at least two thousand years, according to archaeological evidence.
Ingwebu is the Ndebele name — it means 'froth' — for the cloudy, low-alcohol beer brewed from fermented maize and sorghum malt, known elsewhere in the region as umqombothi. It's brewed over several days in large drums, strained, and served warm from a communal calabash.
Why it's made this way: The beer remains central to Ndebele ceremonial life, brewed for weddings, funerals and rites honouring the ancestors, and it is still made in most Bulawayo-area households and shebeens.
More from Zimbabwe
Chibuku (Shake Shake)
Roasted Maize (Mutandavare)
Vetkoek
Madora (Mopane Worms)
Biltong
Mazondo (Cow Trotters)
Part of World of Street Food — 3248 dishes from 118 countries.
Something wrong here? Tell us in the comments below.
Photo credits.