Ghanaian recipe
How to make Red red
All of Ghana
A stew of black-eyed beans cooked in red palm oil with onions, tomatoes and pepper, often with tinned mackerel or sardines, and served with fried ripe plantain. The name comes from the red of the palm oil and the orange of the plantain. It can easily be made without fish.
Ingredients
- 250 g dried black-eyed beans, soaked overnight (or two 400 g tins, drained)
- 100 ml red palm oil (or vegetable oil)
- 2 onions, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic and a thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, grated
- Half a scotch bonnet chilli (optional)
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste and 3 ripe tomatoes, chopped
- 1 tin mackerel or sardines (optional)
- 3 ripe plantains, yellow with black spots, and oil for frying
- Salt, and gari to serve (optional)
Method
- Drain the soaked beans, cover with fresh water and boil for 45 to 60 minutes until soft. Keep a cup of the cooking water.
- Warm the palm oil gently in a pan (do not let it smoke) and fry the onions until soft. Add the garlic, ginger and chilli and cook for 2 minutes.
- Stir in the tomato paste, cook for 3 minutes, then add the tomatoes and simmer for 10 minutes into a thick sauce.
- Add the beans, a little of their cooking water and the fish if using. Simmer for 10 minutes, stirring gently, and season with salt.
- Peel the plantains, cut them into diagonal slices and fry them in hot oil until golden on both sides. Drain on paper.
- Serve the beans with the fried plantain, and gari on the side.
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Many people sprinkle gari, dry grains of roasted cassava, over the beans for crunch.
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