Therefore my dear Ghana food lovers and other readers, I'll keep you starving for a while. I hope you will make it through. Here something to chew on while I'm gone...
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Lunch break
I'll be offline for the next 6 days. Hubby and I are finally going somewhere together. Tomorrow after work we travel to Sarpsborg, to visit my aunt and uncle. From there we go to Oslo, Norway's capital, to visit friends and family, AND to celebrate Norway's Constitution Day (cause we celebrate when we got our constitution, not our independence, which, weirdly enough, came after the constitution). More on that later. But that day is a very big deal in Norwegian circles. So celebrating it in Oslo will be cool. I hope I'll catch a glimpse of the king!
Therefore my dear Ghana food lovers and other readers, I'll keep you starving for a while. I hope you will make it through. Here something to chew on while I'm gone...
Therefore my dear Ghana food lovers and other readers, I'll keep you starving for a while. I hope you will make it through. Here something to chew on while I'm gone...
Saturday, May 8, 2010
The Sunday Classic
A chop bar that used to be my go to place, was a little wooden shed in Adum, Kumasi. It was hidden through som narrow streets, close to the bus station. Me and my fellow exchange student found it on one of our many times spent together in Kumasi town. An old cute lady was making groundnut soup, fufu, banku, rice balls, rice and stew.. We came in our school uniforms one day, sat on the benches inside and said in our purest twi what we wanted. And it was the BEST banku and groundnut soup I have ever tasted. We came back often. Today, it is crazy to think that these days really happened in my life. Being in Norway now, living such a normal, Norwegian life, thinking back to a time when I walked around in Kumasi in a school uniform, speaking Twi, eating in chop bars is almost unreal... I was such a Ghanaian, although I wasn't. It's 10 years ago.
This was the intro. This post is supposed to be about one of my favorite Ghanaian meals.
Nkateenwan and emotuo, or in plain English:
Groundnut/peanut soup and rice balls.
It is so yummy. I have made a photo montage to show how it's made and with what. This is a Ghanaian meal I have perfected! In fact, my husband said that my groundnut soup tastes better than his mother's! Can you get a greater compliment from a man?
How to make it... :
Take some meat (I prefer chicken), steam it with onions and garlic and ginger, after a while, and groundnut paste (peanutbutter or blended peanuts, if you can't get the real thing), cook this together for a while so the chicken takes in the peanut taste. After a while, add water, tomato, tomato paste, pepper, salt.. Cook, taste, add more salt, cook, taste, add more pepper.. cook, cook, cook. Boil rice with extra water for extra long, use a big stick to stir it HARD, mash the rice...into a dough of rice. Shape balls out of the rice. Put the soup in a plate, put the rice ball in the soup, eat with your hands, ENJOY!!
Thanks to Hubby's excellent cooking skills, we enjoy groundnut soup and rice balls in Norway anytime we want. And it tastes almost as good as in Ghana. Highly recommended Ghanaian dish!
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Ghana's WORST eat
The first period I lived in Ghana, I was an exchange student in High School. I was 18, lived in a Ghanaian family for a year. Alone. Gosh, it was scary. And wonderful.
One of my greatest challenges in the Boamah family was the food. First of all, I was always served my food alone. There was a plastic table outside my room, and my hostmom always came with my dinner on a plate, she knocked my door, I opened, she said "Your food!", dumped the plate on the table and left me to eat alone.
For a Norwegian this goes against everything I've learned. Here, eating dinner together is a social institution. That's one of the few arenas the family meets during a hectic day, where everyone sit down to eat, and TALK, together.
Appearantly, we did it differently in Atimatim, Kumasi, Ghana. I felt so lonely and abandoned eating alone at this table. Luckily I had lots of "siblings", little kids who I asked to join me at the table with their food. If the older siblings or parents saw them eat at my table, they wanted to chase them away, but I assured them I wanted them there. The kids were also free enough to talk to me while they were eating. In Ghana, at least according to Hubby, when you eat, you dont talk. Cause your mouth is busy chewing!
Of course, I realized my family didn't hate me, and therefore placed me alone. They did it out of respect and caring and all nice things, thinking that the best they could do for me was to let me eat in peace. While I just wanted to eat with someone. They all ate by themselves, in different locations around the house. Sometimes I took my food with me to my host brother's room and ate with him. My mother was so harsh and short with her words because she didn't speak much English and was shy of me. I learned Twi, I learned the culture, I learned that the Boamah family was gonna be my family nr. 2, and Mrs. B was really a mother to me.
