Category Archives: Standard Nigerian Meals

Afrolems Met Chef Fregz : Hausa Inspired

Appetizers, Cooking with Chefs, Drink Recipes, Goat Meat Recipes, Hausa Recipes, Rice recipes, Standard Nigerian Meals May 17, 2013 Comments: 10

For many people that live in Nigeria, you must have heard of Chef Fregz or seen him on TV( Knorr Taste Quest Show..ring a bell?). This dude has amazingggggg culinary skills and is super friendly. I always heard about this guy that went to Olashore (High school in Nigeria) that did amazing things with food and I was like okkk let’s see first. Usually when people shout about chefs i’m a bit wary because I never trust their judgements. Then one fateful day, I saw a picture of Chef Fregz eba and Okro on Instagram. I didn’t even need to be told that this guy had awesome skills and I wanted to meet him. Fast forward a few months and here we are, cooking together and playing with Nigerian ingredients. It was definitely a fun day. Here is what we made;

Masa

Kunun Aya

Spicy Curried Goat with Tuwo Rice

Masa (Serves 5)

Ingredients

2 Cups of Tuwo rice (Substitute – jasmine rice)

tuwo rice

1 tablespoon of yeast

1 tablespoon sugar (optional)

1 tablespoon of honey or syrup (optional)

1 cooking spoon of oil

1/2 teaspoon of grated ginger

Method

Soak one cup of the Tuwo rice in water and add 1/2 the tablespoon of yeast. Allow it sit for 4- 5 hours

soak rice for masa rice cake

Boil the other cup of rice and mash it and set aside.

In a blender, pour in the soaked rice and the mashed rice and blend till smooth. Some people use the rice flour to avoid all these steps but I like to go the authentic route.

In the blended rice mixture, pour in your grated ginger and sugar and the other tablespoon of yeast and leave to rise for about 30 minutes or less.

blended masa mixture

In a pancake puff pan, grease the pan a little and add the masa mixture to fry and flip as well to brown on the other side. Serve with honey or maple syrup if you didn’t add sugar or the sugar wasn’t enough.

masa frying in pancake puffs

Some people eat Masa with a pepper sauce. It is completely a preferential choice.

masa with syrup and chocolate sprinkles

Kunun Aya (Serves 2)

Ingredients

1 cup of Tiger nuts

1/2 cup of coconut milk (optional)

1 teaspoon of grated ginger

Pineapples to garnish

Method

Soak the tiger nuts in water for 2 hours

tiger nut ofio

Blend the tiger nuts with 1/2 cup of water

Squeeze out the milk from the nuts.

tiger nut milk kunun aya

Mix it with your coconut milk and ginger and serve with pineapple.

We were going to go the route of the pina colada by blending the pineapples and adding them but we decided not to :)

kunun aya hausa drink

Spicy Curried Goat with Tuwo Rice (Serves 2)

Ingredients

1/4 Pound of Goat Meat

1.5 Tablespoons of Curry

1/2 cup of Coconut Milk

3 cherry tomatoes

5 scotch bonnet peppers or ata rodo (Reduce if you do not like spicy food)

1 cube of seasoning

1/4 bulb of onion

1 cooking spoon of Vegetable Oil

Fresh Thyme

Tuwo Rice (Substitute – Jasmine Rice)

Method

Season and Boil your goat meat and set aside. (I stole some goat meat from Chef Fregz Asun dish )

Wash and Boil your Rice and set aside.

boiled tuwo rice

Chop your onions and pepper and set aside.

Heat up the oil and fry the onions and pepper.

Add the cherry tomatoes whole. (These are those really tiny tomatoes)

Pour in your coconut milk and allow to simmer on medium heat.

Add your seasoning, fresh thyme and curry.

base sauce for curried goat

Pour in your goat meat and allow to simmer for low heat for another 3 minutes.

