Recipe of the Day, Week No. 50: (Ndole and mashed-wrapped boiled cassava)"

Steem greetings to all the amazing chefs in this community and welcome to my blog as I share my recipe for the day. I hope you all find pleasure in reading through.

My recipe for the day is mashed-wrapped boiled cassava accompanied by a vegetable soup called “ndole”.

Ingredients Used

• Washed Bitterleaves
• Groundnuts
• Crayfish
• Meat
• cooked cow skin
• Onion
• Garlic
• White pepper
• Vegetable oil
• Seasoning cube
• Salt
• Cassava

Step to Cook the Meal

This meal requires patience, resilience and strength to keep you through. That said, below are the steps to cook this meal.

The first step is to cut your bitter leaves into smaller slices and washed using bicarbonate. The bicarbonate will help to maintain the greenness of the bitter leaves. You boil about 3 litres of water (all depending on the quantity of bitter leaves to be washed), while the water is boiling, add the sliced bitter leaves and add 2 spoons of bicarbonate. Do not add too much bicarbonate else the bitter leaves will be too soft and not good for the ndole. Continue stirring it till you get the desired softness of the bitter leave. Drained it into a colander and continued washing it with cold water to ensure the bitter taste disappeared. Once the bitter taste is no more, then the bitter leave is ready to cook the ndole.

^{Washed bitter leave}

Take your groundnuts, soaked in water for about 5 minutes, drain them, dry them using sunlight and then peel off the peelings. Boil the peeled groundnuts for about 4 minutes, wash them with cold water and slice some onions to blend the groundnuts. The onion gives a good flavour to the soup.

^{Washed groundnuts with sliced onions ready to be blended.}

Wash your meat and cow skin to boil at normal heat for about 30 minutes. It all depends on the kind of meat and how you want your meat well-cooked. For me, my kids do not like eating meat but I still use it to cook because the meat gives an extra taste to the meal.

^{Boiled meat and cow skin}

Once the meat is ready, add in your blended groundnuts and allow to boil for about 15 minutes. The groundnuts need to be well cooked otherwise, it will not be friendly to the stomach. Once the groundnuts are well cooked, add in our grind garlic, and white pepper and if you are a lover of hot chilli, you add in some hot chilli. Then add in the washed bitter leave and stir to get a good blend with the other ingredients. Go ahead and add in your seasoning cube, crayfish and salt to taste.

Allow the ndole to cook for about 10 minutes and you slice your onions and pour on top of the ndole. You might also want to fry the sliced onions before pouring in into the ndole, however, I love to put the onions on and then heat oil and pour on top. It gives a unique taste to the ndole.

^{My ndole is ready.}

For the mashed-cooked cassava, you have to first peel the cassava, wash it well and allow it in water overnight. The next day, remove it from the water and drain it well. Grind it and it becomes a paste, wash your banana leaves put in the paste and wrap. Use a tiny rope to tie the mashed cassava in the leaves so that the leaves will not be separated from the cassava. Boiled it at normal heat for about 45 minutes and it is ready to be consumed.

For me, I do not have the energy to cook the mashed cassava. Here we have women who cook it and sell it in the market. So, I bought the already-cooked mashed cassava. Remove it from the leaves and serve on a plate. Add your ndole beside it and your meal is ready.

^{Served Mashed-cooked cassava with ndole.}

The recipe takes a lot of time and energy to prepare it. I will invite @rafk, @etette and @suboohi to join in the contest.