Egusi Soup, the Life of the Party

In the southern areas of Nigeria, Egusi soup is a ‘MUST’ for party throwers because you can eat it with a lot of dishes.

 

Ingredients:

• 8oz of fresh beef Chunks
• 500g Bush meat
• 500g Stockfish pre-soaked
• 500g Smoked dry fish
• 8oz Palm oil
• 250g  Cleaned Stripe
• 8oz Smoked Awo Chicken
• 20g Grounded Sawa
• 300g Ground Egusi
• 1 Large Onion
• 200g Fresh Pepper
• 500g Tomatoes
• 500g Vegetable (Fresh Bitter leaf-washed to remove excessive bitterness)
• Salt
• 2litres Water
• 4 Cubes Beef   Stock
• 1 tablespoon - Iru (Locust Beans)
• 2 tablespoonful - All Purposed Seasoning
• 2 Cloves - Garlic

 Method:

• Wash the beef, bush meat, stripe, thoroughly
• Place a pot on the cooker and put the meat in it, and season it by: adding sliced onion, salt to taste, garlic, all purpose seasoning, and 1 litre of water, and then cover to cook until tender.
• Wash the dry fish, awo chicken, and stockfish, and washed dry fish and cook for 10 minutes. Add 3 cubes of beef stock
• Ground the pepper, tomatoes and the onion together and pour into a clean bowl.
• Wash the pot and put it back on the cooker, let it dry up and pour the palm oil in it when it’s hot
• Add the grounded pepper, tomatoes and onion and let them cook for 10minutes.
• Mix the grounded egusi with a bit of the grounded sawa and a  pinch of salt. Kneed it properly like dough, cut it bit by bit into the cooking pepper.
• Add Iru (locust beans) stirring thoroughly and cook for 5mins
• Finally, add all the cooked meat and add ½ litre of water. Add the washed vegetable (optional) bitter leaf, tete, soko   spinach etc.
• Add the rest of the grounded sawa, and allow it to cook for 10minutes.
• Check for taste and adjust if necessary.
• Serve hot with any stiff puddings. Pounded yam, Dodo. Semolina, Ground rice amala, etc

 Happy Cooking :)

Rice for All Season

 Jollof Rice

 

Nearly half of the world's population depend on rice for sustenance; 6 billion people love to eat rice. Rice is an all season meal.

 

Jollof Rice is a dish many people hunger for. It is very popular meal in parties; if you don’t have this particular dish you have not prepared for party!

If you know how to prepare Jollof Rice, you can confidently invite friends to your party.

 Ingredients:

 
•  ¼ Litre of Vegetable Oil
• 1 Whole Chicken or 11b of  Beef 
• 3 Ripe Tomatoes
• Red Bell Peppers
• 1 Tablespoon  of Tomato Puree
• 2 Red Chilli Peppers
• 4 Leafs of Bay leaf
• 20g  Margarine or butter
• 2 Crushed Cloves of Garlic
• 3 Cubes  of Maggi  (Seasoning stock)
• 2 Cubes of Chicken or Beef Stock
• Chicken or  Beef seasoning
• 1 Teaspoonful of  Curry  Powder
• 1 Large Onion
• 3 Litres of water
• Salt
• Soy  sauce
• Parsley or Lettuce
• Dry Thyme
• 1400g Brown Rice

 

Directions:    

• Wash the Chicken or (beef) thoroughly

• Put it in a sauce pan and add pinch of salt
• Add 1 litre of water
• Add the crushed garlic, add half of the onion
• Add half a teaspoonful of thyme
• Add 2 cubes of Maggi
• Stir it together and cover to cook for 20mins
• Blend tomatoes, with the red chilli peppers, big red bell peppers and the rest of the onion together and pour it into a bowl.
• Take a big saucepan and ‘cream’ the inside with the margarine or butter, place it on the cooker
• Add the grounded pepper with onion and tomatoes, then add the pureed tomatoes
• Pour the oil into the pepper
• Cover to steam for 10mins
• Wash the rice and leave to drain.
• Pour the Chicken or Beef in a clean bowl.
• Drain the stock from it and pour in the sauce pan cooking with the pepper
• Pour the washed rice in the boiling pepper, add  1½ litre of water
• Add pinch of salt to taste
• Add 4 bay leaves to it
• Add  1 teaspoonful of  curry powder
• Cover to steam  for 15 minutes but do not stir at this time lower the cooker for good result
• Open and stir it, test for tender and taste add warm ½ a litre water if necessary, and adjust taste if you need to, by now your Jollof rice should look like mine and should  taste nice if you have followed this system.
  
• Add 4 drops of Soy sauce
• Cover it to steam for 5mins
• Stir again properly making sure everything blends together.
• Leave to cool down and serve
• Garnish with Parsley, cucumber, lettuce, as desired.

 Enjoy your dish!

 See you again for another mouth watering gastronomical experience



The Secret to the Nigerian Juicy Meat Sticks

Mouth-watering Juicy Meat Sticks

Ingredients:

·         2lb of beef

·         Onion (average sized)

·         2litres of water

·         Salt

·         Garlic powder

·         2 Cubes of Maggi (seasoning)

·         Bell Pepper; red, yellow, and green

·         1 small pepper or 2 small chilli peppers

·         1 litre of cooking oil

·         1 Tomato

·         Beef seasoning

·         Dry thyme

 

 

Method;

• Cut the meat into cube sizes and wash the pieces thoroughly
• Put the meat into a pot; add seasoning and a bit of water. To season; add a pinch of salt to taste, a table spoon of dry thyme, half a teaspoon of garlic powder, beef seasoning, two cubes of magi seasoning. Cut half of an onion into slices and sprinkle over the meat.
• Steam boil the meat for approximately 20 minutes until it is tender and the stock (water with the seasoning) appears slightly thick.
• Whilst waiting for the meat, start cutting the different bell peppers up into mid sized (approximately 1inch each side) squares.
• After removing the meat from the heating, drain the stock from the meat, and put the meat into a bowl.
• Grind the tomato and the small red pepper or chillies and the remaining half of the onion together.
• Put 200ml of oil in the frying pan and fry the meat. Add the ground pepper, tomato and onion paste into the frying pan with the meat to fry together. Add a pinch of salt and stir continuously until dark brown (if in doubt about how brown, fry for 7 minutes). When it has finished frying, put the meat in a bowl to cool.
• After the meat has fried, pre-heat the oven to 200˚/gas mark 4.
• Whilst waiting for the oven to warm up, start putting the skewer sticks through the meat and squares of pepper. (Vary the pattern so that there’s a piece of pepper in-between the pieces of meat. Use a different colour of pepper each time you put another square onto a skewer. 
  E.g. -meat-green pepper-meat-red pepper-meat-yellow pepper-…. etc.)
• Sprinkle a bit of the beef seasoning onto the skewers and meat and place them in the oven to grill for 5 minutes.
• Finally, your ‘stick meat’ treat is ready. Enjoy the Taste! Make sure you follow the system to produce the secret of stick meat.

Happy Cooking

 

This is the Day!

Today will mark the start of my cooking blog!!!

I will be sharing with you the recipes I've learned through the years; recipes that made the hearts of my family and friends leap with joy; recipes that have helped some to lose weight and be in the pink of health.

Join me daily and let's have fun :)