This post became long. And the title doesn't correlate with the text. Until NOW.
The point was, I was served my food outside my room. The food was often delicious. Sometimes it was the opposite. For my Norwegian taste buds, anyway. The worst I can get in Ghana is something I like to refer to as Crushed Fish Stew, and boiled plaintain on the side. I dont know where to start. Ghanaians love their fish, and the bones within it. Why? It makes it so uncomfortable to eat when your mouth is full of tiny bones! Sometimes the fish is served whole so you can pick the meat from the bones. But when my mama served Crushed Fish Stew, it was fish, in the sauce, crushed into pieces, together with the delicious bones, together with green leafes (I think spinach), and it tasted...fish with bones. My food was always one plate, and that was the food we had that night. It's not like I could go to the fridge and make myself a sandwich. So most times I tried to force it in me. If Crushed Fish Stew is served with boiled plaintain in addition, you can count me out. I probably sound like a spoilt brat. But I'm not. I just can't teach my mouth to like it. Never. Ever.
So, sometimes it was a good thing to eat in solitude. At least no one would know I didn't finish my dinner.
Seriously, guys, what IS it with the bones?
pic. Me and my mother no. 2
One of my greatest challenges in the Boamah family was the food. First of all, I was always served my food alone. There was a plastic table outside my room, and my hostmom always came with my dinner on a plate, she knocked my door, I opened, she said "Your food!", dumped the plate on the table and left me to eat alone.
For a Norwegian this goes against everything I've learned. Here, eating dinner together is a social institution. That's one of the few arenas the family meets during a hectic day, where everyone sit down to eat, and TALK, together.
Appearantly, we did it differently in Atimatim, Kumasi, Ghana. I felt so lonely and abandoned eating alone at this table. Luckily I had lots of "siblings", little kids who I asked to join me at the table with their food. If the older siblings or parents saw them eat at my table, they wanted to chase them away, but I assured them I wanted them there. The kids were also free enough to talk to me while they were eating. In Ghana, at least according to Hubby, when you eat, you dont talk. Cause your mouth is busy chewing!
Of course, I realized my family didn't hate me, and therefore placed me alone. They did it out of respect and caring and all nice things, thinking that the best they could do for me was to let me eat in peace. While I just wanted to eat with someone. They all ate by themselves, in different locations around the house. Sometimes I took my food with me to my host brother's room and ate with him. My mother was so harsh and short with her words because she didn't speak much English and was shy of me. I learned Twi, I learned the culture, I learned that the Boamah family was gonna be my family nr. 2, and Mrs. B was really a mother to me. This post became long. And the title doesn't correlate with the text. Until NOW.
The point was, I was served my food outside my room. The food was often delicious. Sometimes it was the opposite. For my Norwegian taste buds, anyway. The worst I can get in Ghana is something I like to refer to as Crushed Fish Stew, and boiled plaintain on the side. I dont know where to start. Ghanaians love their fish, and the bones within it. Why? It makes it so uncomfortable to eat when your mouth is full of tiny bones! Sometimes the fish is served whole so you can pick the meat from the bones. But when my mama served Crushed Fish Stew, it was fish, in the sauce, crushed into pieces, together with the delicious bones, together with green leafes (I think spinach), and it tasted...fish with bones. My food was always one plate, and that was the food we had that night. It's not like I could go to the fridge and make myself a sandwich. So most times I tried to force it in me. If Crushed Fish Stew is served with boiled plaintain in addition, you can count me out. I probably sound like a spoilt brat. But I'm not. I just can't teach my mouth to like it. Never. Ever.
So, sometimes it was a good thing to eat in solitude. At least no one would know I didn't finish my dinner.
Seriously, guys, what IS it with the bones?
pic. Me and my mother no. 2
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Que...bab!
In Europe we think of shredded meat from a big roll of meat being cooked in a street kitchen, served in pita bread with garlic sauce, jalapeños and salad. In Norway, a traditional after-closing-hours-on-Saturday-night-meal, and very important for hungover days as well. In e.g. Germany Döner Kebab has almost become the national dish.
But hey, kebab isn't shredded meat in a bread, now, is it?
Oh, no, the real kebab is meat on a stick!
In Ghana this means chunks of BEEF, chicken, or sliced giant sausages, grilled and drenched in pepper, served in news paper wrappings by a nice guy at the street corner, often referred to as Lambert, or the kebab guy.
