The Rolex is one of Uganda’s most loved street foods: a chapati wrapped around an omelette, fresh vegetables and whatever else fits the moment.
In How to ROLEX, a Ugandan Cookbook, author and creative Jonathan Kabugo explores this everyday street dish through more than 40 tried-and-tested recipes inspired by Ugandan and East African ingredients. A beautifully crafted hardcover book.
The book looks beyond the usual street Rolex. It experiments with vegetables, meat, chicken, sauces, dips and other fillings, while still keeping the chapati and egg at the centre of the wrap. With new ways to wrap, fold and manipulate the chapati around fillings.
It also looks at the life around the Rolex stand, the people that run them, ingredients and the communities within which they exist.
Across Uganda, the chapati stall is more than a place to buy food. It serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. It feeds students, workers, boda riders and entire neighbourhoods. It is also a small business and often a place where people stop, talk and catch up.
Jonathan Kabugo first began thinking more deeply about the Rolex while revising his earlier book, Food That Grew Us. A small section about street food soon became a much bigger idea.
The result of a years-long endeavour, more than 100 chapatis is a cookbook that celebrates the Rolex for what it already is: simple, flexible, affordable and creative. Unique recipes that borrow from native and regional cuisines to reinforce the ROLEX as a key dish in our street culture.
The book invites Ugandans and visitors to look at this familiar street food differently, and to try making it in their own kitchens. Bring the street-tested techniques and hacks to your home kitchen.
How to ROLEX is available in selected bookshops in Uganda and online for readers abroad.
A Year of eating only ROLEX
What started as a book revision became almost a year of chapati and eggs for Ugandan creative and author Jonathan Kabugo. While revising his first book, Food That Grew Us, Kabugo returned to a section about Uganda’s street food culture and the Rolex. He realised there was much more to explore.
One recipe led to another. Different fillings were tested. Chapatis were compared. Friends and colleagues became tasters. Some ideas worked, while others never made it into the final book. Nearly a year and more than 100 chapatis later, How to ROLEX, a Ugandan Cookbook, was born.
The book now features more than 40 recipes built around chapati, omelette, vegetables and ingredients commonly found in katales (food markets) across Uganda and East Africa. Kabugo also travelled to different Rolex stands in Kampala and beyond, following recommendations and speaking to the people who run them.
These visits helped shape another important part of the book: the life and business around the chapati stall. The vendors shared how they work, what customers like and how these small food stands survive and serve communities every day. The result shaped his ROLEX book. He presents a record of the goings-on of chefs, people, places and small businesses that have helped make the Rolex one of Uganda’s most recognised foods.
The Rolex Is More Than Nyanya Mbissi
In Uganda, when it comes to the Rolex, some people belong to team nyanya mbissi. They want fresh tomato slices added after the omelette is cooked. Others prefer bisikilemu, where the tomato is beaten into the egg and fried together. Both sides are convinced they are right.
But at the street stall, the choice is not always yours. Tomatoes may be finished. Cabbage may be missing. You get what is available. And that is part of what makes the Rolex special. It meets you where you are.
A Rolex can be simple or full. It can have cabbage, tomato, avocado, sausage, meat, chicken or chilli. It changes depending on the person making it, the customer and what is available. Like most things in this dear country.
This is the idea explored in Jonathan Kabugo’s book How to ROLEX. Across more than 40 recipes, Jonathan Kabugo experiments with different fillings while keeping the familiar chapati and omelette as the main stay.
The book also celebrates the Rolex stand itself. Across Uganda, these small stalls provide cheap and reliable meals throughout the day. They feed students, workers, travellers and whole communities. They are also places where people stop, talk, argue and catch up on which Arsenal play should be sold or which Gravity Omutujju song is the best.
So whether you prefer nyanya mbissi or bisikilemu, the Rolex is much bigger than the tomato debate. It is one of Uganda’s most adaptable and loved everyday foods.
