Recettes

Groundnut Sweet

Groundnut sweet is peanuts set in caramelised sugar and cut into blocks, and it is made from three things: groundnuts, sugar and water. In Cameroon it is sold by the piece from roadside tables and market stalls, cut from a slab with a knife, and it is among the cheapest sweet things available anywhere in the country. Groundnuts are grown across Cameroon and across the West African savannah generally, and the confection follows the crop. Similar sweets exist wherever groundnuts are abundant and sugar is affordable, which covers a great deal of the continent and much of the world beyond it, and each region has arrived at its own version independently. What makes it work is the contrast in texture rather than any complexity of flavour. The sugar sets to a hard, glassy shell around nuts that stay crisp inside it, so a piece shatters rather than chews. It is the kind of sweet that gets eaten by the handful without anyone deciding to, and it is made in slabs precisely because it is sold and eaten in that way: broken off, handed round, gone.

CameroonNympha

Sanga

Sanga is a Cameroonian dish of pounded greens cooked with palm nut cream and fresh maize, and it sits between a stew and a porridge in a way that neither word quite covers. It comes from the southern and central regions of the country. The maize is the point. Fresh corn kernels go in at the end in quantity, and their sweetness against the palm cream and the slightly bitter greens is the whole balance of the dish. Some households include sugar; most consider it unnecessary because the corn and the vegetables supply enough on their own. The source for this recipe is inconsistent about which green is used, naming both pounded cassava leaves and black nightshade leaves, called zom in Cameroon, and both are genuinely used in Cameroonian cooking. The ingredient list here follows cassava leaves. Cameroon's food carries an unusual number of influences for one country, with French, Portuguese, German and neighbouring traditions all present alongside a very large number of internal ethnic cuisines. Sanga belongs firmly to the indigenous side of that. Palm nut cream, pounded leaves and maize are the raw materials of the forest zone, and the dish has stayed close to them.

CameroonBlessing

Kati Kati

Kati kati is grilled chicken finished in palm oil, and it belongs to the Nkom people of the Northwest region of Cameroon. It is one of the older and more distinctive dishes of that area, and the method is unusual: the chicken is charred over an open flame first, then simmered in palm oil with seasoning. Made traditionally it is stark. Freshly butchered chicken, salt and freshly ground pepper only, roasted over open fire until well coloured, then lightly simmered in palm oil with a stock cube. Everything else is a later addition. This version uses granulated garlic, onion powder and cayenne before grilling, which the contributor is clear is their own adjustment rather than the traditional preparation. The contributor also makes a point worth passing on: do not throw any part of the chicken away. Neck, gizzard, feet and back are, in their view, the best parts, and breast and thigh the least interesting. That is a common position across West and Central African cooking and it runs directly counter to how chicken is usually sold and eaten elsewhere. Rooster is recommended over hen for being lean and the most flavourful while still cooking through on the grill. It is served with corn fufu and njama njama, the huckleberry greens of the region.

Cameroon1 hrBlessing

Cameroonian Banana and Corn Fritters

These are fritters of mashed ripe banana and corn flour, leavened with yeast and deep fried, and the contributor is candid about where they came from: banana fritters exist, corn fritters exist, and this combines the two. It is an invention rather than an inherited dish. Both parents have their own histories. Corn fritters are a traditional sweet and savoury snack in the southern United States and in Indonesia, where they are perkedel jagung or bakwan jagung, and they originate in Native American cooking. Banana fritters are made across West Africa and much of the tropics, and appear in this archive as klako and krakro. What makes this version work is the yeast. Most fritter batters are leavened chemically or not at all; this one proves for an hour to ninety minutes, which is why the finished fritters are chewy and bread-like inside rather than dense. Very ripe bananas, heavily spotted, mash without lumps and carry more flavour. The result is described as sweet and salty at once, which the salt in the batter is doing deliberately. Peanut oil for frying is a common West and Central African choice, and it carries an allergen worth flagging.