The kebab guys where I have stayed in Ghana, have been lovely life savers, super friendly guys, one called LAMBert which we found quite hilarious, the go-to guys if we had a party, or just wanted to enjoy these delicious, hot lollipops of meat. I miss kebab! Or the feeling we had in Community 1 when we lived in a room with a mattress and no money to waste, but decided to buy kebab and coke one night, just to enjoy it. Or when we, in Community 2, desperately needed to spice up our good old rice and stew with some extra meat and bought kebab, carefully removing the pieces from the sticks and put them in our bowl. Always making sure we had an equal number of meat pieces each. I'm getting hungry as I write...
Me and Hubby had a nice division of labor when we had a kebab night. I usually felt shy of going out at night to the kebab stand, cos it is usually placed next to a bar, with lots of people, looking at the obroni all of a sudden emerging from the dark to buy kebab. My job was therefore to go to the nearest shop to buy drinks. In the shop the people knew me, cos I would always come there for other things during the days. Hubby went to do the man job, buy the kebab and hanging around outside the bar. Worked like a charm, but many times Hubby mysteriously ended up doing both tasks. Don't ask me how that happened.
But, I have bought kebab myself. Just so you know it.
I have got to find a way to make kebab the way it is made in Ghana. Should be easy enought, some meat, some sticks, a grill, and red pepper that we have straight from Ghana. But my experience is that no matter how similar the ingredients are, the food we make never really get the true taste of Ghana.
And in Ghana, the kebab guy is never far away...
Pic. 1: Kebab lying on its wrapping paper, ready to be chopped (eaten). The red powder to the left is red pepper. Dip it, if you dare!
Pic. 2: Me, with a cold beer and lovely kebabs in front of me.
Pic. 3: Our room in Comm. 1, with the famous mattress. You'd feel like eating kebab too, if you were to be in this room, right?
But hey, kebab isn't shredded meat in a bread, now, is it?
Oh, no, the real kebab is meat on a stick!
In Ghana this means chunks of BEEF, chicken, or sliced giant sausages, grilled and drenched in pepper, served in news paper wrappings by a nice guy at the street corner, often referred to as Lambert, or the kebab guy.The kebab guys where I have stayed in Ghana, have been lovely life savers, super friendly guys, one called LAMBert which we found quite hilarious, the go-to guys if we had a party, or just wanted to enjoy these delicious, hot lollipops of meat. I miss kebab! Or the feeling we had in Community 1 when we lived in a room with a mattress and no money to waste, but decided to buy kebab and coke one night, just to enjoy it. Or when we, in Community 2, desperately needed to spice up our good old rice and stew with some extra meat and bought kebab, carefully removing the pieces from the sticks and put them in our bowl. Always making sure we had an equal number of meat pieces each. I'm getting hungry as I write...
Me and Hubby had a nice division of labor when we had a kebab night. I usually felt shy of going out at night to the kebab stand, cos it is usually placed next to a bar, with lots of people, looking at the obroni all of a sudden emerging from the dark to buy kebab. My job was therefore to go to the nearest shop to buy drinks. In the shop the people knew me, cos I would always come there for other things during the days. Hubby went to do the man job, buy the kebab and hanging around outside the bar. Worked like a charm, but many times Hubby mysteriously ended up doing both tasks. Don't ask me how that happened.
But, I have bought kebab myself. Just so you know it.
I have got to find a way to make kebab the way it is made in Ghana. Should be easy enought, some meat, some sticks, a grill, and red pepper that we have straight from Ghana. But my experience is that no matter how similar the ingredients are, the food we make never really get the true taste of Ghana.And in Ghana, the kebab guy is never far away...
Pic. 1: Kebab lying on its wrapping paper, ready to be chopped (eaten). The red powder to the left is red pepper. Dip it, if you dare!
Pic. 2: Me, with a cold beer and lovely kebabs in front of me.
Pic. 3: Our room in Comm. 1, with the famous mattress. You'd feel like eating kebab too, if you were to be in this room, right?
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Rice and Stew Very Plenty
Today we are gonna enjoy a nice dinner. Something like waakye. The way you can make it in Norway, in Levanger, at least. Hubby is preparing a nice stew, with boiled eggs, and totally free of wele.
Waakye is rice and red beans cooked together. Hubby tells me that waakye is a word in Hausa, meaning beans. But it has become the name for the mix of rice and beans, served with stew, shito, meat, fish, vegetables, pasta, gari. Back in Community 2, where we lived when I stayed in Ghana, waakye was Sunday food.
