West African Offal Pepper Soup

This is a classic and very frugal West African dish that's based on a Liberian original but has some Senegalese additions and substitutions... And don't be put off by the offal. You could substitute cubed stewing steak if you wish, but remember that offal is a very high-quality, low cost and low fat protein source. Also to give us meat and animal has died and I'm of the opinion that we should honour that animal by making use of as much of it as possible.

Meat is an expensive rarity in West Africa and just about every part of the beast is utilized for eating. The original recipe calls for ox liver and ox heart but I have substituted the more readily available (and less intensely-flavoured pig liver and lamb hearts. This is also a classic variation on the typical West African chilli-based 'pepper soup' though this version uses a number of native thickeners such as okra and peanut butter to make it a much more substantial meal.

Ingredients

3 lamb hearts, halved, trimmed of sinews and major vessels and thinly sliced
1kg pig livers, cut into thick 4 cm strips
200g green lentils
300g french beans, trimmed and halved
1 large onion (half finely chopped, half roughly chopped)
3 large tomatoes, chopped
handful of dried mussels (a Senegalese speciality)
handful of dried piri-piri chillies
juice of 2 limes
2 Maggi (or sotck) cubes
1 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp ground cumin
4 tbsp red palm oil (or groundnut oil in which paprika has been placed)
salt to taste
200g peanut butter
6 okra, finely sliced
6 garlic cloves, peeled
150g cooked black-eyed beans (optional)

Begin by making your chilli paste. Add the chillies, lime juice and dried mussels to a large pestle and mortar. Allow to seep for about ten minutes then pound to a rough paste. Add the finely-chopped onions and garlic and pound to a paste. Now add the spices and the tomatoes and once again pound to a paste.

Add the red palm oil to a large pan and heat. Use this to fry half of your chilli and onion paste. Cook for a few minutes then add the sliced lamb hearts and fry until coloured all over. Add 1l water and the sliced pig livers and Maggi cubes. Bring to a simmer, cover the pot and cook for 25 minutes. Add the okra, the remaining onion, the green lentils, return to a simmer and cook for 10 minutes. At this stage add the peanut butter and the remaining chilli past.

Bring to a boil and cook briskly for 10 minutes, so that the sauce reduces and thickens. Now add the green beans and the cooked black-eyed beans (if using). Return to a simmer and cook for 15 minutes.

Serve this stew over a bed of rice, or as an accompaniment to West African fufu.

About the Author

Dyfed Lloyd Evans is an inveterate collector of recipes. He is the originator of the Celtnet Recipes site which specializes in ancient recipes and recipes from all over the globe. He has a large section of West African Recipes and his collection of over 800 recipes from each country in Africa has been packaged into an eBook The Recipes of Africa, proceeds from which go to supporting the children of Liberian refugees in Senegal, to help gain them an education and a future.