Cameroon1 hr 45 minCuisine228

Pepper soup with beef and cocoyam in a spiced Cameroonian broth

Pepper Soup with Cocoyam or Plantain

Pepper soup is the thin, fiercely spiced West African broth built on meat or fish, chilli and a set of aromatic seeds that give it a flavour nothing else reproduces. This version comes with cocoyam or plantain cooked in the pot, which turns a light soup into a full meal. The ingredients place it in Cameroon rather than Nigeria, whatever the general framing suggests. Njansang, the crushed seed used as a thickener and flavouring, and bush pepper are Cameroonian pantry staples, and Cameroon pepper, the dark powder ground from dried scotch bonnets, appears throughout. Nigerian pepper soup leans instead on ehuru, the African nutmeg, and on utazi and uziza leaves. They are cousins rather than the same soup. Pepper soup is served in restaurants and bars across the region, and it is genuinely a category rather than a single recipe: catfish, goat meat, chicken, cow foot and assorted offal all have their own versions, several of which are on this site. The source makes extensive medicinal claims for it, that it cures fevers, clears congestion and aids weight loss. None of that has been carried across. It is a hot, restorative bowl of soup, which is a reasonable thing to say about it, and it is not medicine.

Cameroon2 hrFoodChef

Accra banana, Cameroonian fritters of banana and grated cassava, fried golden

Accra Banana (Cameroonian Banana and Cassava Fritters)

Overripe bananas mashed with grated cassava, seasoned with salt and deep-fried into small golden balls. In Cameroon it is street food sold nationwide, and it is also celebration food, a fixture at Christmas parties and weddings. What sets it apart from the many other West African banana fritters is the starch. Most versions bind mashed banana with wheat flour, rice flour or cornmeal; this one uses grated cassava, which is why it is also called accra cassava. Cassava is worked into an enormous number of forms in Cameroonian cooking, fufu, garri, bobolo sticks, and this is one more. The result is chewier and denser than a flour-based fritter, with the cassava's faint sourness cutting the sweetness of the fruit. Overripe bananas are not a compromise here, they are the requirement. A firm banana has neither the sweetness nor the softness the mixture needs, and the dish exists partly as a way of using fruit that has gone too far to eat out of hand. The usual accompaniment is African pepper sauce, which is worth taking seriously: the contrast between a sweet fried fritter and a fierce chilli sauce is the whole point of eating them together.

Cameroon45 minBlessing

Achu Soup (Yellow Soup)

Achu soup, called yellow soup for its colour, is a Cameroonian speciality from the North West region, served with pounded cocoyam. The colour is the result of a chemical reaction rather than a spice. Red palm oil is worked together with limestone water, kanwa, ground limestone dissolved and strained, and the alkali reacts with the oil to turn it from deep red to a bright yellow, at the same time thickening it into a smooth, slightly slippery sauce. Nothing else produces that colour, which is why the soup cannot be made without it. Achu itself is the accompaniment: cocoyam boiled and pounded to a smooth, elastic paste, served in a mound with a well pressed into the centre for the soup. Eating it has its own form. The soup is poured into the well and the achu is taken from the edges with the fingers, dipped, and eaten. It is a dish that takes a long time to prepare and is associated with occasions. Achu spice, a regional blend, and assorted meat including tripe and cow skin complete it. **Uses limestone.** Traditional in culinary quantity; measure rather than estimate.

CameroonBlessing

Cameroonian Koki Corn steamed corn pudding wrapped in banana leaves, a traditional Central African dish from Cameroon

Cameroon Koki Corn

Koki corn is a Cameroonian steamed pudding made from ground fresh corn mixed with palm oil and greens, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed until it sets firm. It is the corn version of a dish more commonly made with black-eyed peas. Koki beans, ground soaked beans treated the same way, is the better-known form, and the two are close relatives using the same technique on different staples. Both belong to a wider West and Central African family of leaf-wrapped steamed puddings that includes moi moi and abala. The wrapping is not decorative. Banana leaves are warmed over a flame first, which makes them pliable enough to fold without splitting, and they hold the loose mixture in shape while it steams. They also contribute a faint grassy aroma that the pudding takes on. Palm oil is heated before it goes in, which changes how it behaves in the mixture and gives the finished koki its deep orange colour. Njama njama, huckleberry leaves, a Cameroonian staple green, or spinach is folded through. It sets firm enough to slice and is eaten hot, on its own or with plantain.

