African Canapés

Hello Readers, hope you are all doing well. It’s been a busy summer and exciting things have been happening at Nina’s Cookery Corner. I did my first huge wedding gig in Vienna Austria, preparing and displaying a selection of African canapés for over 400 guests. I am really proud and happy this project went well and got excellent feedback not only from the client but also from guests and the prestigious Austrian catering company that catered for the three course wedding dinner.

Below are some pictures from the event and some African style canapé options.

Some of the recipes for the canapé options can be found on my blog by following the link below. http://ninascookerycorner.blogspot.co.uk/

Feast your eyes on the dishes and don’t forget to like share and comment.

Also, if you’re planning an event, dinner party and want the burden of cooking off your hands, why not let me be your super hero and cater to your needs. Enjoy reading try out the dishes and send me your feedback. Aprons on! 

Olehleh

Plain olehleh with spicy sauce

Gizzard stew and Plantain

Chicken Gizzard and Plantain. An NCC speciality

Akara

Akara and spicy garnished sauce.

Tasty Fish fritters that would make your tongue smile.

Fish Balls

Fishy Fishy Fish balls

Kibbeh with red pepper olive garnish

Okra Soup “Wait Okra and FooFoo"

Okra and foofoo

Hello NCC readers! Hope your weekend was fab! Another “Satiday foofoo post” In Sierra Leone Saturday is foofoo day. Most households will make this dish to have for lunch on Saturday and then on Sunday morning before heading to their church service. In today’s post I opted for okra soup. Okra can be cooked with or without palm oil, blended onions, scotch peppers, ogiri (fermented sesame seed paste) assorted meat of your choice and smoked fish. For a foofoo dish, I prefer without palm oil and I usually have the palm oil version with rice.

Foofoo is made from cassava and is one of my favorite African dishes. It is made from fermented cassava that is later on, cooked and molded into a dough-like consistency ball.

Hope you get to try this dish. Aprons on!

Ingredients

Ingredients

2 dozen fresh okra

1 packet of Foofoo

3 medium sized onions

3 scotch peppers or enough to your tolerance

1  packs of ogiri

Assorted meat (pig foot, oxtail, smoked broiler chicken)

Smoked fish

Maggie season

Salt

Cooking Instructions

Serving for 4

Chopped Okra

Okra Soup

1.            Wash and chop okra into small chunks and put aside.

2.            Bring your meats to boil for about an hour or as soft as you want it to be.

Boiling pot with blended ogiri

3.            Meanwhile blend onions and scotch pepper with ogiri and dry shrimps. This should look like a thick paste.

4.            Add the above mixture to the boiled meat and add 2 pints of water then leave the pot to boil for 30 minutes or until you have a thick soup consistency.

5.            Add 1 maggie cube seasoning and two pinches of salt to taste.

6.            Add the Okra and let the pot boil for about 10 minutes to allow the okra to cook. Leave the pot open whilst it boils until the okra is cooked.

7.            Finally add smoked fish and turn the heat low and let the pot cook for a further 5 minutes and the sauce is ready for serving. 

Foo Foo

1.              Add water to foofoo paste and mix with hand into a thick runny consistency.

Sieving foofoo 

2.              Sieve the foofoo to remove chaff.

3.              Leave this to settle for about an hour or a day before if time permits

4.              Strain off the surplus water and bring foo foo to cook on a low heat.

5.              Keep mixing the foo foo until it thickens into a hard dough

6.              Add about a handful of water to the pot. Cover and leave the dough to cook by steam.

Voila! Dish is done!  

Finished dish

Okra Soup

“Granat Soup” (Peanut Butter Soup)

“Granat Soup” with steamed Rice (Peanut Butter Soup)

Hello NCC readers! Peanut Butter Soup, I like to call this my lazy dish. It is my quick easy guilty pleasure dish. It can be prepared as a sauce/stew or a soup. In today’s post I prepared it as a soup which goes well with steamed rice. The difference is with the stew/sauce the ingredients have to be slightly fried whilst with the soup the cooking method is mainly boiling from start to finish. I used smoked broiler chicken, turkey neck, oxtail and snapper fish to compliment the sweet flavour of the peanut butter however; any meat or fish of your liking can be used. 

As with most of my dishes, this dish is perfect as main course for lunch or dinner. I hope you enjoy reading and hopefully try out the recipe. Aprons on!!!

Ingredients

Ingredients 

1. Jar of smooth Peanut butter (4 table spoon scoops)
2. Half smoked broiler chicken
3. ½ kg turkey neck
4. ½ kg oxtail
5. Two fresh snapper
6. 3 medium size onions
7. 2 Red bell peppers
8. 2 scotch peppers
9. Spring onions
10. Fresh thyme
11. Seasoning (black pepper, all purpose, garlic powder, mixed dry herbs and maggie cube)
12. 1 tinned chopped tomato
13. Tomato puree 

Serving for 4

 

Cooking Instructions

Granat Soup (Peanut Butter Soup)

 

1.      Cut all your meats into sizeable pieces of your choice then, wash thoroughly.

2.      Do the same with the snapper and season with fish seasoning.

3.      Bring the meats to boil with 1 liter water for 20 minutes.

4.      Chop onions, bell peppers and spring onions. Add to the pot of boiling meats 

Vegetables boiling away

5.      Blend one onion with 2 scotch peppers. Also add this to the pot with the chopped tomato.

6.      Scoop 4 table spoonful of peanut butter into 200ml water. Mixed this to loosen the paste to make into a liquid like consistency then add this to the boiling pot of vegetables.

Peanut butter paste mixture

7.      Add seasoning, maggie cube, a pinch of salt for flavour, about 4 stems of fresh thyme and tea spoon full of tomato puree to give the soup colour. Mix the pot and taste to the soup. Add more seasoning if you need to.

8.      Leave soup to boil for a further 20 minutes.

9.      Finally, turn the heat low then add the fish and let the soup cook for a further 10 minutes in slow cooking.

A taste of West Africa

Voila! Dish is done!  

Delicious Dish