Serve with your Tuwo Rice.

food styling with chef fregz

Chef Fregz helping me Style the food

spicy curried goat

spicy curried goat and tuwo rice hausa nigerian food

chef fregz and afrolems

Sneak Preview of Chef Fregz Asun and Puff Puff  Details on Bella Naija. Click Here

puff puff and asun chef fregz

 

 

To Find Tiger nuts in the UK, Canada or US, Follow the links below; Found them online :)

UK: http://www.realfoods.co.uk/product/586/real-foods-tiger-nuts-bulk-wholesale

Canada: 
http://well.ca/products/ecoideas-organic-whole-tigernuts_64925.html 

US:
http://www.tigernutsusa.com/

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Win Credit on Twitter this Friday

General Afrolems Posts, Standard Nigerian Meals April 16, 2013 Leave a comment

For a chance to win Etisalat Credit this Friday, answer a simple question on Twitter. What city did Afrolems spend Easter in? Tweet your answer with the hashtag #Afrolems Winner would be selected at random! Good luck

Easter Special: Hollandaise Sauce with Poached Eggs and English Muffin

Breakfast dishes, brunch recipe, easter recipe, eggs, holiday recipe, Holiday Recipes, sauce, Standard Nigerian Meals March 29, 2013 Leave a comment

Easter is just around the corner and I always wanted to try out the recipe for Hollandaise sauce and I thought this would serve as a good dish for Easter brunch with some freshly squeezed orange juice or lemonade…YUMMY!! Hollandaise sauce is really creamy and has a lemony tangy taste and can also be served with asparagus.

Ingredients

4 eggs

4 bacon strips

1/4 cup of unsalted butter (or 1/2 a cup depending on how runny you want the sauce)

Salt

Freshly squeezed lemon

English muffin

White wine vinegar

Method 

*First we start with the hollandaise sauce, you need a double broiler for this, but you can use a huge sauce pan and a stainless steel bowl.

  • But enough water halfway into the saucepan and allow to boil 
  • Clarify the butter by melting, using a teaspoon remove any foam that may be on top of the melted butter and allow to cool
  • In the stainless steel bowl, crack the eggs and put just the yolks into the bowl (be careful not to allow any egg whites into the bowl)
  • Add half a teaspoon of water and 2-3 teaspoons of freshly squeezed lemon
  • Add a pinch of salt and whisk for about 3 minutes
  • Put the metal bowl over the boiling water (be sure to reduce the heat to minimum). Whisk for about 3 minutes non stop, you will notice a thick consistency that sticks to the whisk
  • Remove the bowl and add half the butter and whisk until it forms a light consistency, then add the remaining butter and a pinch of salt and whisk again.
  • Leave the sauce to stand in a warm place, and be sure to use within one hour of preparation

Poached Eggs

  • In a very shallow sauce pan, add enough water to fill 1/2 way up the saucepan 
  • Once the water begins to simmer/boil add a pinch of salt and a dash of vinegar ( this helps the egg stay together)
  • To make it easier, break the egg in a cup without breaking the yolk
  • Then tilt the edge of the cup slowly into the boiling water ensuring the egg stays together
  • Cook for 5-10 minutes depending on how runny you want the eggs
  • Once they are done, use a spatula to scoop onto a kitchen paper towel and allow to dry

Serve : *Cut the muffin in half and toast lightly, on both sides of the muffin put a strip of fried bacon, then the poached eggs, then another bacon and then drizzle with as much hollandaise sauce as you like

ENJOY!!

Afrolems: Hollandaise Sauce

Afrolems; Hollandaise sauce

Afrolems: Poached eggs

Order Nigerian Food in Toronto for a Limited time

General Afrolems Posts, Standard Nigerian Meals February 12, 2013 1 Comment

Everyone has been asking what ever happened to the weekly orders. Well things have been a little crazy recently. So for a very limited time, I would be offering small bowls of 6 dishes $15 dollars each. If you live within the Greater toronto area, You can place your order for any of these dishes before Thursday 14th of February at  11:59pm and you would be able to pick up on Saturday after 3pm. You can choose one dish or order all 6 in small bowls. Fill out this form and let us know your order

