Luyanda Mafanya has her grandmother to thank.
“The first year after losing my gran in 2015 was the first year I started my blog Cooking with Luyanda. I dreamed about her on my birthday, and the dream was simple: she was in the kitchen cooking, I joined her, and we just cooked together in silence. It was more of a validation dream for me. And it was clear that, as long as I followed my passion for food, I would be doing the right thing. So when I’m sad or emotional, I cook a certain meal. I feel I am cooking through my ancestors, and I make some for her. So when I’m making a meal for myself, I also always prepare a plate for her.”
Her grandmother was a domestic science teacher. “She also travelled a lot and would cook all the meals she discovered on her travels. So in our family we’ve always been cooking, eating people.”
She is telling me the moving story of her visceral connection to the culinary arts over brunch at Guilt & Co at Cedar Square in Fourways. Luyanda lives close by, so she suggested we give it a whirl. I tuck into a brilliant scrambled-eggs bowl with corn, crumbled feta and fresh herbs, while she samples the dainty little egg baskets — which we obviously discuss in some detail because, after all, I am sitting with a proper cooking-eating representative of the ancestral family line, and we must do justice to our foodie experience.
A big trend is nostalgia — cooking the foods that take you back to your childhood — and that really resonates for me. My most nostalgic meal is rice and chicken — just tomatoes, onion and garlic chicken — made into a stew
— Luyanda Mafanya, food blogger
Luyanda started cooking while in res at varsity. She soon tired of the usual pot-noodle student fare and started experimenting with versions of her favourite home-cooked meals. She started her blog and, before she knew it, had tapped into the zeitgeist and become a viral sensation. This led to her finally working up the courage to ditch her finance studies to pursue her passion. It was the connection with her grandmother that convinced her it would be OK to take the next step.
“When I started my blog, I don’t think there were too many young foodie bloggers. So I think I stood out. I think my first big campaign was with Woolies about a year after I started, and when I was called to fly to Cape Town to shoot, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so cool!’ And all this came about simply from my blog and social media, so I think timing was everything. I was there at a time when there weren’t all that many people doing what I was doing. Of course, there were the foodies, and everyone knows the Sibas and all of that, but I don’t think there was a 20-year-old with a 20-year-old crowd doing what I was doing. So it was an exciting time.”
As her audience grew, it pushed her to grow in the culinary sense as well. “I started to consider cooking competitions. I did the second season of My Kitchen Rules Africa, and I got to the semifinals. So that was exciting. Then I was like, ‘Oh wow, OK — I actually can cook! I’m not doing too badly.’ And TV is definitely a different ballgame. It’s hectic and crazy, but I enjoyed it because if you’re a home cook and you learn only from teaching yourself, there are so many other skills you have missed out on compared with a person who went to culinary school. So it challenged me in the sense that I was able to become more creative in terms of developing recipes, understanding different flavours, and experiencing a whole world of different foods, because other contestants’ cooking styles are so different from your own. They’re cooking Indian and Greek cuisine, while I’m thinking, ‘Oh my gosh — I’ve actually never thought about that.’ So it opens you up to more information, better understanding of other cuisines, and openness to different flavours. So it was exciting for me in that sense.”
A highlight — albeit a stressful one — was shooting MasterChef South Africa season four during Covid-19. She got into the top nine. “Meeting Jan Hendrik [van der Westhuizen] was amazing. I was like, ‘Wow — he has a Michelin star!’ I love his style of cooking and way of showcasing African flavours. So I was excited he was on the show, but that was unfortunately the episode I went out. He issued us a challenge to make one of the dishes from his Paris menu, so it was just crazy. But it was exciting even to have the opportunity to do that and have a sneak peek into his cooking process and recipe development. It sucked to go out on that episode, but that was my highlight.”
Turning 30 has been a time of introspection for Luyanda. She has taken some time out from the whirlwind of her career to focus on her own mental health and follow her spiritual journey after she received her calling. She has emerged stronger, more grounded, and as a healer. We discuss the Simone Biles effect — the realisation you need to give yourself permission to recalibrate.
She is now back in full swing, but re-examining her relationship with food and her audience. “I initiated and finished on December 2. And, funnily enough, that’s my grandmother’s birthday. So all is that is very interesting. The connections are always there, which is so weird.”
She tells me the big online trends are wellness and eating to support the health of the body, as well as recreating TikTok fads. “But a big trend is nostalgia — cooking the foods that take you back to your childhood — and that really resonates for me. My most nostalgic meal is rice and chicken — just tomatoes, onion and garlic chicken — made into a stew. That is my go-to. If I’m sad, I make it. If I’m frustrated, I make it. If I feel sick, I make it. That is my favourite occasion, because I can vividly remember every time I was sick my mom and my grandma would make it for me. I don’t follow recipes — I cook with my ancestors, and they work through me. So I’m really just the vessel.”
