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October 24, 2018
Africa is blessed with mouth watering dishes that are wonderful in itself. Abacha is a sumptuous delicacy of the south-eastern people of nigeria. The green vegetables, ugba and other ingedients make abacha a meal rcommended for healthy living. It is often prepared with dried shredded cassava which is usully soaked in water to make it soft. It can be enjoyed as a snack or a full meal anytime, any day. At any igbo traditional gathering, abacha is a must. I personally enjoy it with a chilled glass of palm wine. YUMMY!! Allow me show you how it is made.
Image result for african salad
INGREDIENTS

  • 600g of abacha (shredded cassava)
  • 2cups ugba
  • 1cup of palm oil
  • 2tablespoon of powdered potash
  • fish (any of your choice), spiced and cooked
  • 1 big onion, chopped
  • salt and dry pepper
  • 4tablespoon ground crayfish
  • 2 seasoning cubes
  • 1teaspoon ground ehu seeds
  • hot or boiling water
  • 1 teaspoon iru
  • utazi leaves
  • kanda, cooked and sliced
  • 6 garden eggs, chopped
  • garden egg leaves, optional
  • 1 medium onion, sliced for garnishing
Image result for african salad
METHOD
  • Soak the abacha for 10mins until it softens
  • Drain out the water, pour hot water over it and drain.
  • Rinse the ugba in warm water and place aside
  • Dissolve the potash in water and sieve out the water. Stir the potash water with the palm oil until it forms a yellowish paste.
  • Place on heat and add the ground ehu, pepper, stock cubes, crayfish, chopped onion and ugba. Stir and turn off the heat.
  • Add the iru and mix properly, add the fish and kanda.
  • Add the abacha and chopped garden egg, stir properly.
  • Add sliced utazi and salt to taste.
  • Garnish with sliced garden egg leaves and onion. Feel free to play with this part, you can garnish it to your taste.
Abacha can be eaten warm or cold depending on your preference. Serve with a cold glass of palmwine or any drink of your choice. Thank me later.

Image result for abacha served with palm wine
ENJOY YOUR MEAL!
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September 10, 2018

Ofe Owerri is what I will like to refer to as the PRIDE OF THE HEARTLAND. My grandmother never misses an opportunity to prepare this food for my father whenever he hits the village. She calls it ‘nri eze’ (food for a king). The original recipe of this meal has being tweaked so many times to suite peoples taste and pocket. I am therefore going to share with you the original recipe of OFE OWERRI.
 Image result for ofe owerri
Ingredients
·         3- 4 pieces of Stockfish chunks and stock fish head
·         2 - 3 pieces of Dry Fish (Azu nkurkunku or Azu Asa)
·         1 cup of dry grounded Crayfish
·         2tbsps Ose Ikpo (Dry grinded pepper or chili flakes)
·         1 big bunch Ugu leaves – sliced
·         1 small bunch Okazi leaves (thinly sliced)
·         6-7 pieces of Ede (cocoyam). You can substitute this with Achi - a very popular soup thickening agent. You may not have the time to go through the stress of preparing the cocoyam paste for soup when Achi can suffice but Cocoyam is the REAL DEAL in Ofe Owere.
·         1 wrap of Imo state Ogiri - Locust beans (optional)
·         2 cooking spoons of Palm Oil
·         Salt
·         stock cubes
Instructions
1.   Season stockfish with salt, ½ cup of the crayfish, 1 tbsp. of dry pepper.
2.   HOW TO MAKE THE COCOYAM PASTE
3.   Wash the Cocoyam thoroughly and boil with the skin on in lots of water for 10 –15 minutes
4.   When cooked, peel off the skin and pound into a paste. The cocoyam is usually sticky so add a tablespoonful of palm oil. This does 2 things: it keeps the cocoyam from sticking to the mortar and also it enhances the color of the soup.
5.   Once the stockfish have softened, taste the stock and make any necessary adjustments to the flavor.
6.   At this stage, add the cocoyam paste in small portions with your cooking spoon or simply mix the ground 'Achi' powder with some water in a bowl, stir well and pour into the soup. Reduce the heat and watch the soup thicken. Stir thoroughly to ensure all cocoyam lumps dissolve totally into the soup. The soup could be runny or thick. Or it could be just in-between. Your choice.
7.   Add the palm oil and washed chunks of dry fish to the soup. (We are adding the dry fish at this stage to prevent it from dissolving in the soup) Part of the enjoyment is to pick pieces of fish from the soup while eating. Cover the pot and let the soup cook until the oil combines with the soup and looses that raw taste (this takes about 2-5 minutes)
8.     If you are using achi stir often to prevent the achi from sticking to the bottom of the pot
9.   Add the ogiri, the remaining crayfish and dry pepper and stir thoroughly.
10.      Thoroughly wash the vegetables with cold water. Wash twice or thrice to remove any traces of dust or sand. (it is advisable prefer to wash veggies before they are sliced. That way, vital nutrients won’t be rinsed off. But okazi is basically washed after slicing)
11.      Stir after adding the vegetables and allow to simmer on low heat for an extra 5 minutes then turn off the heat.
12.      Serve with your choice of 'swallow'.
Note that the Imo state ogiri is different from the Anambara state ogiri. It is however important to make use of the imo state ogiri.


