← Nouns Cooking · West & East African

Ingredients

• 600 g stewing beef (or goat, or a mix with tripe), cut into chunks
• 1 tsp salt, plus more to taste
• 3 red peppers, deseeded and chopped
• 2 Tomato, chopped
• 2 Scotch bonnet chilli, stems removed; use 1 for less heat
• 1 Onion, roughly chopped
• 700 g spinach (or a mix of spinach and kale)
• 80 ml red palm oil
• 1 Onion, diced
• 2 tbsp Iru (fermented locust beans) (optional)
• 2 tbsp Ground crayfish
• 100 g smoked fish or stockfish, boned and flaked (optional)

Method

1. Put the beef in a pot with the salt, half the diced onion and 500 ml water. Cover and simmer for 35–40 min until tender. Keep the stock.
2. Meanwhile, pulse the pepper-base ingredients to a coarse purée. Tip it into a dry pan and boil over medium heat for 10 min, stirring, until most of the water has cooked off.
3. Wash the spinach, plunge it into boiling water for 30 seconds, then drain, cool and squeeze out as much water as you can. Chop roughly.
4. Warm the palm oil in a wide pot over medium heat (do not let it smoke). Add the rest of the diced onion and the iru, if using, and fry for 3 min.
5. Add the reduced pepper purée and the crayfish and fry for 12–15 min, stirring often, until the sauce thickens and the oil floats to the top.
6. Add the beef, the smoked fish and about 125 ml of the beef stock. Simmer for 5 min and season with salt.
7. Fold in the spinach and cook for 3 min, just until hot. Serve with white rice, pounded yam or eba.

Tips

• Squeeze the spinach really well, or the stew turns watery. Crayfish is a shellfish allergen.
• Iru (fermented locust beans) gives the classic funky depth; leave it out if you cannot find it.
• Wear gloves to cut or blend scotch bonnets, keep your hands away from your eyes and wash the board, knife and blender well afterwards.

Sources

Written in our own words after cross-checking these recipes:

Chef Lola's Kitchen Low Carb Africa Sisi Jemimah