Nigerian chef Hilda Baci (Hilda Bassey) has made her way back into the Guinness World Records (GWR) books.
The GWR on Monday confirmed that, alongside food brand Gino Nigeria, Baci now holds the world record for cooking the largest (pot) serving of Nigerian style jollof rice last Friday – a massive 8,780 kg (19,356 lb 9 oz) of the delicious dish.
The 28-year-old chef served up the dish at an event in Victoria Island, Lagos, with thousands of people in attendance and musical performances on stage.
Baci said it took “nine hours of fire, passion and teamwork” and 1,200 kg of gas to create the 16,600 plates of rice “served with joy, love and community.”
“Rules of the record stipulated that certain ingredients had to be used, and Hilda shared the exact measurements of everything she stirred into her record-breaking dish. Her ingredients, cooked up in a gigantic pot, included 4,000 kg of washed basmati rice (the rice had to constitute at least 80% of the total weight), 164 kg of fresh goat meat, 220 kg of Gino Asun & peppered chicken cubes, and 600 kg of her own jollof pepper mix,” the GWR said in a statement.
It added that Baci and Gino Nigeria had to follow strict rules when it came to the distribution of the food, with none of it allowed to be wasted.
“Hilda Baci @hildabaci reminded us yesterday (Friday), that greatness can begin in the simplest of places, even in a pot of rice. With imagination and courage, she turned Jollof, our beloved national treasure, into a story that carried Nigeria’s culture to the world, immediate past vice president of Nigeria, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, noted in a post on his Instagram handle.
“In the scale of her effort and in the generosity of its sharing, she proved that food is never just food. It is memory, it is pride, it is identity served to the world on a single plate. I commend Hilda for the brilliance of her idea, for the heart behind its execution, and for attempting a Guinness World Record for the Largest Pot of Jollof Rice ever in such a creative way,” Osinbajo added.
“We have done it again,” Baci posted on her official X handle, in response to a post by GWR affirming her new record on Monday.
“I didn’t realize it would be this hard and it has been a challenge. It’s a lot of hard work but really satisfying to achieve the record. This achievement also belongs to the people of Nigeria as they all contributed to the achievement,” Baci later said.
The Nigerian chef had in May 2023 broken the Guinness World Record for the longest cooking marathon, (individual), with a time of 93 hours 11 minutes.
Baci’s record time of 93 hours, 11 minutes had beaten the previous record of 87 hours and 45 minutes set by India’s Lata Tondon in 2019. The Nigerian chef prepared over 100 pots of food during her four-day kitchen marathon between May 11 and 15. That record was later broken in October 2023 by Irish chef Alan Fisher, with a time of 47 hours, 21 minutes.
Fisher record was eventually broken by Australia’s Evette Quoibia who cooked for 140 hours, 11 minutes, 11 seconds in February 2024.
Jollof rice is a staple dish in West Africa and there’s a big debate about who makes it best – Senegal, Ghana or Nigeria, from the ingredients that are used as well as the preparation methods.
Maybe a Senegalese or Ghanaian chef might decide to battle Baci for the largest pot of Jollof Rice world record in the coming months or years.
But for now, per GWR, Hilda Baci and Nigeria hold the bragging rights.