We woke up at 6 to go to the 6.30am Mass. At 8.30 we closed, and Hubby often went out to buy waakye, FULL of pepper usually, and the good times - fried COW meat. Mmmmm. We put all the food in a bowl, and ate it together with Ghanaian gospel booming in the background, and our neighbors making noise as usual. Yum.
Of course, considering the contents, it's a heavy meal. Like most Ghanaian meals. And, as tradition, every Sunday, a few hours later, fufu waited in my in-law's house. Sunday in Community 2 is eating day.
<-- Waakye, Norway style
Today we enjoyed our waakye, celebrating that Hubby has survived a whole year in this country so different from his homeland. Tomorrow it will be exactly a year since I drove the looong way to the airport, shaking, so nervous to go pick him up at the airport, in NORWAY. It was unreal. Now having him here seems like the most natural thing in the world. We should have celebrated tomorrow, but I am (hopefully) travelling to Norway's smallest city, with 2 good friends, to visit good friend number 3 from African Studies. Will be FUN!
Have a smashing May 1st weekend!
We woke up at 6 to go to the 6.30am Mass. At 8.30 we closed, and Hubby often went out to buy waakye, FULL of pepper usually, and the good times - fried COW meat. Mmmmm. We put all the food in a bowl, and ate it together with Ghanaian gospel booming in the background, and our neighbors making noise as usual. Yum.
Of course, considering the contents, it's a heavy meal. Like most Ghanaian meals. And, as tradition, every Sunday, a few hours later, fufu waited in my in-law's house. Sunday in Community 2 is eating day.
<-- Waakye, Norway style
Today we enjoyed our waakye, celebrating that Hubby has survived a whole year in this country so different from his homeland. Tomorrow it will be exactly a year since I drove the looong way to the airport, shaking, so nervous to go pick him up at the airport, in NORWAY. It was unreal. Now having him here seems like the most natural thing in the world. We should have celebrated tomorrow, but I am (hopefully) travelling to Norway's smallest city, with 2 good friends, to visit good friend number 3 from African Studies. Will be FUN!
Have a smashing May 1st weekend!
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
I just love my cow skin well cooked
Ok, I do dig my own grave alot of times. Like when I ask my readers to suggest blog projects, as I did in the post below. This time a loyal reader, and lovely blogger, Nana Yaw, suggested I'd blog about Ghanaian food. For a whole week! Awurade, boa me.
Let's see what I can do. I can't let Nana Yaw down.
Ghanaian food no. 1.
Wele. That is, in English words, cow hide (skin).
Mmm. Yummy. Or?
I have never seen the joy of eating cow hide. But Ghanaians, they just love this curled, chewy thing. I had to do some research beyond my own head for this, and found much information on GhanaWeb. A whole article actually.
"Some “Wele” are hard and others soft, however it is a common delicacy in almost every meal-particularly cooked rice, “wakye”, ground-nut and palm nut soup."
Soft? Hard? Chewy is more like it.
“Lots of Ghanaians consume “Wele” because they see it as fun when chewing it"
Oh, how fun to chew on a piece of skin that you can never bite through. Mmm. Ok, so I'm not wele's best friend.
Here is worst case scenario for me, and wele. I am in Ghana, someone has gone to buy rice, or waakye for me from a street vender. Waakye is rice and beans cooked together, will go further into it's phenomenon on a later stage. Back to the meal awaiting. I have asked the buyer to get some MEAT with the food, not fish. When you buy rice or waakye or something from the street in Ghana, there is always several protein sources to choose from. You get your rice, your sauce, and then pick: an egg, fried fish, fried meat, salad, pasta, beans, gari (one day...), and..... WELE. I would ask for fried meat. I get my food in a bag, opens, put in a plate, digs out the meat and... OH NOOOO! The highlight of the meal is the meat. Imagine my disappointment when I find WELE. A curled up, chewy, light brown, hairy?, piece of cow skin. You can't chew it a) because it's chewy b) because the thought of what it is is ewwwie..
I say: "But... I asked for meat."
Ghanaian friend/husband etc: "It is meat. It is wele!" Followed by a big grin, and watery teeth, looking at the wele in my plate.
An alternative answer could be: They didn't have meat.
And you think WELE is a good subsitute? You might as well give me a plate full of lizard tails. (Maybe that's good?)
