The main foods eaten by a moderately well-off family living in Mali’s capital, Bamako, are rice, millet, sorghum, and beans, cooked as a sort of porridge, served with a meat or fish sauce. A common meal in southern Mali is called tô, a pudding made from pounded millet, served with a sauce of meat or vegetables. In the North, the Songhay and Touareg make thick doughy pancakes served with wild leaves. Tô is also popular in Burkina Faso.

Kadidia Traoré spends the whole morning cooking Sunday lunch for her family in Bamako:

"First I put the oil in the pot, and while that is heating, I clean and salt the fish. I then peel the potato and fry it in the oil with the fish. Then I pound black pepper and garlic together and add it to the pot. I bought all the ingredients this morning. We go to the market each day. There’s also cabbage, aubergine, courgette, and okra, as well as rice in the finished dish.

"This is a typical Sunday lunch when you have the money, but it is much more expensive than an everyday meal. Normally we would just eat rice, with some kind of meat, vegetable, or fish sauce."