Pan-Seared Tilapia & Okra Tempura

What's a girl to do when she's short on time and expecting friends over for dinner? A cross between Southern and Mediterranean cuisine using two pillars of Ghanaian cuisine: tilapia and okro (as Ghanaians call it). Okro is prominent ingredient local stew like okro soup (which I've blogged about in the past) while tilapia is one of the most common fish found in the Volta region of Ghana. Tilapia is a very forgiving fish that absorbs flavors well and, when cooked at the right temperature, melts in your mouth.  Although simple, this marinade was a bit of an experiment, but ended up working out well. 

Pan-seared tilapia topped with scallions, basil and tomatoes alongside some fried okra, green beans and brown rice. 

Pan-Seared Tilapia

4 tilapia fillets tilapia
Salt and pepper to taste
1 teaspoon corinader
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
3 lemons
3 cloves of garlic
1 bunch of scallions
2 tablespoons, olive oil
3 medium tomatoes
1/4 cup basil leaves
 

1. Squeeze three lemons and set aside the juice. Crush garlic cloves and add to the lemon mixture. Add half of the scallions to the mixture.
2. Rinse the tilapia fillets before covering with the lemon mixture. Set aside in the refrigerator for 10 - 15 minutes. 
3. Place the marinated fillets on a flat plate or baking dish and lightly sprinkle them on both sides with the flour, salt, pepper, and coriander.
4. Heat the oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Cook the tilapia until it flakes easily with a fork, about 3 - 4 minutes per side. Serve immediately.
5. After removing the fish from the skillet, add another tablespoon of olive oil and tomatoes. Season the tomatoes with salt and pepper. 
6. Garnish with the remaining scallions, basil and tomatoes.

Okra Tempura

5 cups of oil
1/2 cup cornmeal
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup buttermilk (see below for a substitute if you don't have it on hand)
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 1/2 pounds fresh okra, sliced thickly
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
4 cloves of garlic
 

1. Heat oil in a large pot. 
2. In a bowl, combine the milk with 1 teaspoon of lemon juice to make buttermilk if you don't have it on hand. 
3. In another bowl, combine the cornmeal, flour, salt, and cayenne pepper. Dip the okra in buttermilk and then coat it in the cornmeal-flour mixture. Carefully add okra to the hot oil and cook until golden brown.
4. When removing it from the oil, drain it with a slotted spoon and place it on paper towels to absorb the oil.  

I also made some green beans and brown rice to go along with this dinner, which serves about 4 people. 

Domoda: Gambian Peanut Stew

I wouldn't be Gambian if I didn't do a post about domoda. Also known as maffe in Senegal, asindessi in Togo and aziin nusunnu in Benin, domoda is The Gambia's national dish. It's a delicious, hearty peanut stew often featuring chicken or beef. As mentioned in my post on churrah gerte, peanuts are omnipresent in Gambian cuisine. Whenever I feel a little homesick for my mother's cooking, domoda is my go-to meal. Everyone has their own vegetable preferences regarding what they like to throw in. I personally love to thrown in some sweet potatoes and carrots (which are delicious when tender), but sometimes I add bell peppers. 

Domoda and brown rice.

Domoda

1 lb chicken breast, cut into ½ in. chunks
¼ cup peanut oil
2 large onions, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 tablespoons tomato paste
1 cup natural, unsweetened peanut butter
3 cups of vegetable stock
2 cups water
Scotch bonnet chilies, diced
1 cup sweet potatoes, chopped (or the tuber of your choice) 
2 carrots, sliced thickly
1 bay leaf
Salt to taste

1. Heat the oil in a large pot. Add the chicken to the pot and cook until lightly browned. The chicken does not need to be completely cooked through - it will finish cooking as it simmers in the stew.

2. Dilute the tomato paste in the water, add to the pot, and bring the mixture to a boil. Add the carrots, sweet potatoes, and chillies.

3. In a separate pan, sauté the onions and garlic until golden brown. Add the onion and garlic to the pot. 

4. Add the bay leaf, salt, and the peanut butter. Adjust the thickness of the sauce by adding more peanut butter (to thicken) or adding more water (to make it thinner). 

5. Reduce cover the pot and allow it to cook for 45 - 50 minutes while stirring occasionally to ensure the peanut butter does not stick to the bottom of the pot. 