order naija food toronto

Ogbono Soup

Nigerian Soups, Standard Nigerian Meals January 30, 2013 Leave a comment
I was blog trolling one saturday afternoon and came across Kitchen butterfly’s ogbono soup pictures and holy moly I could not stop thinking about Ogbono soup that day. The next day I ran to the african store and started stocking up on things I needed for this amazing dish. I was literally singing all the way through the cooking time. At this point it had occurred to me that I had not made Ogbono in a few years “what was wrong with me?” This drawy tasty goodness hadn’t stepped into my kitchen in a long time. I had to do it big. However, my idea of doing it big was to serve this with pounded yam and not until I got home that freezing sunday afternoon did I realize I had run out of both yam and yam flour so no pounded yam for me. Ah well, nothing was going to stop me. Eba it was. I sat down with a bottle of schweppes bitter lemon and enjoyed this delicious meal. Hope you enjoy making it as well. mmmm I can still taste it.
P.S: a little birdie told me that Ogbono has a secret weightloss substance. For those watching their height (lol), you may want to ask your dietitian or nutritionist.
  • 1 cup ground ogbono
  • 3 cooking spoons Palm oil
  • 5 fingers of Okro
  • Handful of bitter leaves
  • 1 table spoon of dry pepper (chilli powder)
  • 2 tablespoons of salt
  • Beef
  • shaki (tripe)
  • Pomo (cow-skin)
  • Dry fish
  • Crayfish
  • 3 maggi cubes
  • half a bulb of onion
  • 2 scotch bonnet peppers
  • 2-3 cups of water

Method

Wash the beef, tripe, cow skin and place in a pot. Season with 1 tablespoon of salt, scotch bonnet pepper, onion and 2 maggi cubes. Bring to boil till meat is tender. You may need to take out beef if it cooks before the cow skin and the tripe.

Chop Okro fingers and set aside.

In a separate pot, heat up 2 cooking spoons of palm oil on low heat and and pour in the grounded ogbono and melt in the pot on low heat. Continually stir until completely melted.

In the pot of meat still cooking, ensure there is enough water, pour in your fish, crayfish and the rest of your seasoning.

Pour in the rest of your palm oil, your bitter leaves and the chopped okro.

Do not cover the pot at this point as that would break the resilience of the okro and make it less drawy.

Add the melted ogbono slowly into the pot of meat so it doesn’t splash on you and stir in.

Allow to simmer for 2-3 minutes on low heat without covering the pot.

Serve with Eba(Garri), Pounded yam or semovita or any carbohydrate of your choice.

ogbono

Nigerian Meat Pie – 10th Day of Christmas

holiday recipe, Holiday Recipes, Nigerian Snacks, Standard Nigerian Meals December 22, 2012 Comments: 4

The oh so famous Nigerian Meat Pie! Oh how i love meat pies. I remember always getting excited and looking forward to these at parties! Use this recipe for when you want to entertain guests or for when you are feeling a bit nostalgic. Enjoy!

Dough

4 cups of Flour

1 Tablespoon (2 teaspoons) of baking powder

500 grams (1.1 lbs) of Margarine

1 Teaspoon of Sugar

Pinch of Salt

1 cup of cold water

2 eggs

Meat pie filling

2 large Irish potatoes

2 medium carrots

1.5 Lbs of ground beef

1 medium bulb of onion

1 small scotch bonnet pepper

2 cooking spoons of Vegetable Oil

2 cubes of Maggi

1 teaspoon of thyme

2 tablespoons of plain flour

Cold water – 1 cup / 250 ml

1 pinch of salt

Items needed while making meat pie

  • Oven
  • Fork
  • Roller or smooth bottle
  • Meat Pie cutter or the lid cover of a small pot

How to make pie filling

  1. Was and peel potatoes and carrot. Dice potatoes and carrots
  2. Wash and dice onions
  3. Place large pot on medium-high heat
  4. Pour in 2 cooking spoons of vegetable oil let heat up for about 1 minute
  5. Add in diced onions and let fry for a bit. Add in potatoes and carrots, stir and let fry for about 2 mins. Add in ground beef, sir and let fry till most of the beef cooks.
  6. Add in thyme and stir
  7. Slowly add 1 cup of water. Cover the pot and let boil for about 10mins or until soft.
  8. Mix 2 tablespoons of flour with half cup of cold water. Pour mixture into pot. This helps make sure filling does not dry up while baking in the oven.
  9. Add in salt to taste, stir ingredients again and turn off stove. Let simmer until pot becomes cool.

