African: Ofe Nsala (White Soup)

ofe nsala

Ofe Nsala a.k.a Afie Efere a.k.a White soup as it's name suggests is one of the few Nigerian soups where the  ever-present palm oil is absent.  This soup is native to the Igbos in the eastern part of Nigeria and the lovely folks of the Niger-Delta (of which I am proud to be part of).  

Weeks ago while hanging out with Fola of Stylefash and Berry of Berrydakara, Fola unknowingly placed an order for Ofe Nsala. Yes it was unknowingly 'cos she didn't ask directly, she just said 'lemme know when I can come and eat Ofe Nsala at yours' (or something like that. lol) and subconsciously my mind went to fufill-order-mode, I made a note to myself that the next soup cooking marathon I do would consist of a delicious pot of nsala for Fola (I cook soups in bulk on a single day, package 'em and freeze 'em). This past Sunday I made five soups and of 'cos Fola's beloved nsala was included (pssst she knows I cooked nsala this weekend but she doesn't know I cooked it for her, she'll be shocked when she finds out....heehee). Anyway I decided to cook mine with catfish as I feel it tastes better with catfish (you can cook yours with beef, chicken, tripe, pork etc).  As expected The Chief Taster decided he wanted some of the nsala after I sent him pictures of it and some of the pounded yam I made, he went further to reserve the head of the fish and made me swear it would be served steaming hot.....Imagine! Anyway sorry Fola, your full pot has been cut to half, I will make it up to you I promise!

Ingredients

1.  One large catfish

2.  Utazi leaf

3.  Onions

4.  Yam or Cocoyam (to be used as thickener)

5.  Stockfish

6.  Smoked catfish

7.  Crayfish

8.  Pepper

9.  Salt

10.  Uziza seeds

11.  Ogiri Igbo or Maggi/Knorr

Method

1.  Cut 2 large pieces of old yam and boil till properly cooked then pound in a mortar or process in a food processor and set aside (do same if using cocoyam).  I decided to make extra pounded to be eaten with my portion of nsala (like they say "in for a penny, in for a pound",  might as well do enough that can be eaten with your delicious fresh nsala)

Pounded Yam

2.  Gut catfish and clean thoroughly. Put in a bowl and pour hot water on it and leave for 2 minutes, afterwards douse with cold water (this helps to make the fish tougher so it doesn't break up during the cooking proper).

cut fish into parts

3.  Using a good sized pot, put your fish and water (just enough to cover the fish) and set to boil on medium to low heat, be careful not to stir the pot unnecessarily to prevent the fish from breaking, add stockfish and blackfish and set to boil. 

4.  Add your ogiri igbo (or maggi/knorr), pepper, pounded uziza seed, stockfish, black fish and crayfish and stir carefully.  I like the traditional taste that ogiri igbo gives my soups so I try to use it as often as I can.

Large wrapped package of ogiri igbo

All that wrapping is just fancy stuff

what you get after all that unwrapping...half a teaspoon of ogiri

 

4.  While it's steaming away carefully add small lumps of pounded yam (or cocoyam) and allow to dissolve and you'll notice the soup thicken.  Using the back of your cooking spoon, mash any stubborn pounded yam lump

mash any stubborn yam lump

add utazi leaf...sparingly

 4.  Let it cook till the fish is almost cooked through then add utazi leaf (due to the bitter taste of utazi leaf, it is advisable to use only 3-4 leaves out of the bunch).

5.  Lower heat and allow simmer for 5-8 minutes and hey presto! Nsala is ready

Before......

...during....

....after!

Thanks for stopping by!

don't forget to Read! Comment!! Follow!!! and Cook!!

