ABSTRACT
The food habits of the Kikuyu have changed considerably over the past century. People used to grow a variety of grains and early in the century finger millet was still an important staple food together with sorghum (Anderson, 1937; Proctor, 1926; Orr & Gilks, 1931). Nowadays the areas under cultivation with millet and sorghum are insignificant; when needed these grains are usually purchased. They have largely been replaced by maize which was introduced early in the last century; yellow maize initially but later, in the first decades of this century, white maize became popular, and nowadays is highly preferred (Paterson, 1943;Bertinetal. , 1971).