Filling_Final

How to make Meat Pie dough/crust

  1. Put the flour in a large bowl. Mix in baking powder, salt and sugar (optional).
  2. Scoop margarine from bowl and place in center of the flour bowl. Rub/Work margarine into the flour in little bits using your finger tips. Continue to work in margarine until it all starts to feel like breadcrumbs.
  3. Slowly pour in bits of the cup of cold water while kneading the dough. Knead into a stiff ball. Make sure dough is not too hard or too soft. If it becomes too soft, add more flour to help make it stiff.
  4. Let dough sit for 5 to 7 minutes. This makes the dough more elastic

Dough_Final

Putting it all together

  1. In a small bowl, beat eggs until smooth
  2. Cut a portion of the dough and place on a flat board dusted with flour.
  3. Using a baking roller of a cylindrical bottle, flatten dough till its about half an inch thick.
  4. Using a meat pie cutter or the cover of a small pot/saucepan, cut flattened dough in a circle and peel off the edges from the cutter.
  5. Place 1-2 tablespoons full of filling in the center of the cut dough
  6. With a basting brush, lightly dust edges of the dough with eggs (this helps the edges hold when folded)
  7. Gently fold the dough in half to cover the filling. Dip a fork in the eggs and use to mesh edges together.
  8. Brush folded dough with eggs to give that classic golden brown meat pie look.

Preheat oven at 375 degrees

Grease non-stick baking pan with 1 teaspoon of margarine

Place meat pies on baking pan and bake for 30-45 minutes checking halfway

Meat Pie_Final

Candied Coconut – 9th Day of Christmas

Appetizers, General Afrolems Posts, holiday recipe, Holiday Recipes, Nigerian Snacks, Standard Nigerian Meals December 20, 2012 Leave a comment

I don’t know about you but what comes to my mind during this festive period is the amount of candy, chocolate and food I can have. Growing up my mum always made this snack for my brothers and I and we loved it. It  brings back childhood memories and I believe this would make for a very great Christmas snack. So on this 9th day of Christmas I give you Candied Coconut……Seasons Feedings!

Ingredients

  • 1 Coconut
  • 1 Cup of sugar
  • 1-2 spoons of cream

Recipe 

  1. Break the coconut and separate the coconut meat from the shell
  2. Using a grater, grate the coconut into tiny pieces
  3. In a small saucepan, put in the sugar and allow to caramelize under low heat.
  4. Add 1-2 spoons of cream, this prevents the caramel from getting too hard
  5. Stir in the grated coconut meat, continue to stir for about 10-15 minutes or until it is almost dark brown. You’ll notice the caramel sticking to the pot and also getting burnt, this is normal.
  6. Leave to cool down for 10 minutes
  7. Using a spoon, scoop some of the candied coconut into a parchment paper and mold into any form you desire.
  8. Leave to cool for an hour
  9. Once it’s cooled, unwrap and serve

coconut candy

 

naija coconut candy

 

Ofada Stew or Designer Stew with Rice – 7th Day of Christmas

Holiday Recipes, Rice recipes, Standard Nigerian Meals December 18, 2012 Comments: 3

For people that live in Surulere in Lagos, you would know the popular joint close to Akerele called Bank Olemoh. The Rice and stew served at the local restaurant (Buka) there is popularly called Bank Olemoh Rice or Designer rice or Designer stew and rice. I have also heard it is popularly called Ofada Stew and sometimes people mistake it for Ayamatse. The concept of designer stew is not the what we think in terms of name brands but the idea is to have multiple proteins in one pot of stew. Your proteins could range from beef to egg to tripe(shaki) to cow skin (pomo) to chicken etc. This stew is a little complex but indeed very interesting to make and it was the first dish Afrolems started with. Hope you find it easy to make. Seasons feedings….enjoy!