Bex

Beef Lasagne

My older sis lived in Italy with her family for a long time and her mother-in-law made sure she taught her every Italian dish known to man. The first time I had lasagne at my sister's I was pleasantly surprised at the rush of creamy cheesy flavour and the herbal fullness of my sisters lasagne and made up my mind I would have a go at preparing mine one day.  Earlier this month on one of my many grocery shopping trips, I was kinda surprised to find lasagne sheets in Nigeria and remembered my lasagne ambition, I picked up a pack and started planning my recipe.  Last Sunday morning, ignoring Mr. Man's exaggerated eye rolls and loud 'hmmmmphs' I decided to try my hands at making it.  Just as I was about to start I remembered my sisters recipe called for parmesan cheese and I didn't have any, but luckily for me I had some cheddar cheese so I decided to use that instead.  Mr. Man took one bite of his plate and I can never forget the way his eyes lit up (he's a foodie and can be quite opinionated when it comes to rating food he has never tried) and he gave it a good 10/10! Success!

Ingredients

2 teaspoon olive oil

1 large onion (chopped)

2 crushed garlic cloves

600g beef mince

1/2 cup red wine

500g bottle of tomato pasta sauce

1 teaspoon sugar

250g packet of dried lasagne pasta sheets

2 cups of Bechamel sauce or white sauce (learn to make yours HERE)

2 cups of grated Cheddar cheese

1 tablespoon Oregano (optional) 

Salt

Pepper

METHOD

1.  Heat oil in a frying or saucepan over medium heat and add chopped onions and garlic and stir-fry for 2 minutes. Add you minced meat and with a wooden spoon crush the lumped up meat against the sides or bottom of your cooking vessel to loosen them. Cook for 10 minutes while stirring every 3 minutes or so.

 2.  Add sauce, sugar and wine and season with pepper and salt (add oregano spice or any spice of your choice at this point).

3.  With the heat on low, allow to simmer for 30 minutes or until the sauce has thickened

grease or oil spray tin

Lasagne sheets

4.  Preheat oven to 180°C/160°F. Lightly grease a square baking dish.  Spoon some of the mince mixture over the base of dish and arrange the lasange sheets over it, you can carefully break the sheets so it would fit the baking pan. 

5.  Do another layer by adding the minced mixture on the lasagne sheet, use a spoon to level it and drizzle some of the Bechamel/white sauce (learn to make yours HERE) sprinkle some cheddar cheese and layer with lasagne sheets as you did before.  Do like 4 layers in total.

6.  For the topmost layer don't cover with lasagna sheet, just layer with white cream, cheese and a whatever is left of the mince mixture (if nothing is left don't worry). 

7.  Cover baking foil loosely with foil and pop in the oven and bake for 45 minutes, remove foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes or until pasta is tender and cheese has melted

         8.  Allow stand for 10 minutes before digging in!

cheesy goodness

Lasagne with red wine (no point saving what's left from your cooking for later)

Going.....

Going......

All gone!

CONFESSION:

After pouring in the 1/2 cup of wine, I took the time to pour myself a liberal amount of red wine, matter of I filled the glass to the brim and got quite boozy.  Who said you have to wait till the end of your cooking to enjoy the rewards?  **Hic***

Thanks for the follows, comments and suggestions.  I've learnt a lot over the past month from you my constant readers and people that have taken the time to teach me a thing or two about my recipes. I want to specially thank all my BBM and Facebook friends for helping me advertise this blog.  

Please take time out to visit my Facebook page and like it!!! (Click HERE!!!!!)

Read, Comment, Follow and (by God!) COOK!!!!

BEX

Chinese: General Tso's Chicken Sauce with Basmati Rice

Ever wondered how Chinese food is made? Well if you're a diehard Chinese food lover like me you would have at least thought about it once.  I decided to give Chinese cooking a go after I got tired of being ripped off doing takeaways.  My favourite Chinese meal has to be chicken cashew nut followed by Emperor Tso's sauce which is soooo easy to cook that it's outrageous. Oh I forgot, I like sweet and sour sauces as well. Let's get cooking shall we?

