Actually this stew has a lot of options in it and it isn’t ayamase at all. This is just a general stew that is enjoyed over couscous, quinoa, fonio, any type of rice, rice dishes like coconut rice and beans, boiled yam, cassava, potatoes, cocoyam, boli which is a whole plantain that has been roasted or grilled or boiled.
The optionals for this dish are 1 handful of ugba, 2 chicken eggs or 6 quail eggs hard boiled, 1 piece of soaked smoked dried fish, 1 pinch of boni bonga fish powder, 2 smoked dried shrimps crumbled or 3 dried anchovies, This can be used either with or without 1 pinch of crayfish.
There are choices of protien like 1 kg or 1 lb of goat’s or lamb’s feet, oxtails, smoked turkey, 1 cow’s tongue or 6 lamb’s or goat’s tongues, tripe that has been cleaned and rinsed in a vinegar and water solution 1 Capfull of white vinegar to 1 quart or 1 liter of water and keep changing the water until it no longer smells bad. The boiled tounges has to have the hard skin removed and when done it comes off easily. It is 4 cups of water in the pressure cooker and cooked for 25 minutes, if it is still hard then repeat.
Any type of fish, mince of turkey, goat, chicken, beef or veal, can be used as loose or open or made in to meatballs, If making meatballs add 1 handful of oatmeal and 1 egg for a binding agent, mix and shape in to meatballs and set aside. 1 can of corned beef or canned fish, 1 package of zabiha halal sausages can be used too. Clean livers and kidneys by removing the membraines and cutting around the kidney for removing the cortex. Fill large bowl with water and add 2 handfuls of kosher salt for cleaning. Rinse about 5 or 6 times after it sat in the fridge for 1/2 hour.
Drain the bloody water a few more times and add 1 cap full of white vinegar and rinse 5 more times or until water turns clear. Shrimp and crab can be used as well. One of any color bell pepper can be used for the stew base along with 1 onion or shallot or 4 green onions, 1 scotch bonnet or habenero deseeded if you are not using a pinch of either red chili powder or African yellow chili powder, in a blender in 1/4 cup of water or you can take 1 bag of baby carrots and 2 cups of water and boil until soft then puree and use as a stew base.
For frying fish, kidneys, liver, mince and making meatballs, 1 cow’s lamb’s or goat’s hearts chopped, 1 can of corned beef or 1 package of sausage add 3 tbs of corn, canola or peanut oil to fry, The rest you can use the same amount of red palm oil. This is for making the stew base itself.
Here is the other stuff used as seasoning and they are 1 tbs of soup thickener of choice and that includes achi, 3 dashes of maggi or knorr aroma, 1 bullion cube, 1 pinch of dawadawa or Curry Powder, 1 pinch of sentleaf, utazi, uziza leaves, ugu or moringa leaves,
In morter and pestle is the main part it is 1 bullion cube, 1 pinch of uziza seeds, crayfish, along with a pinch of thyme, 8 cloves of garlic chopped. If you are going to use the oven for the tongues instead of the pressure cooker it is 400F or 200C for 30 minutes and then repeat until it is done. The rest are all done on stovetop.
I am going to further explain what I did so you can get the picture and not be confused. Hopefully you can take it from here so here we go. In a pressure cooker I added the tripe, water garlic, curry powder, the contents of mortar and pestle, maggi or knorr aroma, uziza leaves, moringa leaves, red chili powder, thyme then I cooked it then added the palm oil to a regular pot and let it get hot and poured the pepper mix puree in to the pot and cooked it in to a stew base and then put the contents of the pressure cooker in to the stew base and reduced it by cooking it for 20 minutes then adding soup thickener of choice at the end my choice for today was ukpor. There is also uso and as i mentioned achi and another one it is like a seed you got to grind. This one is native to Cameroon I think the others are from Nigeria.
If using crab boil it first in 1 cup of water and the protiens of choice you have to fry cook these first then add the stew base on top of it then add the spices and 1 pinch of pink salt. Then again sorry for jumping all over the place.
This goes down nicely with any non alcoholic brew of choice. If paired with moin moin or ekuru even better.
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