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September 01, 2018
This Nigerian delish Soup, is native to the Efik people of Akwa Ibom and Cross River states of Nigeria. It is also very nutritious as the soup consists mainly of vegetables. Afang Soup is prepared with a generous quantity of Water leaves and the Okazi leaves.
Image result for Afang soup
Ingredient for Afang Soup
400g sliced Okazi/Afang leaves | about 4 handfuls
250g Water leaves
20 to 25 cl red palm oil (about 1 drink glass)
Beef, Kanda, Dry fish (stockfish optional) any animal of your choice is just fine.
2 tablespoons ground crayfish
Pepper and salt (to taste)
2 stock cubes
A handful of unshelled periwinkles.
Before you cook the Nigerian Afang Soup
Slice, wash and drain the water leaves into tiny pieces. Grind or pound the sliced Okazi leaves. 

Cooking Directions
Wash the unshelled periwinkle thoroughly to remove sand and dirt. Boil with salt for about 5miniute and set aside.

Boil the beef and Kanda with the diced onions, salt and stock cubes in a very small quantity of water. When done, add the dry fish, crayfish, pepper, and periwinkle and cook for about 5 more minutes.

Now add the water leaves and allow to boil for 5 minutes. Stir and add the okazi leaves. Stir, add the palm oil in generous quantity, check for salt and to taste. Allow to cook for 5 minutes or till the okazi is tender.

Voila!! You have your delightful pot of Afang soup. 
Serve with fufu, Eba, semo, amala, wheat, pounded yam.
Enjoy, don't forget to savour the sweetness of sucking out the periwinkle from its shell.
Bon appetite!!


Health benefits of Afang soup
Well first, Afang soup is a good source of unsaturated fatty acids. Unsaturated fatty acids make up the HDLs (i.e High-Density Lipoproteins). HDL is known as good cholesterol because it helps to remove other forms of cholesterol from the bloodstream.
It is rich in essential dietary fibre. Dietary fibre is essential for weight loss and also helps prevent constipation.

The Okazi leaves used in its preparation are rich in iodine. Iodine helps in preventing goitre.

The waterleaf mix of Afang soup helps to slow down the digestion and conversion of starch to simple sugars. This makes Afang soup useful in managing diabetes.
It also contains a lot of anti-oxidants. Anti-oxidants are important in repelling free radicals and preventing oxidation.
It is also a rich source of Vitamin C. Vitamin C increases the body’s resistance to disease.


I bet you didn't know that Afang had this much benefits. Now that you know, you should definitely eat more of it.
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September 01, 2018

Rice dishes could get really boring especially when you're making Coconut recipes like prawn coconut rice. Now there are different ways to make coconut rice. You could make it as plain as the Classic coconut rice, you could make it with shrimp as shown In this shrimp coconut rice, you could make it in form of jollof rice as shown in coconut jollof rice Or you could simply customize your ingredients to suit your taste as shown in the brown coconut rice. 

Image result for Prawn Coconut Rice

For this particular recipe, I used fresh deveined prawns with long grain rice. The long grain rice has already been parboiled therefore, it has less starch within and doesn't require extra parboiling. To add a pop of color to your coconut rice, you could use different colorful vegetables. Now the main protein used in this dish is prawns. There's this amazing taste the shelled crustaceans gives to meals that I really love. Without further ado, here's how to make prawn coconut rice. 



Prawn Coconut Rice


Prawn coconut rice is simply amazing


Ingredients:

•2 Cups Coconut milk 
•3 Cups Rice
• 250g Fresh Prawns "deveined"
•12 Cups Stock (prawn, meat,fish e.t.c)
• Salt - To taste
• 4 Cloves Garlic
•  1 Cup Sweet Corn
• 1 Cup Green peas
• 2 Medium sized Scotch Bonnet
• 4 Medium sized Green Chillies
• 5 Small Carrots
• 2tbsp. Cooking Oil

Instructions:
View the steps Below

Calories per serving: 0 (N/A)
Fat per serving: 0 (N/A)


Directions

Step 1: 
The first step is to add the cooking oil into the empty pot. Next, Add the minced garlic and stir-fry for 1 minute before adding the deveined prawns into the pot. Add Salt to taste, then flip the prawns. Let it cook for about 2 minutes on each side, remove from the pot then set aside. 

Step 2: 
Next, you add the stock into the pot and let it boil. Next, you add the rinsed parboiled rice and coconut milk. Mix, then add salt to taste and water. Cover the pot and leave to cook for about 15minutes till the water dries up in the pot. 

Step 3: 
Now its time to add the veggies and other ingredients. Add the chopped carrots, sweet corn, cooked peas, chopped green and red chilies, then mix. Finally, add the cooked prawns into the pot and leave to simmer for about 1 minute and your prawn coconut rice is ready. 



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