BAKED YAM AND CHEESE- YAM DISH 2- "5 THINGS TO DO WITH YAM TUBERS"

As a Nigerian, i was brought up and programmed to have  yam with sauces, eggs,stews or oil(yup... red oil) and i never found it filling enough for the hungry worms in my belly, but Baked yam and cheese is one of the most filling meals i have ever made and it is one i recommend for people entertaining Europeans or non Nigerians (meals for your Caucasian visitors that will make them feel in touch with our roots...hehe...see what i did there?...roots...yam..lol...). It is delicious, fast, straight forward and i guarantee you that it will be a hit among your dinner guests no matter which part of the continent they are from.. Enough of the chatting, lets get cooking.

INGREDIENTS(SERVES 10)

One yam tuber

2 table spoons of sugar

1teaspoon of salt

Onions (cut in rings)

Grated Parmesan Cheese
2 chopped up chilies

PROCESS

Cut yam tuber into thin rounds but do not  peel the skin off and wash under cold water. Drizzle yur salt and sugar on both sides of the yam. Pre heat your oven at 180°C- 200°C  , lightly grease your tray with butter and Place the pre boiled yams on the baking tray. Place the tray into the pre-heated oven and leave for 20 minutes. Check if the yam is soft by pressing a fork into the sides of one of the rounds(it should easily get mashed). Once you are satisfied that your yams are soft, drizzle your cheese all over the yams and place back in the oven for a further 5 minutes and serve, Thank me later.
For non cheese lovers like my friends, serve the baked yam with salsa, vegetables and shredded cod like i have done in the picture above.

"YAM PORRIDGE" MEAL 1 - 5 THINGSTO DO WITH YAM TUBERS

Yam porridge is extremely delicious, super filling, and exotic looking if done properly (at least my way). There is not much to explain about this dish because i'm not one of those writers who dwells on food history and stuff like that. I thought myself how to cook this dish, and not to brag or anything of that sort, i got it right the first time and so will you. Lets get cooking.



AYSUGGEST'S you have Yam porridge

With fish masala stew

Ayamase Stew

With Toasted bread

With boiled plantain and Red stew

With Beans

INGREDIENTS(Serves 5)

One yam tuber (peeled and cur into ice cube sized chunks)

2.5 spoons table spoons of sugar

1 teaspoon of salt

3 Beef stock cubes

7 red chilies

3 fresh tomatoes

1 big red sweet pepper

1 big onion

4 Table spoons of palm oil

3 table spoons of cray fish

1 deboned dried fish (shawa)

2 Cups of water




METHOD

Blend the chilies, peppers, tomato and onion and half a cup of water together, till smooth. Rinse the peeled/cut yam with cold water and place in a non stick pan with the cups of water, sugar, salt and allow the combination to boil for 10 minutes. 

Pour the blended pepper over the boiling yam and Add the stock cubes,palm oil, cray fish and dried fish, stir in all the condiments properly before covering the yam for another 15 minutes. 

Take the lid off the pan and reduce the heat to the lowest and carefully mash some of the yams( about 6 visible yam cubes), so that the liquid can start to thicken, 

Cover the pan and let it boil for a further 10 minutes and then repeat the mashing process (be careful as you want to have enough yam chunks left in there). The combination should start burning once the paste is thick enough. Stir it slowly and then leave for another 2 minutes before you Turn off the heat and serve with any of the AYSUGGEST'S or like i have done here with FISH MASALA. Please pardon the quality of the picture.

AY'S vegetarian stew- DISH 5- "5 spicy stews"

This is one of those dishes i discovered by accident. I say by accident because i love meat and fish on a crazy level and frankly speaking i look forward to the end of my meal, just so i can start eating whatever animal was plated for me.
As Africans our parents made sure we ate all our carbs or main dishes before we tasted our meat. It was considered disrespectful in some places if you ate your meat first...like really? The idea behind the "no eating your meat tradition", was that we kids never finish our food if we ate our meat first....But really...like wtb (that means what the bullocks)... it means we wont come out obese, like ...that behavior should be encouraged ...Eat meat and go to sleep...lol...

Anyway, enough of my rants and back to this tasty veggie stew. Like i was saying, i discovered this when i wanted something different and non meaty to go with my cous cous, and i tell you what.....i didn't miss my meat and fish for a second.
Don't take my word for it, lets get cooking..

