My First African Fried Stew

This recipe  came about the other day after I have been hitting the African blogs like crazy. I  really love the food it is yummy and spicy plus these ladies are very gracious and I am so happy I can talk to them in instagram and twitter. This is truly a Nigerian stew with a twist. Anyway  it came out very delicious.  Yay me a German girl  who is married to a Pakistani guy can pull this off. I just want to thank these ladies for posting their recipes so I can learn about how  their food is cooked. I thank Allah for giving me adventurous taste buds.  Also my love for reading has opened up new doors for me for my learning experience. I am never too old to learn and learning is from the cradle to the grave.

Fried stew base ingredients: I think I got this memorized by now. There are a few bloggers that I read this recipe for this stew base and it is very easy to make.

1 red bell pepper

1 habanero  or scotch bonnet seeds removed, Trust me these are very firey.

1 tomato cut in small pieces

2 cloves of garlic

1 shallot or onion chopped

1/4 cup water for ease of processing

2 tbs peanut oil

2 tbs palm oil

1 tbs tomato paste

In my blender I added  1/4 cup water, habanero, sometimes I switch up and use scotch bonnet instead. I also added 1 shallot  or onion, 1 tomato and turned on my blender and blended it. In a small pot I added the 2 tbs peanut oil, 2 tbs palm oil, and the pepper onion or shallot and tomato blend from my blender in to the pot and cooked it until I seen some cracks and I added a 1 tbs of tomato paste and continued to fry for 5 minutes.

For cleaning the kidneys:

2 tsp salt

1 tbs of white vinegar

water for rinsing and cleaning

In this case I made kidneys and I was kind of late getting dinner done oh my and I had to get these cleaned asap. One day I am going to do a video and post it on youtube on how to clean kidneys. this I learned just by watching my grandfather. You take a small knife and  cut pieces of kidney and make sure you don’t cut in to the white part. The white part in the center is just utter rubbish and utter rubbish and inedible so cut carefully around this  white part.  Take the pieces of the kidneys and put them in cold water and take 2 tbs of salt and with your hands swish it around making sure the salt water gets all over the kidneys,  strain with a strainer and put more water in the bowl to soak the kidneys add a little more salt the same amount as the first time for at least an hour in the fridge. Sadly I didn’t have time to do this  because I had just gotten home from  my doctor and it was already running late so I couldn’t soak them like I wanted to so I used the vinegar in the water  and swished the kidneys around and rinsed them twice more. Ok this is  called speedy kidney cleaning and it worked. Now I can cook the kidneys.

For cooking the kidneys: 1 pinch of oregano

1 pinch of basil ,  2 tsp  peanut oil for frying kidneys

I pinch of uziza  seeds in mortar and pestle ground  Oh my God they have a delightful peppery smell I had experienced it.  I have been dragging my husband to the African stores.  There are several here in Chicago and we have a mini UN that lives in my neighborhood and I really love it. 1 bullion cube and 3 dashes of Maggi or knorr aroma.

1 pinch of crayfish.

Method of combining sauce and kidneys:

First I used peanut oil in my wok. I fried the kidneys  til they were done.

I added the other half of onion and cooked it till the rawness went away. I added a pinch of oregano, a pinch of basil, 1 pinch of ukazi seeds I had ground earlier, 1 pinch of crayfish and I stirred.  I added half of the stew base. the other half I can use for another recipe and I had fried it with the kidneys.  So my twist was  the oregano and cool because I am in great company because a lot of these chefs even the ones from Africa are using mixed herbs.

Oh another option is you want to put tripe in here instead of kidneys it is doable.

I talked to the Nigerian lazy chef and others about  how I am introducing my fussy husband in to eating African food.  And there was a couple of other people also Matse from Matsecooks and a few others, many thanks. This is very helpful because I have my misgivings because of the assorted meats is a very tough sell for Riaz who is my hubby by the way and he does make an effort to try stuff.

P.S. Also you can add liver. Same cleaning and cooking method as kidneys also implies. Chicken, lamb, veal, beef, goat, turkey smoked and unsmoked, rabbit, quail, tongue of cow, lamb or goat, fish all precooked ahead of time is doable too.