Angwamu ni toolo beef(Rice w/ oil & salted beef)

Heeyyyy! Look who it is AGAIN!!! Haha! Yes, I am trying to keep my word. Today I wanted to share one of the commonest rice recipes that were around growing up in Ghana. A lot of men who said they didn't know how to cook knew how to make this particular rice because after plain white rice this was the next easiest thing for them to make lol. 

Most people don't use toolo beef(salted beef) but I did because I like the flavor it gives

Ingredients

• 3 cups of rice
• 2 1/2 cups of water
• 3 tablespoons oil  
• 1 chunk of salted beef(depends on how its sold in your local African market -OPTIONAL )
• 1 medium onion
• 1 tablespoon salt(that is IF you don't use the beef)

Method: 

1. Chop the onion into small chunks, if using the salted beef wash and cut that too in little chunks
2. In a cooking pot, over medium heat, add in the oil and fry the beef until it's well done, add in the chopped onion stir 
3. Once the onion becomes fragrant, add in the rice, stir until it's well coated with the oil then pour in your water
4. Cover with foil and cook rice until it's soft to touch

PS: Depending on the kind of rice you use, you may need more or less water than what is suggested in this recipe. Use your judgment when it comes to that.

The ingredients minus the water

How my rice looked once it was ready

Another angle of the rice

Chicken Stew

Hello there, I am back again; I am just as surprised as you are LOL!! Today's recipe is very simple and easy to make. Growing up in Ghana this was the next best thing after jollof(to me), I haven't had chicken stew in God knows when so today I decided to make some for my mom and I. I like to use LIVE chicken when I find some but in this recipe I used the regular chicken from the grocery stores(rolls eyes)........ NOW Let's dive right into it shall we?

Video -Fried Chicken Stew


Ingredients: 

• 1lb of chicken(chopped)
• 5 fresh tomatoes
• 2 and half onions
• 1 whole ginger
• 2 pieces of fresh garlic
• 2 scotch bonnet pepper(Jamaican hot pepper)
• 1 tablespoon curry powder
• 2 tablespoons seasoning salt
• 1 tablespoon red pepper
• 1 onga or knorr cube
• 1 green bell pepper(optional)
• 1 small tin/can of tomato paste
• 2 carrots(optional)
• 2 tablespoons oil
• Oil for frying

To season the chicken:

• 1-2 tablespoons seasoning salt
• 1 tablespoon red pepper
• 1 teaspoon parsley flakes
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes(optional)
• 1 teaspoon black pepper

Method:

1. Clean the chicken, remove the skin(optional to the skin lovers), wash the chicken very well.(I always soak my chicken in some water and vinegar and then wash it again)
2. Season chicken with spices in a medium sauce pan, on medium heat, steam the chicken until its no longer pink. 
3. In a frying pan or deep fryer, fry the chicken until its golden brown, then set aside
4. Blend the tomatoes, 2 onions, ginger, scotch bonnet peppers and garlic. Slice the remaining half of the onion and in a medium/large sauce pan add the 2 tablespoons of oil. Add in the sliced onions and stir for about a minute. 
5. Add in the blended ingredients with the tomato paste and allow the stew to cook for about 20-30mins(you can add 1 tablespoon of seasoning salt, some parsley and half of the onga or knorr cube at this step, I do that so everything cooks with it & after I add in the chicken I then add in the remaining spices to adjust the taste)
6. Chop the green pepper and carrots in medium sizes, check on the stew and once it looks almost ready(look at the picture below or in the video) add in the fried chicken, adjust spices to your taste and let it simmer for awhile
7. Add in the chopped green pepper and carrots and the chicken stew is ready to be enjoyed with some white rice, yellow rice, spag rice, boiled yam or anything of your choice. 

Ingredients: to the right is the spices to season the chicken(which is in the pot), the fresh ingredients is in the blender the sliced onion on the chopping board and the chopped green pepper and carrots in the bowl

Seasoning the chicken

Chicken all seasoned and ready to be steamed

After steaming the chicken: frying it

Blended ingredients with tomato paste, seasoning salt, parsley flakes and half of onga cube

After stew looks almost done, add in fried chicken

Adding in the green pepper and carrots

All done and ready to be enjoyed!!

Served with yellow rice and kelewele

Peppered Gizzards

So this recipe has been a long time coming, I keep procrastinating and I apologize for that. I made these at one of my at home dinners and they quickly became a hit. PS: this is a VERY spicy dish so if you can't tolerate spicy meals, I beg this is not for you. Haha. Well I hope you like it when you try it. 

• 2 trays of gizzards(that's how they were sold when I got them, about 1/2 a pound)
• 2-3 scotch bonnet peppers(depends on how spicy you want it)
• 1/2 ginger
• 2 garlic
• 1/2 onion 
• 1 teaspoon powdered red pepper(depends on your spicy tolerance)
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1 tablespoon seasoning salt 
• 1 teaspoon black pepper 
• 1 tablespoon oil 
• Oil for frying 

1) Wash the gizzards well, steam(precook) it, then add all powdered spices with the exception of red pepper flakes .....allow it to steam for awhile 

2) Heat up some oil on medium heat and deep fry the gizzards until it's dark brown

3)While gizzards are frying, blend ginger,onion, scotch bonnet peppers and garlic with 1 small cube of knorr and 1 teaspoon of seasoning salt

4)In a small sauce pan, add the tablespoon of oil and the blended spices and stir until the sauce almost thickens up, add in the fried gizzards and red pepper flakes and stir it all together until all the gizzards is coated in the sauce. 