AYSUGGEST'S you have this stew
With rice
As a sauce for cous cous
With Bread
With Quinoa
With any type of Pasta


INGREDIENTS (Serves 5)
4 Sweet Green peppers
4 Sweet red peppers
6 green chilies
1 onion
4 diced Irish potatoes
2 non flavored bullion cubes
half a teaspoon of salt to taste
Chopped onions (1 small onion should do)
Chopped carrots (As much as you like)
Chopped spinach leaved (about 2 handfuls)
2 Tablespoons of olive oil

PROCESS

Clean your peppers and onion and add to a food processor. Add one cup of water to the peppers and blend until fine.
Get a pan and heat up 2 spoons of olive oil, and add your diced onions and carrots. Let the onions and carrots fry in the oil for bout 1 minute, and then pour in your blended pepper. Cover up the pan and let it boil/fry for 15 minutes. Take the lid off  and add your chopped spinach, your diced carrots, the bullion cubes(crush it in), and the salt. Stir it all into the pepper properly and then cover the pan and let it boil for a further 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and let the stew sit for 10 minutes and then serve with any of the AYSUGGEST'S and thank me later.

AY'S Sardine fish stew- DISH 4- "5 spicy stews"

This sauce is very special to me. It might sound very sad if i explain why, but i will give you a summary... just because i love the story.

Okay, you know being young and overly eager to help mum in the kitchen,...well..yeah i was one of those kids. My mum will do a special fish sauce for our Sunday boiled yam dish  and my sisters and I will  literally be gathered around the table before the food even got ready.

However the only way my mum thought i could be of any help, was to make me the official deboner of the fish. I was not too pleased with this. So i came up with this grand plan when i grew up and was allowed to cook. I promised to surprise her with a much simpler, tastier and less tasking fish sauce. This was when i discovered that sardines were pretty much boneless, equally as tasty and less tasking. So i made my 1st sardine stew, and i must say (she will probably kill me for this...my mum that is) my fish sauce surpassed hers, by a frigging mile...and till this day, this is like the ying to my yang of all yam sauces..

I love this sauce so much it hurts me to share. Anyhoo enough of my over dramatics( is that a word?) Lets get cooking.



AYSUGGEST'S you have my sardine sauce

With boiled yam (my best recommendation)

Boiled potatoes

On toasted bread

With mashed sweet potato

With fried yam chips




INGREDIENTS( serves 8)
7 Canned sardines in vegetable oil

3 fresh tomatoes

6 red scotch bonnets

1 Big red sweet pepper

1 onion (for blending)

1 chopped onion

1 table spoon of tomato puree

3 Table spoons of oil (olive or vegetable)

2 stock cubes (any flavor, trust me it does not really matter what flavor the stock cube is)


PROCESS

Separate sardines from the oil after opening all the cans. Mash up the sardine with a fork, but do not over mash( you want to leave some chunky sized fish..well no reason why...but hey that's how i do it).


Blend your fresh peppers,scotch bonnets, onion and tomato with a quarter cup of water(you want the sauce to be thick), ensure it is not blended to a smooth paste.

Heat up your oil in a pan and add the oil from the sardine cans. Once the oil is reasonably hot, add your chopped onion and tomato paste and stir for about 3 minutes . Add your blended pepper to the pan and let it fry for 15 minutes. Add your stock cubes and stir before you finally add your mashed up sardines. Let it cook for a further 5 minutes and turn off the heat. Serve with any of my AYSUGGEST'S and thank me later.

AY'S Nigerian fish masala stew - DISH 3- "5 spicy stews"

Masala Stew is a very popular  dish among Malaysians and Indians. I believe we all have different palettes, so i have created my very special recipe that can and will compete with the originals if you follow my method thoroughly. Do not take my word for it, lets get cooking.

AYSUGGEST'S you have fish masala 
With boiled potatoes
With Rice
As a curry for chips
With Jolada Rotti
As a sauce for sweet potato mash
As  a topping with yam or sweet potato porridge.