CameroonBlessing

Eru soup, Cameroonian shredded wild leaves cooked with palm oil and fish

Eru Soup (Cameroonian Wild Vegetable Soup)

Eru soup is finely shredded eru leaves cooked down with waterleaf or spinach, palm oil, crayfish, smoked fish, beef and cow skin. It is Cameroonian, most closely associated with the Bayangi of the southwest, and it is one of the country's best-known dishes. Eru is the common name for two closely related climbing vines, *Gnetum africanum* and *Gnetum buchholzianum*, gathered wild from the forest rather than farmed. The leaves are tough and leathery, which is why the method insists on soaking them for hours, or on cooking them with kanwa. That toughness is also why eru is always shredded very finely, much more finely than any cultivated green would be. The pairing with a soft green is not optional. Waterleaf traditionally, or spinach where waterleaf cannot be found, provides the moisture and bulk that eru alone would not, and the ratio is roughly one to one. Palm oil goes in generously and late. The Nigerian relative is afang soup, made by the Efik and Ibibio of Cross River with the same leaf under the name afang or okazi. The two are close cousins: afang tends to be soupier and eru is more finely ground. They are kept as separate pages here because they are genuinely separate national dishes, and that is flagged. The source's health claims about eru's protein and mineral content have not been carried across.

Cameroon2 hrBlessing

Kondré, Cameroonian green plantain and meat stewed with spices

Kondré (Cameroonian Spiced Plantain and Meat Stew)

Kondré is green plantain and meat cooked slowly together in a blended spice paste until both are completely tender. It comes from the Bamileke of western Cameroon and is made for weddings, family gatherings and funerals. Three things make it, and the source sets them out clearly. The meat, goat traditionally, beef commonly, sometimes smoked pork, cooked long enough to fall off the bone, which means an hour and a half at minimum. The plantain, which must be green and unripe: ripe plantain collapses over three hours of cooking and, more importantly, tastes wrong. The source's line is worth quoting in spirit, if it is not green, it is not kondré. The third component is the spice list, and it is what makes this specifically Cameroonian rather than a generic stew. Pèbè (false nutmeg), djansang, rondelles, mesep and white Penja pepper are West and Central African spices with no straightforward substitutes, sold at African grocers. Penja pepper in particular is a protected Cameroonian product with a real reputation. Toasting the whole seeds before blending is marked optional in the method. It is worth doing, dry-toasting hard seeds releases their oils and deepens the whole dish. The source's ingredient list omits the plantain itself, which the method then requires.

Cameroon3 hr 25 minBlessing

Kwacoco bible, Cameroonian grated cocoyam steamed in banana leaves

Kwacoco Bible (Cameroonian Steamed Cocoyam)

Kwacoco bible is grated cocoyam mixed with palm oil, smoked fish, crayfish and greens, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed until set. It is a staple of the Bakweri of Cameroon's South West Region. Its closest relative is Nigerian moi moi, the steamed bean pudding, and the technique is the same: a wet seasoned mixture portioned into leaf parcels and cooked in a covered pot with water in the base. Grated cocoyam behaves much like blended beans, it sets into a firm, sliceable mass when steamed, because the starch gelatinises and holds everything suspended in it. The banana leaves are not packaging. They flavour the parcels as they steam, and they are what gives the dish its particular aroma; foil holds the shape but contributes nothing. Cocoyam is worth knowing about here, because the variety matters. The source notes that the pink-fleshed ones are starchier and drier when cooked, and that raw cocoyam can leave a slight itch in the throat, that is calcium oxalate, and cooking removes it entirely. It is also why gloves are worth wearing when grating. Nobody, including the source, can explain the name. It has been left unexplained rather than given an invented etymology.

Cameroon1 hr 40 minBlessing

Mbongo tchobi, a black Cameroonian fish stew

Mbongo Tchobi (Cameroonian Black Spice Stew)

Mbongo tchobi is a jet-black Cameroonian stew, usually made with fish, built on a spice that has been burnt black before grinding. It comes from the Bassa of the Littoral region and is now eaten across the country. The colour is the whole identity of the dish and the source is right that it puts people off before they taste it. It comes from mbongo spice, sometimes sold as black spice or mbongo tchobi, a mixture whose components are charred over fire until black, then ground. Burning spice deliberately, rather than toasting it, is unusual anywhere; here it produces a smoky, faintly bitter depth that nothing else reproduces, and a sauce that looks like ink and tastes rich. The other markers are njansang or akpi, lightly fried before blending, and the herbs, basil and parsley, blended raw into the base rather than added at the end. Pangasius or another white fish is what the recipe uses; catfish is traditional and the source gives the correct treatment for it, pouring hot water over it first to remove the sliminess. The source's prose is badly garbled in places, with words run together and sentences broken mid-clause. The sense has been reconstructed. Its stated serving of one person for a kilo of fish is not credible.

Cameroon1 hr 5 minBlessing

Ndole

Ndolé is Cameroon's national dish, bitter leaves cooked down with a thick paste of ground peanuts, with meat, fish or prawns, and it is what appears when an occasion needs marking. It comes from the Sawa people of the Littoral province, around Douala, and it has travelled from there to become the dish most associated with Cameroon anywhere in the world. The source's description of its standing is not overstated: it is treated with the seriousness of a flag. The two components are what make it. Ndolé itself is bitter leaf, the same Vernonia amygdalina used in Igbo ofe onugbu, washed repeatedly to draw out the bitterness. The ground peanut paste is the counterweight, giving richness and body that turns what would be a sharp green into something deep and heavy. Getting the balance right between the two is the whole skill of the dish. Too little washing and it is harsh; too much peanut and it is cloying. Prawns, beef, fish or a combination go in, and it is served with plantain, miondo or rice. **Contains peanut**, unavoidably, it is half the dish.

CameroonFoodChef

Ndomba, Cameroonian fish seasoned and steamed in banana leaves

Ndomba (Cameroonian Fish Steamed in Leaves)

Ndomba is fish, chicken or pork seasoned with a paste of local aromatics, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed. It is Cameroonian, and it belongs to the same family of leaf-wrapped dishes as kwacoco bible and ekpang nkwukwo. Papillote is the technique, and the leaves are not packaging. Wrapped tightly, the parcel traps every drop of moisture the fish releases, so it cooks in its own juices with the aromatics rather than losing them to a pan. The banana leaf also flavours what is inside it, a grassy, faintly tea-like note that foil cannot provide. Joom leaves, which the ingredient list also names, are used the same way in Cameroon. The spice list is what places it. Pèbè (false nutmeg), country onions, white pepper, mesep (wild basil), akpi and garlic are West and Central African aromatics, and the source is right that the blend changes depending on whether you are making the fish, chicken or pork version. Two problems with the source. It calls for two sachets of a branded spice mix, which has been described generically. And the whole recipe is very sparse, five short steps for a dish that involves making a spice paste, portioning, wrapping and steaming.

Cameroon55 minBlessing

Njama Njama (Cameroonian Greens)

Njama njama is greens blanched, squeezed dry and then cooked through a tomato, onion and chilli base. It is one of the most eaten vegetable dishes in Cameroon, particularly in the North West Region, and it is usually served with corn fufu. The plant it is named after is African nightshade, *Solanum scabrum*, also called huckleberry, a leafy green grown across Cameroon and to a lesser extent Nigeria and Kenya. It is not the same as the toxic nightshades the name might suggest; the cultivated leaf is a staple vegetable and has been for a very long time. The source is honest about a substitution that most sources would hide, and it deserves credit for it: this recipe uses turnip greens rather than actual njama njama, because the real thing is hard to find outside Cameroon. Collard greens and watercress are named as alternatives. The result is a good dish but it is not, strictly, njama njama, and that has been flagged. The technique is worth taking seriously. Blanching, then an ice bath, then squeezing out as much water as possible, is what keeps the greens green and stops them watering down the tomato base. Four bunches of raw greens reduce to about three cups cooked. Khati khati, grilled chicken in tomato sauce, is the usual partner.

Cameroon50 minBlessing

Potato Hot Pot

Potatoes parboiled and browned, then finished in a tomato and pepper sauce with vegetables and shrimp. The source places it in Cameroon and identifies it as a close relation of poulet DG, which is the useful frame. Poulet DG, poulet Directeur Général, the general manager's chicken, is one of Cameroon's best-known dishes: chicken with fried ripe plantain in a vegetable-heavy sauce, named for its expense and its association with people who could afford it. Potato hot pot is the same construction with potatoes in place of plantain, and it is worth understanding the substitution rather than treating this as a generic potato stew. The technique that carries it is the one people skip. The potatoes are parboiled and then fried or browned before they go into the sauce, which means they arrive with a crisp exterior and hold their shape rather than disintegrating. Potatoes added raw to a tomato sauce break down and thicken it into mush. The source is relaxed about the protein, chicken, beef, pork, fish, shrimp or beef liver all work, and the ingredient list happens to use shrimp. Crayfish or smoked turkey are common additions. The "Mild Fresh herbs Blend" in the ingredients is not defined anywhere. A blend of parsley, celery leaf, spring onion and basil is the usual Cameroonian equivalent.

