To make nshima, you slowly stir maize flour into boiling water until it thickens. The cook keeps stirring until it gets so thick that you can shape it. The smoothness and stickiness are very important - a good cook can serve nshima that is firm enough to scoop with but soft enough to break with your fingers.
Nshima is eaten with side dishes called 'ndiwo' or 'relish'. The relish can be cooked greens, beans, fish, chicken or a tomato-and-onion stew. You take a small ball of nshima with your right hand, press a little dent into it with your thumb, and scoop up some relish. Then you eat it in one bite.
Different countries in southern and eastern Africa have their own version of this dish, made with the same kind of maize flour. In Kenya and Tanzania it is called ugali; in South Africa, pap; in Zimbabwe, sadza; in Malawi, also nshima. They are all cousins of the same idea: a soft, filling food to eat with your hands.
Eating nshima together is a way of being a family. Often everyone shares one big plate of nshima in the middle of the table, and the relishes are spread around it. You wash your hands together at the start, dig in together, and wash again at the end. It is food, but it is also a tradition.