INGRIDIENTS (Serves 5)
10 Fresh Croaker fish (or any fish of your choice)
1 teaspoon of salt
2 Cups of coconut Milk
1 and a half teaspoon of corn flour dissolved in 2 table spoons of room temperature water
4 table spoons of masala powder
1 teaspoon of turmeric powder
1 chopped onion
3 chopped red sweet peppers
5 chopped scotch bonnets
2 big carrots(chopped up into cubes)
Chopped garlic
1 teaspoon of Powdered ginger
3 Teaspoons of curry
Half a teaspoon of cumin seeds
10 table spoons of vegetable oil
2 fish stock cubes (or any stock cube if you cannot find fish flavored , the fresh fish will over power the flavor)



PROCESS
Clean your fish properly and glaze the fresh fish with salt and set aside for 1 hour.
Heap up the oil in a wok and add cumin seeds until they expand and start to pop.
Add your chopped up onions, sweet peppers and scotch bonnets and allow them to fry for 5 minutes. Add your masala powder, turmeric, curry, chopped garlic, carrots and ginger to the vegetables and stir.
 Leave to cook for another 5 minutes. Place your fish strategically in the pan, by separating the vegetables, making sure your fish touches the bottom of the pan. Once all the fish is in, pour your coconut milk over the fish, reduce the heat, and allow the combination to cook for 10 minutes.  

Add your dissolved corn flour to the mix by poring it in slowly and stirring as you pour. Let the stew cook for 2 more minutes and then turn off the heat. Serve as i have done below, with one fried fish, masala fish, rice and boiled potatoes. Thank me later

Yoruba Traditional chicken and beef stew - DISH 2- "5 spicy stews"

This is stew most Nigerians like me grew up with. We have stews with all our rice dishes, swallows and in some cases, beans dishes. It is very straight forward and tasty as long as one does not over power it with too much seasoning.

Anyhoo....lets get cooking.


AYSUGGEST'S you have stew with anything. Yes...Literally anything. Well apart from cereals, if you get my gist.


INGREDIENTS (Feeds 5)

FOR THE MEATS

20 Beef cubes(cut into thumb size shaves)

10 chicken drumsticks

2 teaspoons of salt (we want the broth to be a bit salty)

2 stock cubes

1 large onion (Chopped up)


FOR THE SAUCE

12 Scotch bonnets (red)

5 Big red sweet peppers

2 large onions for blending

5 Large fresh tomato

1 chopped onion

2 table spoons of tomato puree

7 table spoons of vegetable oil

1 stock cube


PROCESS
FOR THE MEATS: Wash your meats with water thoroughly and place in a pan with the chopped onions, salt and stock cubes. Add one cup of water and boil the meats and chicken for 20 minutes. Take out the chicken and let the beef continue boiling for further 10 minutes.Drain the left over water into another bowl and set aside as we will be using it later.

Put your oil in a frying pan, let it heat up and fry the meats in the oil. Once the chicken and beef browns from frying, take them out from the oil and set aside.


FOR THE STEW: Place the scotch bonnets, sweet peppers, onions, tomato and one cup of water into a blender, and blend until smooth. Transfer the blend into a pan and boil for 15 minutes (to dry out excess water)

Take the oil used for frying the meats, add 7 spoons of the oil into a pan and heat up for 2 minutes. Add your chopped onions and tomato paste into the oil, stir and fry the onion and paste for 2 minutes, and then pour in your boiled pepper. Let the stew cook for 15 minutes and then add the stock cube and half a cup of the beef/chicken stock.

Let the stew cook for a further 5 minutes, then add the meats and stir it in. Let the stew cook for a further 10 minutes and then turn off the heat.



Allow the stew to sit for about 30 minutes and serve. (Please do not use salt for the stewing process, it has a way of over powering stews).

Serve with anything and thank me later.

AYAMASE "NAIJALONDON style" (green chilli stew) - DISH 1- "5 spicy stews"

Stews are quite important to my fellow Africans and our culture, but all African countries do it differently. Most people confuse stews and soups and rightly so because stews are quite similar to soups, However stews are much thicker and require longer cooking over low heat, unlike soups which are watery and require less cooking time.


My first stew is something Nigerians call Ofada stew ,purely because it is popularly accompanied with our brown rice which we call ofada rice. In England however, it is popularly called Ayamase, which is essentially a mesh of little bits of meats in spicy pepper. Ofada and Ayamase are very similar in taste and method, but they have different recipes.


I will show you how to do both versions, but let us start with AYAMASE

Okay... lets get cooking...