Don't get me wrong, I'm not judging Ghanaians for enjoying their wele, hell no, I am in awe of their ability to enjoy the WHOLE part of every animal, how they find fish bones as good as the fish itself, chicken bones, WELE etc. It's just me. And the texture of the food, more than the taste. I eat animal skin. Our Norwegian traditional Christmas dinner is all about getting the skin of the pork crispy. But that's the keyword. Crispy. Not chewy.
That's it. All I can say about wele. Appearently, according to GhanaWeb, it's cancerous cos of the way it's being processed. Finally I have a better excuse not to like this lovely delicacy.
Picture and info borrowed from GhanaWeb.
Let's see what I can do. I can't let Nana Yaw down.
Ghanaian food no. 1.
Mmm. Yummy. Or?
I have never seen the joy of eating cow hide. But Ghanaians, they just love this curled, chewy thing. I had to do some research beyond my own head for this, and found much information on GhanaWeb. A whole article actually.
"Some “Wele” are hard and others soft, however it is a common delicacy in almost every meal-particularly cooked rice, “wakye”, ground-nut and palm nut soup."
Soft? Hard? Chewy is more like it.
“Lots of Ghanaians consume “Wele” because they see it as fun when chewing it"
Oh, how fun to chew on a piece of skin that you can never bite through. Mmm. Ok, so I'm not wele's best friend.
Here is worst case scenario for me, and wele. I am in Ghana, someone has gone to buy rice, or waakye for me from a street vender. Waakye is rice and beans cooked together, will go further into it's phenomenon on a later stage. Back to the meal awaiting. I have asked the buyer to get some MEAT with the food, not fish. When you buy rice or waakye or something from the street in Ghana, there is always several protein sources to choose from. You get your rice, your sauce, and then pick: an egg, fried fish, fried meat, salad, pasta, beans, gari (one day...), and..... WELE. I would ask for fried meat. I get my food in a bag, opens, put in a plate, digs out the meat and... OH NOOOO! The highlight of the meal is the meat. Imagine my disappointment when I find WELE. A curled up, chewy, light brown, hairy?, piece of cow skin. You can't chew it a) because it's chewy b) because the thought of what it is is ewwwie..
I say: "But... I asked for meat."
Ghanaian friend/husband etc: "It is meat. It is wele!" Followed by a big grin, and watery teeth, looking at the wele in my plate.
An alternative answer could be: They didn't have meat.
And you think WELE is a good subsitute? You might as well give me a plate full of lizard tails. (Maybe that's good?)
Don't get me wrong, I'm not judging Ghanaians for enjoying their wele, hell no, I am in awe of their ability to enjoy the WHOLE part of every animal, how they find fish bones as good as the fish itself, chicken bones, WELE etc. It's just me. And the texture of the food, more than the taste. I eat animal skin. Our Norwegian traditional Christmas dinner is all about getting the skin of the pork crispy. But that's the keyword. Crispy. Not chewy.
That's it. All I can say about wele. Appearently, according to GhanaWeb, it's cancerous cos of the way it's being processed. Finally I have a better excuse not to like this lovely delicacy.
Picture and info borrowed from GhanaWeb.
Monday, April 26, 2010
dream big
Write, write, write.
I don't understand why a person who dreams of being a journalist or creative writer, can't think of topics to blog on? I want I want I want to do a journalism course. But maybe I should be an author instead. How fun won't it be to write a book? Hmm. What would it be about? Biography? I am such a famous person, people would just storm to the stores to buy my story, right? Even if it was so, I have such a bad memory, I wouldn't remember all the things that has happened in my life.
I'm 27 soon. I want to have a dream to follow, yet at the same time a steady income. Oh, fellow blogger, NY, inspire me to write! I have stories in my head, but they don't come through my fingers. Yet.
Challenge for bloggers. What book would YOU like to read? What should it be about? Give me a topic. Maybe it can be my new blog project. Who knows. I need something to excite me. Life is getting to normal!
I don't understand why a person who dreams of being a journalist or creative writer, can't think of topics to blog on? I want I want I want to do a journalism course. But maybe I should be an author instead. How fun won't it be to write a book? Hmm. What would it be about? Biography? I am such a famous person, people would just storm to the stores to buy my story, right? Even if it was so, I have such a bad memory, I wouldn't remember all the things that has happened in my life.
I'm 27 soon. I want to have a dream to follow, yet at the same time a steady income. Oh, fellow blogger, NY, inspire me to write! I have stories in my head, but they don't come through my fingers. Yet.Challenge for bloggers. What book would YOU like to read? What should it be about? Give me a topic. Maybe it can be my new blog project. Who knows. I need something to excite me. Life is getting to normal!
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