Cameroon55 minBlessing

Poulet DG

Poulet DG is Cameroonian, fried chicken and ripe plantain in a tomato and vegetable sauce, cooked as one pot and served hot. The name is the good part. Poulet is French for chicken; DG stands for Directeur Général, Managing Director. The dish is named for the kind of person who could afford it. It emerged as a dish for those with money, at a time when chicken and plantain together in that quantity was not an everyday proposition, and the name stuck as a piece of affectionate mockery. It is now widely cooked at every level. The construction is what makes it work. Chicken is fried and set aside; plantain is fried separately until caramelised at the edges; a sauce of tomato, onion, pepper, carrot and green beans is built in the same pan; then everything is combined briefly at the end. That last part matters. The plantain is added late so it keeps its shape and its sweetness against the savoury sauce rather than dissolving into it. It is best eaten immediately, the source is emphatic that it is markedly better hot.

CameroonBlessing

Sese plantains, Cameroonian green plantain cooked with palm oil and tomato

Sese Plantains (Cameroonian Plantain Porridge)

Green plantain cooked down in water with tomato, onion, pepper and palm oil until soft and the liquid has thickened around it. It is Cameroonian and eaten across West Africa, and it is one of the most straightforward one-pot meals in the repertoire. The name is a description of the cooking. Sese refers to the motion of turning the plantains as they cook, which is what gives the dish its texture, the pieces soften and their starch leaches into the liquid, thickening it without any need for a thickener. It is also called sese planti, turning planti, or simply unripe plantain porridge. Green plantain is the requirement rather than a preference. Unripe plantain is starchy and firm, holds its shape through the cooking, and provides the starch that thickens the pot. Ripe plantain is sweet and soft, disintegrates, and turns the dish into something else entirely. It scales in both directions. At its simplest it is plantain, palm oil, salt and crayfish; elaborated, it takes fish, any meat and vegetables. Both versions are made routinely. The source's water quantity is malformed and its health claims about palm oil have not been carried across. Cashews as a garnish are an unusual touch and worth keeping.

Cameroon50 minBlessing

Recettes Cameroon

Achu Soup (Yellow Soup)

Cameroon Koki Corn

Groundnut Sweet

Sanga

Kondré (Cameroonian Spiced Plantain and Meat Stew)

Eru Soup (Cameroonian Wild Vegetable Soup)

Mbongo Tchobi (Cameroonian Black Spice Stew)

Kwacoco Bible (Cameroonian Steamed Cocoyam)

Cameroonian Banana and Corn Fritters

Kati Kati

Plats emblématiques : Cameroon

Recettes Cameroon les plus populaires

Groundnut Sweet

Sanga

Kati Kati

Cameroonian Banana and Corn Fritters

Pepper Soup with Cocoyam or Plantain

Accra Banana (Cameroonian Banana and Cassava Fritters)

Achu Soup (Yellow Soup)

Cameroon Koki Corn

Eru Soup (Cameroonian Wild Vegetable Soup)

Kondré (Cameroonian Spiced Plantain and Meat Stew)

Kwacoco Bible (Cameroonian Steamed Cocoyam)

Mbongo Tchobi (Cameroonian Black Spice Stew)

Ndole

Ndomba (Cameroonian Fish Steamed in Leaves)

Njama Njama (Cameroonian Greens)

Potato Hot Pot

Poulet DG

Sese Plantains (Cameroonian Plantain Porridge)

Recettes Cameroon

Recettes à la une

Achu Soup (Yellow Soup)

Kondré (Cameroonian Spiced Plantain and Meat Stew)

Eru Soup (Cameroonian Wild Vegetable Soup)

Mbongo Tchobi (Cameroonian Black Spice Stew)

Kwacoco Bible (Cameroonian Steamed Cocoyam)

Cameroonian Banana and Corn Fritters

Kati Kati

Plats emblématiques : Cameroon

Recettes Cameroon les plus populaires

Groundnut Sweet

Sanga

Kati Kati

Cameroonian Banana and Corn Fritters

Pepper Soup with Cocoyam or Plantain

Accra Banana (Cameroonian Banana and Cassava Fritters)

Achu Soup (Yellow Soup)

Cameroon Koki Corn

Eru Soup (Cameroonian Wild Vegetable Soup)

Kondré (Cameroonian Spiced Plantain and Meat Stew)

Kwacoco Bible (Cameroonian Steamed Cocoyam)

Mbongo Tchobi (Cameroonian Black Spice Stew)

Ndole

Ndomba (Cameroonian Fish Steamed in Leaves)

Njama Njama (Cameroonian Greens)

Potato Hot Pot

Poulet DG

Sese Plantains (Cameroonian Plantain Porridge)