AYSUGGEST'S you have this stew

As a topping with white rice

With mashed up beans

With any swallow (e.g. pounded yam or cooked cassava flakes)

As a sauce for boiled yam

As a sauce for bread


INGRIDIENTS( serves 10)

FOR THE PROTEIN (you can add or take away meats from this recipe if you are not comfortable with all)

Beef cubes(cut into thumb size shaves)

Boneless chicken (cut into thumb like shapes)

Goat meat(cut into little pieces)

Tripe (cow intestine)

Ponmo( cow skin)

Cleaned Snails ( use extra alum to clean if slippery and cut into small pieces)

4 stock cubes

2 teaspoons of salt

1 large onion


FOR THE SAUCE

20 hot green chilies

5 Big green sweet peppers

4 large onions

Iru ( farmented locust beans which needs to be washed once)

A little bit of Barbequed Panla( semi dried roasted cod fish)

4 table spoons of powdered cray fish

20 pieces of dried out prawns (take off the heads)

3 stock cubes

Half a cup of Plam oil (red oil)


METHOD
FOR THE MEATS

Wash all the proteins seperatly and thoroughly. Add the beef and chicken into a pan with 1 cup of water and add 3 stock cubes with one teaspoon of salt to the beef and chicken. Cut 3/4 of the onions into the beef and chicken and bring the mix to boil (for about 25 minutes). Taste the beef as this usually takes longer to soften, and turn off the heat when the beef is soft enough to your taste. Drain the water into a bowl, as we are going to use this tasty water to finish the stew.


Combine the rest of the meats into another pan, add 1 cup of water, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1 stock cube and the left over 1/4 onion to the pan, and boil. Meats like the snail and ponmo usually boil faster than goat meats, so taste them after 20 minutes to make sure they do not over soften. Boil the goat meat until you are satisfied with how soft it is. You can get rid of the water from this combination as the smell is not too pleasing (and remember we still have our chicken and beef water).


Heat up a lot of oil in a pan or use a deep fryer, and fry all the protein to a brown consistency and set aside for the stew.


FOR THE STEW

Combine the chilies, sweet peppers and 3 large onions, stock cubes into a food processor/ blender with one cup of water and blend (do not make the blend too smooth, it gives it a better texture, but it still be tasty if you mistakenly over blend). The blend should be thick enough to go through a small hole strainer, just to get rid of any excess water.

Chop up the last onion and set aside


Heat up your palm oil in a large size pan, until it is extremely hot (usually your house will be filled with smoke unless you have an extractor). Once the oil is extremely hot, the consistency of the oil should change from red to a almost burnt black. Add your chopped onions and immediately throw in the sieved pepper and cover (be very careful as the oil is very hot, you can try spooning in the pepper slowly if you are not comfortable pouring it all in at once).


Let the stew fry for about 15 minutes on low heat, and then add 1 cup of your meat/beef water. and cover again for another 10 minutes.

Add your locust beans, the panla, dried prawns and crayfish to the pepper and stir, then leave for a further 5 minutes before you add all the other meats. Once the meats are added stir it all in and let the stew cook for a further 10 minutes, still on low heat before you turn it off. Allow the stew to cool down for about 15 minutes so that all the ingredients will settle.

Your AYAMASE is ready to be served. Serve with any of the AYSUGGEST'S or as i have done here with my Chinese beef fried rice. Thank me later.

SWEET POTATO ROUGH BALLS - DISH 5- "5 SWEET POTATO DISHES"

Photo cred :setthetablewithlove.wordpress.com

Still on these sweet potatoes, i thought i will end on a high note with another exquisite version of how those left over sweet potatoes of yours can be used. Like the name says, this recipe is simply about how to make sweet balls with your potatoes

Okay lets get cooking.....

AYSUGGESTS you have sweet potato balls

With a nice chutney sauce

Dipped in Sweet and sour sauce

With AYSALSA

With cream cheese

With Mayonnaise and herbs sauce

With a sprinkle of lemon juice and grated cheese

INGREDIENTS

Boiled sweet potato (see previous post for method)

5 tablespoons Bread crumbs

half a teaspoon of chilli flakes

1 egg (beat egg in a bowl)

1 stock cube

PROCESS

Add 1 stock cube to your bread crumbs, to give your coating a nice flavor. Mash up your boiled sweet potatoes until it is almost smooth (lumps will give your balls a better texture). Pour a generous amount of oil in a pan and allow the oil to get very hot(or use a deep fryer).

Grease your palms with butter, and roll your sweet potato into balls. Dip your balls in the egg then take it out and dip in the bread crumbs. Roll all the balls unto a tray and then fry the balls in the already heated oil. 

Place balls into a sieve layered with kitchen towels or any cloth(this will help soak up the oil).

Serve on a plate with any of my AYSUGGESTS and thank me later.