5) Serve as an appetizer, side dish or whatever is preferred, everytime I made this there were people consuming alcohol so it worked for them 

Before adding more spices for steaming

After adding seasoning, stir and let it steam some more

Ready for frying 

I used a whole onion because I had a lot of gizzards to coat

Blended and ready to coat the gizzards.

All ready/ 

Shito (Black pepper)

Shito is basically the main thing most people eat with their fried yams, the banku, kenkey, fried rice and my uncle even eats it with his chinese food lol. So I will say for some of us it is mandatory to have at home. Some of these ingredients are hard to come by in the States but if you know of anyone coming from Ghana you can always ask for some.

• This recipe is for a small quantity of shito. You can increase the quantity of ingredients for a bigger portion of shito.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups of oil
•  1/2- 1 cups of powdered red pepper(or more depending on how spicy you want it)
• 1/2 cup of fish powder
• 1/2 cup of shrimp powder
• 3 medium sized onions
• 1/4 cup of ginger
• 1 jalapeno pepper
• 1 tablespoon of tomato paste
• 1 tablespoon of seasoning salt(I use lawry's as always)
• 2 Maggi or Onga shrimp cubes

Method:

1. Blend the onions, pepper and ginger, in a medium sized pot pour in the oil and heat it up then pour in the blended ingredients, stir for awhile and let it cook for about 5 -10mins, add in tomato paste and let it cook for a while about 15-20mins
2. Add in your dried ingredients, if the oil is disappearing from the shito you can feel free to add more to it.Add your seasoning salt and maggie or onga cubes
3.  Keep stirring and when it turns dark brown it means your shito is almost ready(yayy!) Reduce the heat on the shito and allow it to simmer for awhile(when the oil rises to the top it means your shito is DONE!!!







Onions, garlic, ginger, onga cube and jalapeno pepper






Oil, powdered red pepper and tomato paste



Powdered shrimps

The blended ingredients "frying" in the oil before adding the powdered ingredients + tomato paste

Powdered fish

Process of making the shito, as you can see there is barely oil in the picture in the left

Shito all ready and done to be given away to the family :-)

Shito served with fried rice, grilled chicken, fried plantain and salad

Served with fried yam,fried plantain,fried egg,fish and sardine

Tsofi/Chofi(Turkey tails)

Let me start off by saying if you aren't ready to do some serious cleaning on this meat then please just buy it from the African markets or restaurants  lol because this recipe calls for a lot of major cleaning and pulling lol. The end result is delicious but the process is just draining lol. So here we go. 

Ingredients 

• 1 lb turkey tails
• 1 tablespoon seasoning salt
• 1-2 tablespoons red powdered pepper(depending on how spicy you want it)
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 tablespoon ginger powder
• 1 teaspoon onion powder(optional)
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• Oil for frying

Method:

1. Make sure you wash the turkey tails very well, removing all sight of dirt, also removing any straw/hairy like things you might find in them(these really need to come out before anything else) and as much fat off as you can(I say this because there's a lot of fat on this part of the turkey)
2. After you are done washing it well, season with the all the spices and refrigerate for about an hour or 2 or even overnight(if you are not in a rush to make it) 
3. In a medium saucepan, pour in enough oil that will be used for deep frying the turkey tails. On medium heat, heat up the oil and fry till its golden brown.
4. After you are done frying you can enjoy it as it is with some fried yams or you can sprinkle some kebab powder on it(if you have some at hand)

This is how the turkey tail looks before cleaning and cutting into the little tiny pieces. As you can tell it needs a lot of cleaning

Seasoned over night

Top left was plain fried turkey tails, bottom left is when the kebab powder was added, the right pictures a special sauce was added to it. 

Light soup(Pepper soup)

Where the fufu lovers at? This is one soup that MOST people eat with their fufu. Mostly served with goat meat but can be made with chicken as well(but not the overly processed one that's usually too soft and tends to break in the soup so the "live" chicken is the best for light soup). But today's one I will be using goat meat.

Ingredients:

• 2lbs goat
• 3 onions
• 4 tomatoes
• 2 scotch bonnet pepper or Jamaican hot pepper(or more,your preference)
• 1/2 jalapeño pepper 
• Ginger
• Half a clove of garlic
• Dried fish(that's if you have any available,it's optional)
• Spices to taste

You can add 1 tablespoon of tomato paste but it's optional not everyone uses tomato paste in their light soup. I was told some use it because of the bright color it gives the soup I usually don't....depends on who I am cooking for. 