INGREDIENTS

3/4 Cup chicken broth

2 tablespoon cornstarch

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons soy sauce

2 teaspoon ground ginger

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

2 medium onions, chopped

2 medium garlic cloves, minced

1/2 teaspoon ground pepper

500g of uncooked chicken cut into 1 inch cubes

White wine vinegar, corn starch, soy sauce and chicken broth

METHOD

1.  In a medium bowl mix together chicken broth, cornstarch, sugar, soy sauce, vinegar and ginger and whisk together. Set it aside

2.  Heat oil in a frying pan or wok over medium heat, add garlic, onions and pepper and cook for 2 minutes

3.  Add chicken and cook until browned which should take like 8 minute

4.  Add the reserved sauce you made in step 1 and simmer till the sauce thicken and the chicken is cooked through and through

5.  Serve with long grained rice or better still Basmati rice!!!!!

African: How to Cook Ogbono Soup (without leaves)

Growing in Jos, Plateau I hated everything that was gooey and slimy (like I said in an earlier post, I'm a fussy eater) and it was just my luck that my grandmother was Yoruba and would happily put a steaming bowl of eba and okra soup mixed with stew in front of me ignoring my cries of 'No! No, Mama No' she would sit in front of me and with a sinister gleam in her eyes daring me not to eat my lunch or dinner.  My mum being more of an ogbono soup person and would try to make me eat my plate of semovita and ogbono soup with a cane in her right hand.  Being forced to eat these soups made me hate them the more. As soon as I was old enough to choose my meals I just stopped eating Ogbono and Okra (Granny never succeeded with Ewedu as even my mum wouldn't touch it).  I still thought them vile till on a trip to London (of all places) my older sis gave me her own version of Ogbono and I was converted.  I still won't touch Ewedu and would only eat seafood okra from Yellow Chilli but it's obvious to everyone that I've made major progress.  I'm not an expert on Ogbono soup cooking but here's my own recipe......

IMPORTANT:  Please endeavour to buy real and fresh Ogbono seeds from the market, I heard that one way to find out if it's the real deal is to break a seed into two bits and rub together, if the sides start drawing then you know it's the real deal.  Also try not to fry your ogbono in the palm oil as it might lose it's draw.

Ingredients

(Depending on the quantity you can increase or scale down on the ingredients as you think fit)

Your choice of beef, goat meat, lamb or tripe (shaki, roundabout etc)

1 cup of ground Ogbono

1/2 cup ground crayfish

2 big spoons of palm oil

1 cup periwinkle (optional)

Snails (optional)

Stockfish (optional)

2 cubes of Maggi or Knorr

1 cup of warm water

Salt (as needed)

Ground Cameroun pepper (as needed)

Method

1.  In a good sized pot cook your choice of meat with onions, maggi and any spice of your choice till soft and set aside

2.  In a another good sized pot pour your palm oil and when it gets a bit hot (make sure it's not hot enough to fry the ogbono) add your Ogbono and meat stock and start stirring making sure no bits of Ogbono are sticking to the bottom of the pot

Mixing Ogbono to the melted palm oil (remember not to fry the ogbono in the oil)

                                             

3.  Stir till it starts drawing (add some big spoonfuls of warm water if you think it's too slimy or mix a little more Ogbono with warm water in a bowl and add to the main pot if its not drawing enough) and add dried ground pepper and crayfish

4.  Cover and cook for 15 minutes on low heat 

Stirring mixture of palm oil, Ogbono and meat stock water

5.  Open pot and stir well gently scrapping the bottom of your pot to make sure no debris is sticking at the bottom, add your meat, stockfish, tripe, snails, periwinkle, Knorr/Maggi and salt give it a good stir and cover pot.  Cook for another 10 minutes on low heat and.....Taadah...you're done! Serve hot with any swallow (Eba, Semo, Pounded yam, Wheat) of your choice!!!!

just added meat, periwinkle, snails etc in the pot

Smells like heaven

Good God!!!

I know Ogbono can be a little tricky but this recipe works for me and I'm sure it'll work for you too!

Send pictures of your creation to ijawgal@yahoo.com

Don't forget to...

Read, Comment, Follow and COOK!!!!!

Bex