Recettes

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Fufu

Fufu is starch pounded to a smooth elastic mass, and it is among the most widely eaten things in West and Central Africa. The word comes from Twi, spoken in Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire, where it means to mash or to combine, and the sound of a mortar and pestle working in rhythm is the sound of fufu being made. What goes into it depends entirely on where you are. West Africa favours white yam, sometimes with plantain. Central Africa favours cassava. Plantain, cocoyam, semolina, rice and combinations of flours all appear, and each gives a different texture and a slightly different name. That variability is why fufu is better understood as a category than a recipe. It crossed the Atlantic with enslaved West Africans and survived. Foo foo and fou fou in the Caribbean are made with plantain or cornmeal, coocoo in Barbados is the same idea, and Cuban, Jamaican and Puerto Rican versions carry sweet plantain and pork fat. Whatever the base, it is eaten the same way: a piece is pulled off with the fingers, an indentation is pressed in with the thumb, and it is used to scoop soup or stew. It is never eaten alone, and its slightly tangy, near neutral flavour is what lets a heavily seasoned soup do the talking.

Les mieux notées

50 minMediumCôte d'Ivoire · Nigerian

Recette de FoodChef · Africook

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Semovita

Semovita is one of Nigeria's swallows: the family of smooth, firm starch preparations that are pinched off by hand, rolled between the fingers and used to lift soup from a bowl. The swallow is not a side dish. In Nigerian eating it is the vehicle and the soup is the flavour, and a meal is understood as the pairing of the two. It is made from semolina, the coarse milling of durum wheat, and it belongs to the wheat based end of the swallow spectrum rather than the cassava, yam or maize end. That places it alongside amala, eba, fufu, pounded yam and starch as one option among several, chosen by household preference and by what the soup is. Semovita is smoother and milder than most of the alternatives, which is a large part of its appeal. Its status is worth stating plainly: Semovita is a brand name that has become the general term for the product, in the way a number of household names have. The dish is Nigerian, industrially produced and comparatively recent, and it earned its place at the table on texture rather than on history. It is eaten with ogbono, okra, efo riro, egusi and every other Nigerian soup.

Les mieux notées

17 minEasyNigeria

Recette de Blessing · Africook

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Kenkey

Kenkey is fermented maize dough, wrapped in banana leaf or corn husk and steamed into firm parcels. It is sour, and the sourness is the whole character of it. The fermentation runs one to three days before anything is cooked, and a kenkey that has been rushed is immediately identifiable to anyone who eats it regularly. It comes from the Ga people of Accra and the surrounding coast, who have been making it for centuries, and it has spread across Ghana without losing that origin. Ga kenkey and Fante kenkey are recognised as distinct: the wrapping differs, and so does the ratio of fermented to fresh dough, which changes how sour the finished parcel is. Kenkey is street food in the most functional sense. It is bought in its wrapping, which serves as the plate, and eaten with fried fish, shito and a raw pepper and tomato grind, standing up or sitting on a bench. The wrapping is not presentation; it is what the dough is steamed in and what keeps it for days without refrigeration. That combination of sour dough, hot pepper and fried fish is one of the most recognisable plates in West Africa.

Les mieux notées

55 minMediumGhana

Recette de Laila · Africook

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Tuwon Dawa Da Miyan Kuka Recipe

Tuwon dawa is guinea corn swallow, and its pairing with miyan kuka is one of the fixed combinations of Northern Nigerian eating. The tuwo is stiff, plain and pale; the soup is dark green, drawing and sharply flavoured. Neither is eaten without something like the other. Guinea corn is sorghum, and sorghum is the older grain of the Sahel. It was the staple of Northern Nigeria long before maize arrived from across the Atlantic, and it holds ground in the north that maize has taken elsewhere on the continent because it tolerates the heat and the short rains better. Tuwon dawa is what that grain becomes on a plate: milled, stirred into boiling water and worked to a smooth firm mass. The word tuwo covers a family rather than a single dish. Tuwon dawa is the guinea corn version, tuwon masara the maize one, tuwon shinkafa the rice one, and Hausa households distinguish between them by texture and by which soup they suit. Miyan kuka, made from ground baobab leaf, is the partner most associated with the guinea corn version, and the two together are among the most recognisable plates in the north.

Les mieux notées

MediumNigeria

Recette de Amara · Africook

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