PlantwisePlus Blog

Recipe courtesy of Hannah Serwaa Numah
Following Claire’s series of posts on ‘making the most of the Plantwise knowledge bank’, I’d now like to introduce our next mini-series, which asks our country partners for their favourite recipes using top crops brought into plant clinics in their countries, so we can share them with you! Our first recipe comes from Hannah Serwaa Numah, who is the National Data Manager for Ghana. She tells us how to cook okro stew and akple, which is a traditional Ghanaian dish made from dried corn flour.

Okro stew

By Aravind Sivaraj (own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons]

• 1 pound of beef
• 1 medium size smoked fish (salmon)
• 2 medium tomatoes
• 1 pound okro (6 pieces for one person)
• 2 large onions (1 for steaming and 1 for stew)
• 2-5 hot peppers
• ½ cup palm oil
• 3 medium sized garden eggs (one for one person)
• spices

Method

1. Cut the meat into appreciable size, wash it and put in a pot
2. Chop one onion, add salt to taste and a little water to the meat and cook until it becomes tender. Add any spices of your choice
3. Wash and blend the pepper and tomatoes together and pour into a bowl to be used later
4. Chop the okro and garden eggs into small sizes
5. Put the chopped okro and garden eggs into a pot, add enough water, put on fire to boil for about 10 minutes
6. Stir (okro and garden eggs) when needed but not continuously in order to keep the okro slimy
7. Heat the palm oil in a pot and add one chopped onion to fry until it becomes soft
8. Add the tomato and pepper puree and allow to cook for 10 minutes
9. While the sauce cooks, wash the smoked salmon and split into pieces to your own taste
10. Add the cooked meat with the salmon to the sauce and allow it to cook for 5 minutes
11. Add the cooked okro and garden eggs to the sauce and allow it to cook, lower the fire and leave it to simmer gently
12. Add salt to taste

You can add crab and any other fish or meat you prefer.
Akple
Ingredients
For this recipe you just need ½ cup dried corn flour, water and salt to taste
Method

1. Put 2 cups of water in a pot and put on fire to boil. Add salt to taste
2. Mix a small portion of the dried corn flour in a porridge form and add to the boiling water
3. Stir continuously in order not to form lumps with a wooden ladle until it begins to boil
4. Pour half of the content into a bowl and leave the rest on fire to boil
5. Add the dried corn flour continuously to the porridge on fire and stir continuously in order not to form lumps until it solidifies. If it becomes too thick, add some of the hot porridge in the bowl and stir continuously (it needs to be in a solid form). Lower the fire and continue to stir

The whole process takes about 25-30 minutes to cook.

By DromoTetteh (own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons]