• Cooking time: 120 minutes
• Portion: 1 persons

Ingredients:

• Assorted namaa (lamb chops, goat meat and cow leg)
• Assorted offal’s (saki, fuku, heart and kidney)
• Two pieces of scotch bonnet/habanero pepper
• Two pieces of tomatoes
• One-half cups of arborio/paella rice (for the tuwo shinkafa)
• One small sized pumpkin
• One piece of smoked fish
• 100g of sorrel leaves
• One bunch of spinach (spinach and sorrel leaves 2:1)
• One cooking spoon of palm oil (optional)
• One piece of red bell pepper
• One onion
• Half cup of raw groundnut (you can substitute with groundnut paste)
• White cup of locust beans seasoning cube
• Salt to taste

Life belongs to the living, and he who lives must be prepared for changes.

– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Energy value

• calories 240kcal
• proteins 70g
• fats 4.5g
• carbohydrates 10.5g

Pre-processing

1. To speed up the cooking process, do all your prepping before you start cooking.
2. Cut the pumpkin into half, then proceed to cut into chunks.
3. Peel the hard-outer layer, take out the seeds and the hairy pulp.
4. You may be able to use canned or tinned pumpkin puree, as long as it is organic. 100% pumpkin with no sugar, salt or flavouring added.
5. If you are using pumping paste or puree, add it to the pot after the meats have cooked.

Preparation

• For the miyan taushe:

1. Boil and season the pumpkin with the assorted meats and smoked fish.
2. Take out the meats and fry slightly (optional), meanwhile mash the cooked pumpkin to a pulp in the pot containing the beef stock.
3. You can choose to mash all the pumpkin chunks to a pulp or mash some whilst leaving the others in tiny bite-sized pieces.
4. Once this is done, set aside.
5. Roast the groundnut with the skin on for Three minutes in a pan. Peel the skin off, and then blend in a mill till the groundnut forms a paste. However, you can use already roasted and peeled groundnut or shop-bought 100% groundnut paste.
6. Blend the ingredients for the pepper (tomatoes, onion, scotch bonnet/habanero pepper & bell pepper) and boil reduce it till most of the water content has evaporated.
7. Put the fried meat back into the pot containing beef stock and mashed pumpkin, let it cook till the stock starts to bubble up.
8. Lower the heat, add the groundnut paste, stir and let it also dissolve.
9. You need to lower the heat to prevent the stock from thickening too fast and burning.
10. The groundnut paste will take roughly three minutes to dissolve thoroughly and you will notice that the stock has thickened and taken on an orange colour.
11. Add the beans and One-half cooking spoons of the reduced pepper, and palm.
12. Stir and let it combine with the stock.
13. After a few minutes, the contents of the pot should look like this.
14. Simmering nicely, you should be able to taste the groundnut and notice the difference the pepper and the beans make to the flavour profile in terms of aroma and taste.
15. This rich pumpkin soup will be watery at first. Let it sit on the heat further on low heat till it thickens, thereby intensifying the flavour.
16. Taste for salt and seasoning cube and readjust if necessary.
17. Wash and chop the spinach, then add to the pot.
18. Stir and let it cook for a minute or two to wilt, while it combines with the soup.
19. Spinach is like a garnish to Miyan Taushe. However, the quantity to be used should not be such that the soup will resemble vegetable soup.
20. Therefore, you need the spinach to float around in scattered pieces.
21. Rinse the sorrel leaves, chop and add to the soup.
22. The sorrel leaves truly make this dish. Sorrel has a souring, tangy taste to it which is distinct. In a few minutes after you add it to the soup, you will taste the effect.
23. If the soup is too thick for your preference, add a little water or beef stock and you are done. The vegetables should still be bright green, contrasting nicely with the orange of the soup, so don’t cook for too long.

• For the tuwo shinkafa:

1. Wash the rice with cold water, add to a pan, cover with water and cook on medium heat.
2. If you have not cooked with this rice before, I recommend that you add just enough water to cover the pot and monitor closely.
3. Medium heat because you don’t want the rice to burn.
4. The first stage of the cooking process, the water will be absorbed by the rice, stir and add more water, again just about enough to cover the rice.
5. Let it cook until it becomes soggy.
6. Try to mash the rice with the spoon and it should flatten easily.
7. If it does not do not even bother trying to force it or you will become frustrated.
8. Just add more water and repeat the process until the rice grains melt against the pot with little effort and it becomes starchy and sticky.
9. Once you have the result that you want, lower the heat to prevent burning and proceed to fold the rice just as you would when making Semovita, Amala or Fufu but this time mashing with a wooden spoon in the process.
10. Make sure the heat is on low.
11. You may need to add some more water at some point and leave to steam. This will make the job of mashing much easier. Just don’t drown it with water.
12. Keep mashing and stirring until you have a starchy rice pulp.
13. Tuwo Shinkafa is not meant to be as smooth as Semovita or Poundo yam, for example, so don’t beat yourself up about it. You are not cooking with flour. It is meant to be slightly lumpy and grainy.
14. Serve in medium-sized balls either by rolling in your hands or using a thin cellophane sheet.