Beans Porridge
Nigeria
Verified Africook
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Beans porridge is one of the most-eaten dishes in Nigerian homes: beans cooked soft, then finished in a palm oil base with blended pepper, smoked fish, crayfish and ugwu. It is weekday food, made in quantity, and it is as likely to appear at breakfast as at dinner. The palm oil base is what separates it from plain cooked beans. Onion is softened in the oil, blended tomato and pepper go in and are cooked until the oil separates out, and only then do the beans join. That separation is the marker Nigerian cooks watch for: it means the raw tomato has cooked off and the base is ready. Ugwu, the fluted pumpkin leaf, goes in at the end and needs only a few minutes to wilt. It is one of the most widely used greens in southern Nigeria and gives the dish its colour and a mild, slightly nutty flavour. Fried ripe plantain is the standard partner, and the sweetness against the savoury beans is why that pairing has stuck. Yam and rice also work. Despite the beans and vegetables, this is not a vegetarian dish as written: the crayfish and smoked fish are doing much of the seasoning.
Beans porridge is a Nigerian home dish of beans finished in a palm oil, pepper and smoked fish base, conventionally served with fried ripe plantain.
Dietary tags are provided by contributors as a guide, not verified by AFN, and they depend on the products you buy. If you have a serious allergy, check every ingredient yourself.
Heat the palm oil in a large pot over medium heat.
Add the chopped onions and sauté until translucent.
Stir in the roughly blended tomatoes and pepper mix, and cook until the oil starts to separate from the tomato.
Add the smoked fish, crayfish and seasoning cubes, and stir well to combine.
Pour in the cooked beans and stir gently. If the mixture is too thick, add some water to reach the consistency you want.
Let the beans simmer for about 10 to 15 minutes so the flavours meld and the palm oil works through.
Add the chopped ugwu, stir, and cook for a few minutes until the leaves wilt and soften.
Serve hot with fried ripe plantain.
Personal notes from Sobecooks5 reviews
Getting fresh shombo in Berlin is impossible abeg, so i had to use normal red peppers from Turkish market and extra habanero. It took way longer than 60 mins because my brown beans were stubborn to soften before stirring into the sauce, ended up a bit too thick but the crayfish saved the taste o.
Bought some fresh ugwu from Rye Lane yesterday just to make this. The trick really is letting the palm oil and tomato pepper mix fry properly until the oil separates before putting the smoked fish. My house smells amazing right now, e sweet die sha.
my grandmother in cape coast always said you must fry the chopped onions in the palm oil until they are almost dark before adding the tomato, it gives the beans porridge a deeper taste. herh the smoked fish and ugwu combination is top tier oo.
chale this came out very nice oo. couldn't get ugwu at the afro market on morse rd so i just used chopped spinach at the end. still tasted like home paa, especially with the smoked fish and crayfish flavor.
I had to search everywhere in North Seattle for red palm oil and ground crayfish. Coming from Ethiopian cooking where we use niter kibbeh and berbere, the combination of smoked fish with the scotch bonnet and palm oil sauce was such a unique depth of flavor. We ate it with bread, but next time I might try a bit on injera.