Tapiwa Guzha is a Zimbabwean born and raised food mastermind. He learnt to cook from his grandmother, he developed a passion for food in his youth.

He moved to Cape Town to study and it took him off cooking for a while. But his love for cooking still found its way back during his postgraduate days in Cape Town. He further developed his interest in cooking and did this during his postdoctoral years. He said during an interview “overtime cooking evolved for me and became a tool to entertain people and to unwind after a long day”. He decided to leave the traditional academic life and pursue his passion for education through the medium of food.

This brought on the season of Tapi Tapi, an ideophone that directly translates from the chikorekore dialect of the Shona language in Zimbabwe which means “sweet sweet”. When he opened up, he focused on making European, Asian and American inspired ice creams. He experimented with the flavors and he used some unusual ingredient combinations but he still always felt like something was missing as it did not fully reflect the unique flavors, textures and aroma of the continent and this made him feel uninspired.

He was in a Zimbabwean cuisine restaurant and saw a few snacks from home being sold there and wondered how they would taste in ice cream form. This was a lightbulb moment for him and he decided to start creating flavors that appealed to his childhood palate. The name flavourite came from here as every flavor, according to him, is his favorite.

Tapi Tapi explores different African flavors, many of which are symbolic to children of the soil. Flavors like rondo which is made from vanilla and edible clay or nhopi which is made from roasted pumpkin and dark chocolate. He experiments with different ingredients like wild roots, avocados, okra to mention but a few.

The African infused flavoring goes beyond the ice cream itself; his cones are made with millet, cassava, sorghum, maize and plantain flour.

This invention appeals a lot to the African child and his palate.