6. Serve hot over rice.*

*I chose to serve this over brown rice because I find that brown rice works better with thick stews. White rice can sometimes become a bit mushy. In Ghana, I've become particularly fond of Primelin Brown Rice. 

Domoda is often eaten with chicken or beef, but it can also be adapted to vegetarian palettes. Throw in whatever you'd like -- squash, eggplant, yams, etc.

Fried Eggplant and Chickpeas in a Tomato-Onion Berbere Sauce

Lately, I've become very interested in learning about various spices of the world. In the next few weeks, I aim to learn to make some of the essential major African spice blends: Morroco's Ras el Hanout, Egypt's dukkah, Tunisia's baharat, and Ethiopia's famous berbere. Based on the availability of different ingredients in my kitchen, I decided to start with berbere on a whim. If you can't handle pepper, you can substitute a little bit of paprika; however, any true version of berbere requires the essential ingredients of fenugreek and chili peppers.

Berbere, which means "hot" in Amharic, is a common Ethiopian/Eritrean spice mixture that includes delicious flavors like ginger, chili peppers, garlic, cardamom, cumin, and fenugreek. It is an essential part of many classic Ethiopian meals, especially the famed Doro Wat. According to Ethiopian-Swedish celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson, "berbere can be used to season everything from vegetables to meats and stews." As a devotee of Samuelsson's amazing Harlem soul food restaurant Red Rooster, I've been eager to employ some of his techniques and recipes in my own kitchen experiments. 

Along with cauliflower, my other go-to vegetable in a pinch, eggplant absorbs flavors well and can be an excellent meat substitute in a meatless dinner. It doesn't hurt that eggplant is rich in fiber and antioxidants. It also helps prevent cancer and lower cholesterol. When buying eggplant, a word of caution: they are very perishable, so if you buy them, you should intend to eat them within 1 -  2 days. Eggplants can also be a little bitter, so you'll need to salt them to pull out some of the bitter components.

After making berbere following Samuelsson's recipe, I fried some eggplant until golden and then made a fragrant sauce with some tomatoes, onions, chickpeas, and berbere with a side of couscous. If you don't use all the berbere mixture, you can keep it in a small glass jar with an airtight lid for a few months.

My soundtrack to this dinner was Jill Scott's "It's Love" from her debut album "Who is Jill Scott?" alongside a little Cabernet Sauvignon, which goes well with eggplant.

Fried Eggplant and Chickpeas in a Tomato-Onion Berbere Sauce
Serves about 3 hungry people as a main course, 5 - 6 as a side dish.

2 baby eggplants, sliced into rounds
Kosher salt, to taste
3 - 4 tablespoons olive oil (You may need to add a little more if the pan is too dry)
2 medium-sized red onions, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1  1/2 teaspoons berbere (Spice blend following Samuelsson's recipe)
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
4 ripe beefsteak tomatoes (or any large tomato variety)
One 15-oz can of cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed
 

1. Heat a frying pan on high heat and add 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Add enough eggplant slices to fit in one layer. Salt to taste (otherwise the eggplant will be bitter). Cook until the bottoms are golden brown, then flip it until it is golden brown on the other side. I like my eggplants truly brown, so I cook them for about 5 minutes on each side, adding more oil as needed. Add more salt as needed.
2. In a small pot, add the onions and cook until they are soft. Add the garlic and cook for 2 additional minutes. Add the berbere and cayenne. Cook until the mixture becomes fragrant, before adding the tomatoes, chickpeas and half a cup of water.
3. Cover the pan and allow the mixture to simmer until the tomatoes break down into the sauce. 
4. Serve the eggplant and chickpea tomato berbere sauce over couscous. 

If you're feeling like you really want to try something a little different, you can also serve this mixture over attiéké, a popular Ivorian side dish made from cassava. Attiéké has a texture very similar to couscous, but it's gluten-free and quite healthy. It's simple to make and can be found in most African grocery stores. To make attiéké, you can simply steam it. Alternatively, you can pour it into a bowl and cover it with boiling water. While letting it steam for about 10 minutes, you use a fork to occasionally separate the grains.  

Banku and Okro Soup, Ghana-Style

Growing up, I was an okra soup fanatic. Whenever my mother made it, I could be continually counted on to eat to excess and then promptly fall into a food coma. I've cut back as I've grown older because okra soup made with palm oil isn't the healthiest of dishes. Several chefs have attempted to adapt the recipe with vegetable oil to make it slightly healthier and reduce the cholesterol impact of the palm oil; however, I believe that the palm oil is essential to rich, deep flavor of the dish. I'm a okra soup purist, if you will. As such, these days, I only eat it sparingly, but relish those rare occasions. If you do choose to adapt the recipe with vegetable oil, I suggest using poultry instead of beef or smoked meat as the flavor is slightly better. 