Method:

1. Wash goat meat,remove any visible fat,in a big sauce pan, season with pepper,seasoning salt,and your choice of spices. On medium heat, steam goat meat for about 10-15mins or till it's no longer red/pink
2. While meat is steaming,blend the onions,tomatoes,pepper,ginger and garlic. When meat is done steaming pour in the blended ingredients on, adding about 2-3 cups(or more) of water(you are making soup not stew so it shouldn't be thick at all) I usually add a small can of tomato sauce to it if I have it at home
3. When the soup has boiled for a while, season it with your choice of spices and allow it to cook for 10-15mins. Prepare your fufu and enjoy lol. 

Ps: Will update with more pictures as time goes on. Thank you. Enjoy

1. Seasoned goat meat 2.Steamed goat meat 3.Ingredients to be blended 4. blended ingredients
5.Blended ingredients added to the steamed goat meat 6. Water that was added 

When I talk about dried fish from the african market this is what I am referring to

Plantain chips

I love plantain chips no it's very serious, everytime someone is coming from Ghana I ask for plantain chips lol so the craving got real and I decided to do it myself. It's not like they sell in Ghana but it's pretty darn close lol!

Ingredients:

• 2 green or yellow plantain(depending on what you prefer)
• 1 tablespoon salt (less if you don't want it overly salty)
• Oil for frying 

Method 

1. Peel and wash plantains. Cut into very thin slices the shape is your choice but make sure you cut it as thin as possible(that gives you the crunchy-ness of plantain chips). You can also use a potato peeler to slice the plantain into thin slices. 
2. I soaked mine in salt water for 15 mins before frying(you can choose to skip this part and just add salt after frying), heat up oil on medium heat and fry until its golden yellow.(see pictures for guidance)..

Stages

Theedee's yummy plantain chips :-D

I used a potato peeler to achieve this style plantain chips

Ghanaian Pancake

As I was going through my blog stats, I saw that someone was searching for the recipe for this. Then I asked myself, how did we make pancakes in Ghana when we didn't have Auntie Jemima. Since I couldn't remember very well I went straight to my mom and asked,she wasn't so sure either,its been a while so pardon us lol but we finally figured it out!! So here we have it. They remind me slightly of crepes because of how thin they are lol.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of flour
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• 2-3 tablespoons of sugar or more(depending on how sweet you want it)
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 teaspoon of salt
• 1/3 teaspoon of nutmeg
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 cup evaporated milk
• 1 teaspoon of oil for frying(I use coconut oil for everything now but vegetable or canola oil will do too)

Method:

1. In a bowl, melt the butter(you can melt it in the microwave), then beat in the eggs, add half a cup of water, add in the flour and mix very well till there are little to no lumps in the mixture. 
2. Add in the sugar, milk, salt and the remaining half cup of water, continue mixing till its very smooth with minimal lumps(Some people like to blend their mixture so it can have a very smoother consistency, but that's extra work for me so I just mix by hand)
3. On medium heat , add the teaspoon of oil to a small frying pan, when the oil is hot, pour some of the batter in, tilt the pan in a way that the batter fills up the whole pan(see pictures), fry till there are bubbles on the top(see picture)
4. Using a spatula turn the pancake and allow that to also fry till its golden brown.

Step 1.1

Step 1.2

Step 2

Step 3

Step 4

Lets Eat!!!..Hehe

Hello & Welcome

Hi,

Mac n Cheese,Corn,Fried Chicken and Mashed Potatoes (Summer 2009)

Welcome to Theedee's cuisine, thank you for taking your time out to check out my blog. I started this blog after some friends of mine tried some of my dishes and recipes and enjoyed it. Some people kept asking on Facebook if I had a blog so I figured,it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. I'm NOT a chef, I just enjoy cooking and also coming from a family that loves food and cooking. I guess it was only natural that I enjoyed cooking as well. I hope you find some of my favorite dishes easy to understand and also to make. I added some pictures of dishes I have cooked at home for our breakfast, lunch, dinner and also for a couple of special friends. Pardon the quality of some of these pictures. :-) If you see any dish and would like a recipe, just let me know via email. Ps: The best way to become a GOOD cook is to tweak the recipe with your best judgement. :-)

Curry shrimp,salad,scones,meat pie,grilled chicken,fried rice,jollof,corn and mac n cheese. I didn't make the cake unfortunately. lol

French toast,scrambled veggie eggs, turkey and pork bacon,fruits,hotdogs & pancakes (Summer, 2007)

Waakye,Jollof,Potato salad,Beef sauce,Turkey(made by my aunt),Lo mein,African salad (Thanksgiving,2012 .Part 1)

Corn,Garlic bread,Cranberry sauce,Fried & Grilled fish,Banku,Beef sauce,Coleslaw,Shito (Thanksgiving,2012. Part 2) 

Chicken wings,Beef Skewers,Corn and Shrimp (Summer 2011)

Ot),Kelewele,African salad,Jollof,Lo mein,Tsofi,Grilled chicken and Biscuits (Mom's birthday 2012)

Fried rice, jollof,grilled chicken with khebab powder,kelewele,meat pie and cupcakes with strawberry frosting(Summer 2011)

Fried yam,fried plantain,tsofi(turkey tail)with khebab powder,shito,red pepper and sardine(Summer,2012)

Rice n peas,curry goat,steamed veggies and fried plantain(Summer 2012)