Ingredients

Beef

Shaki (cow or goat tripe)

Pomo (Cow skin)

Cow Intestine(optional)

Chicken

or whatever other protein you would like to add

8 tomatoes ( if you can get 2 of the pieces of tomato that are almost bad, that helps) – blended

3 scotch bonnet peppers- blended

1 red bell pepper- blended

3 cooking spoons of palm oil

1 bulb of onion- chopped

1 tablespoon of dawa dawa (iru) or Locust beans

2 tablespoons of salt

1 table spoon of dry pepper

4 cubes of Maggi

Method

*Wash, season and boil all protein.

*Fry the protein separately till brown and somewhat crispy

*Heat up 2 cooking spoons of palm oil till it turns clear. This is what is called bleaching of the oil. To prevent your smoke alarm from going off, continually take it off the burner to cool and re-heat till its clear.

*Fry the Iru (locust beans) for 2 minutes and take out of the oil.

* Toss in the onion and blended tomatoes and peppers and fry it dry.

*Pour in the seasoning and stock from the boiled protein if any.

*In a separate pot, bleach the rest of the palm oil.

* Pour in the fried protein into the pot of stew

*Once the other oil is bleached, pour into the pot of stew. (Be careful not to let it splash on your face so pour it with the cover of the pot protecting your face)

* stir in and allow to simmer for about 3 minutes.

Serve with White rice and plantain. designer rice

Afia Efere -Ofe Nsala – White PepperSoup 4th Day of Christmas

Holiday Recipes, Nigerian Soups, Standard Nigerian Meals December 15, 2012 Leave a comment

On the 4th day of Christmas my true love gave to me, a soup that is local to both Efik people and Igbo people called Afia Efere or Ofe Nsala. Some other cultures just know it as white pepper soup. There is nothing white about this soup in my opinion but it is very tasty that’s for sure. This recipe would have your nose dripping because of the pepper but it is surely delicious. It is usually a regular on my mum’s christmas menu. Little wonder that her recipe inspired the creation of this dish today. Head on over to her blog for the recipe. I decided to serve mine with some peanuts and white rice. Some may prefer Pounded yam or Eba. Either way, Seasons Feedings,…Enjoy!

white peppersoup

Plantain Canoe with Jumbo Shrimp – 3rd Day of Christmas

Holiday Recipes, Plantain Recipes, Standard Nigerian Meals December 14, 2012 Comments: 2

On the 3rd day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, a plantain canoe with Jumbo shrimps. After making my avocado boat on the 1st day of christmas, I got inspired to go to see with another dish that still involved shrimps. I am a big shrimp lover so pardon me if you absolutely cannot stand shrimp. You can always substitute with chicken, fish, snail or whatever you want. I usually hope my recipes inspire my readers to create their own dishes. This recipe is fairly easy and is indeed a good idea for a main course if you are light weight or you can cut up the plantain into smaller bits and serve as an appetizer. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did. Seasons Feedings…Enjoy!

Ingredients

1 cup of Shrimps

1 finger of plantain

1/2 cup of Green, yellow and red bell peppers

1/4 cup of mixed veggies (chopped corn, peas, carrots)plantain recipes

1 scotch bonnet peppers

1/2 tomato

1 clove of Garlic

1 Bulb of onions

1 cube of Maggi

1 tablespoon of salt

1 teaspoon of black pepper

1 teaspoon of curry

Pinch of Thyme

2 tablespoons of butter

Method

Heat oven to 370 F, Peel Plantain, slice in half vertically and place in oven for 15 minutes.

Heat up the butter and pour in the chopped onions, garlic, peppers, tomato and mixed veggies.

Add all the seasonings; salt, pepper, curry, thyme, maggi and stir in.

Toss in the shrimps and reduce the heat to low to allow the shrimp cook. Continue to flip the shrimp on both sides to make sure it is cooked all the way through.

Switch the oven to broil and increase the heat to 550 F and leave the plantain in for 5 minutes.

Take the plantain out after it has browned on both sides and serve the shrimp sauce on the plantain.

bole roasted plantain and shrimp

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

roasted plantain and shrimp naija food

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

plantain canoe with jumbo shrimp christmas

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