I learned how to make this recipe from my friend Julie from Ghana. We added a few crabs that you can see in the pictures, but I've omitted them from the recipe below. 

Okra soup is a fascinating dish because of its many permutations across West Africa and its reinvention in the Americas as gumbo. Creole gumbo usually features a roux (a thickening agent made with a fat such as butter, mixed with flour) and is typically served over hot rice.  

This recipe uses garden eggs, which are also called "African eggplants." When I first arrived in Accra, I was very confused as to what exactly the pale yellow "garden eggs" were. I had never seen them before when visiting Gambia or Kenya. After some inquiries, I learned that they are simply another variety of eggplant. In the States, if you're lucky, you may be able to find them at speciality African (and sometimes Asian) grocery stores. They're slightly more bitter than the aubergine (dark purple) eggplants I am used to. 

Okra Soup
1 medium-sized salmon
1 lb smoked turkey (Note: traditionally most people tend to use beef)
1 pound Okro (Note: Ghanaians call okra "okro")
2 cloves garlic
3 medium tomatoes
1 large onion
1 tsp. grated ginger
2 chili peppers (scotch bonnets or other red chilis are best), ground or finely chopped
3 garden eggs (Substitute aubergines if unavailable)
1/2 cup mushrooms
1/2 cup palm oil
2 cubes of Bouillon cubes
Salt to taste

1. Chop half of the pound of okra, then grate the other half. The smaller you cut the okra, the better the draw will be.

2. Cut the stalks off the garden eggs and cut them in half.

3. Soak the garden eggs and the okra for 10 minutes before transferring them to a pot to boil until the garden eggs turn translucent. Remove from flame.

4. In a separate pot, pour 1/2 cup of palm oil. When the oil is hot, add the onion, ginger, bouillion cubes, ground chili pepper and garlic. (Optional: add some ground ginger). As the mixture softens, add tomato and mushrooms, and continue to let it simmer over the fire.

5. Allow the pot with the palm oil mixture to continue cooking for 2 to 3 minutes before adding the smoked turkey and fish. Once the turkey and fish are sufficiently cooked, add the okra mixture.

6. Add the okra into the mixture by turning it from the bottom of the pot to the top. Allow the mixture to cook for another 10 minutes. The okra is added last in order to avoid over-cooking it.

7. Serve when ready alongside banku (for Ghanaians) or rice (my personal preference).

Pouring the boiled okra and garden egg mixture into the pot with the palm oil

Because I was aiming for the full Ghana experience, I also made the okra soup with banku, one of Ghana's staple foods. I'm fascinated by the vast array of starchy side dishes across Africa. In much of West Africa, fufu is omnipresent. In Kenya and parts of eastern and central Africa, the starchy side is ugali, a maize-based side similar to polenta. In Zambia and parts of southern Africa, there is nshima. In Benin and Togo, there is the omnipresent pate (pronounced "pat.")  In Ghana, there is the one and only banku. Aside from their starchy consistency, all these foods share the common element of near tastelessness, thereby making them a perfect base to sop up the spicy and earthy flavors of rich stews like okra soup. 
 

Freshly made banku, shapely by yours truly. Be careful not to eat too much or you will quickly find yourself fast asleep.

Banku
2 cups water
1 pound cassava dough
2 pounds corn dough
Salt to taste

1. Mix the 1 cup of water and cassava dough then pour the mixture through a sieve to ensure that all the unmilled pieces of cassava and any other residue are eliminated.

2. Add the corn dough to the cassava dough.

3. Add some salt and mix thoroughly until the mixture thins and becomes smooth.

4. Put the pot over medium fire and continue to mix. The banku will become more difficult to stir, but continue to mix in order to ensure it does not become lumpy. Add about one cup of water and cover the pot for 5 minutes to allow the water to evaporate and cook the banku further. During this time, stir the banku intermittently.

5. When the banku is ready, shape it into a small ball using a spoon. Alternatively, if you won't eat all of the banku at once, spoon out portions into small plastic bags and roll up the ends.

The finished product: banku and okro soup.