Google Doodle Celebrates Jollof Rice

American multinational technology company, Google, is celebrating popular dish, jollof rice on Friday, November 4, with a doodle on its homepage.

According to Google, the celebration of jollof rice, a dish local to countries in West Africa, was to appreciate farmers who plant and reap rice so that the meal can be prepared.

For the doodle, Nigerian content creator and visual artist, Haneefah Adam, created a stop-motion animation video showing the preparation of Jollof rice.

The video which has a background music by a Senegalese jazz artist, Hervé Samb, showed a step by step process to making the dish as well as the ingredients used in making it.

Talking about the dish, Adam said, “This is a celebration of culture—not just my culture, but of everyone who recognises food as a conduit. The diversity of how we approach food is really interesting—like how the preparation of Jollof is different in Nigeria vs. Senegal (they even have different names). This just goes to show the richness and beauty of our collective culture as a continent.”

Google also noted the friendly rivalry between Nigeria and Ghana on which country prepared the best jollof rice.

It noted, “Nigerians and Ghanaians are particularly competitive over who makes the best jollof — and for good reason. There are distinct differences between the two cooking styles.

“For example, Nigerians use long-grain rice that absorbs more spices, while Ghanaians use basmati rice with a more aromatic flavor.”