Bitter leave soup

Ingredients 

Bitter leaves (chopped and washed)

Crayfish 

Cocoyam (ede)

Ogiri

Mixed Meat and its stock

Palm oil (you only need a little)

Smoke catfish 

Periwinkle (optional)

Dried fish

Dried blended pepper 

Step 1. cut, wash the bitter leaves and cook for few minutes.. this helps to extract the bitterness from the leaves.. making it easier to give a final wash.

Step 2. Wash the cocoyam, peel, wash and boil without salt.. (Tip. always wash your root vegetables before peeling and after peeling)

Step 3. Add pepper to the boiling meat and it stock

Step 4. Add in the stock fish

Step 5. add in the smoked cat fish

Step 6. Add in oil and cocoyam

Step 7. the crayfish

Step 8. Ogiri... stir to dissolve (or you can dissolve in warm water before adding it to the soup)

Step 9. Add in the periwinkles

Step 10.. finally the washed bitterleaves

Continue to stir, if too thick add in some to loosen up.

The kids called out for pounded yam, as soon as the soup was ready....

Green tomatoes stew (green tomatoes sauce)

I went shopping at my local whole food market, to my amusement  I spotted some green tomatoes.. quickly a thought came to mind "green tomatoes stew!!!, quickly I got that feeling of a kid in the candy store. Packed hand full of the tomatoes, humming on my way home filled with excitement. 

When preparing this stew, I recommend you stick to this recipe and quantity of ingredient; because the tomatoes are quite tangy and the bell peppers are quite sweet, so its important you strike a balance, also adding thyme and curry  helps.

This stew taste as good as our everyday red stew, only the colour makes a different.

Ingredients 

2 Green tomatoes

4 Scotch bonnet or more if required

4 Bell peppers

1 Onion

Stock cubes (chicken stock preferable)

1 tsp curry powder

1 tsp dried thyme

Vegetable oil

Step 1. wash, chop and blend the vegetables till very smooth

Step 2. Pour the blended vegetables into a pot and allow to simmer.. till almost past

Step 3. Add in the vegetable oil

Step 4. Add in the curry powder

Step 5. Add in the thyme

Step 6. The stock, taste and allow to simmer for few minutes and its ready...

I and my family enjoyed ours with some steamed rice.... the taste was out of this word.. #yum

Walkers potatoes style crisps (potatoes crisps jollof flavour)

Ingredients

Potatoes

Oil to fry 

Jollof base sauce 

Stock cubes 

Red bell peppers 

Scotch bonnet (chilli pepper)

Tomatoes purée 

Onions  

Curry powder 

Thyme 

Veg oil 

Thyme 

Step 1. Peel and shred the potatoes in to thin pieces.. Next wash, blend and steam the jollof base sauce, add in the oil to fry, thyme, curry powder and stock cubes. (Once the potatoes go into the sauce, I suggest you taste the seasoning again)

Step 2. Soak the potatoes in the jollof base sauce.. Leave for up to 2hours 

Step 3. (Fried version).. You can deep fry in a deep fryer or in a frying pan, your choice. Because they cut thinly, they will crisps up quite quickly so be very vigilant. Once fried, place them on kitchen towel to remove excess fat... 

***For the (oven baked version).. Line the baking tray with greaseproof paper, place the chips one at time spreading extra sauce on them.. Then bake till crispy on gas mark 5.  

All ready .. Serve with any cold drink of your choice.. 

Fried potatoes crisps jollof flavour

Baked potatoes crisp jollof flavour

Spicy plantain chips (how to make plantain chips)

Ingredients

Ripen plantain

Blended dried peppers 

Salt to taste 

Oil to deep fry 

Step 1. Slice the plantain very thinly.. Season with the pepper and little salt. Leave for few mins to marinate....

 

Step 2. Heat up the deep fryer or frying pan with oil, spread the plantain out evenly then fry till brown in colour or to the colour you prefer.... 

Step 3. Strain out any excess oil by placing the plantain on a drying towel or kitchen paper. Pour back into the bowl, add in more pepper, toss properly to even out the pepper....

Finally serve with any drink of your choice, happy snacking 

Ekana gowon (how to make ekana gowon)

Ekana gowon means Gowons finger, now don't ask me what that means, lol. Legend has it that it became popular after the Biafran war. If anyone has any info on this please drop a comment.

This childhood favorite actually has over a dozen names across Nigeria including honey sweet and ojukwu finger.

I seriously doubt if this can still be found with street vendors or at mallams stalls as they used to be back in the 80s.

To demystify it, I'll tell you it's simply warm caramelized sugar poured into one corner of a little nylon/polythene bag to create the cone shape and left to cool off and harden.

Ingredients

21/2 cup sugar (300g)

2 tbsp honey

125ml water

Step 1, combine all the ingredients in a small pan and place on a slow heat..

 

Step 2.. Start stirring 

Step 3. Continue to stir (pls be very careful, if your kids are helping out.... Pls pls pls keep eyes on them)

Step 4. Slow but surely, the sugar mix will start caramelizing..

 

Step 5. It should look like this.. Take it off the cooker and continue to stir (you need it to cool down a bit, before transferring them to the bags... Remember you have to work fast at this point, otherwise the candy will harden up before it gets into the bag)

Step 6. Start transferring the liquid into the bag, placing a toothpick in the medium.. Then tie the tip up 

Step 6. Leave to completely cool down, should take about 20-30mins

All ready.... While unwrapping the sweets for the kids, I saw it as an opportunity to tell the kids how, as a kid a save my money to buy them after school 

Dodo ikire (Nigeria spice plantain)

This is a spicy, savory and sweet treat as it combines the sweetness of very ripe plantains with pepper, onions and salt.

Unlike the popular Ghanaian kelewele which has seemingly similar ingredients, this is all mashed and mixed together before frying to create this dark sinfully delightful plantain treat.

Dodo ikire is named after the town of ikire where this traditional recipe originates from in Osun state.

Legend has it that it was created by a poor old woman who was so impoverished that she couldn't throw away the over ripe plantain she had left.

If you've ever travelled through there and neighboring towns and toll gates, you must have come across lots of street vendors and "hawkers" trying to sell you some.

It's a lovely treat worth trying if you haven't tasted it before. Your tastebuds would thank you!!!

Ingredients 

Very ripe plantain 

Small amount of onion

Fresh or dried crushed peppers

Salt to taste

Veg or palm oil (I preferred veg oil)

Step 1 chop up the plantain into smal cubes..  Add in the peppers, onion and little salt to taste

Step 2. Stir while gently mashing the plantain.. Don't over do it!!!. Leave for few mins to marinate

Step 3. Heat up the oil, when hot enough start dropping in the plantain in little ball shapes (they will come apart, so don't worry.. Because ones fried and alittle cooled, you can use you hands in shaping then together)... 

Step 4. The plantain will start turning brown, at this point keep an eye on them.. Otherwise they will burn. 

Finally... All ready for consumption, before I could say "Jack Robinson".. The kids are them all up.... #Smiling