The Nigerian egusi stew and fufu turned out pretty delicious yesterday! The picture definitely doesn’t do the taste justice. I was too excited to try it that I didn’t really care about getting closer or making it look pretty.
The stew is on the right and the fufu is on the left in the picture. The stew was delicious both on its own and with the fufu. Made of egusi (dried and ground seeds of squash, melons, or gourds), bell pepper, tomato, onion, and spinach, plus a handful of spices, this stew is fairly smooth and has such a lovely flavor. It’s not really a flavor I can describe or compare, so you’ll have to make friends with a Nigerian or convince me to type up the recipe at some point and share it on here. I believe normally this stew has some kind of fish in it, but my version was meatless. Kiarra did say I could add vegan fish to it if I wanted but I was never a huge fish fan to begin with so I’m good without it I think. The fufu is made of ground plantains or cassava. You boil some water then add the fufu powder and mix it vigorously until it becomes the consistency of good, homemade playdough. You then flatten out about a quarter sized piece of fufu into a cup or spoon shape and scoop up some of that delicious stew. I really enjoyed the dinner.
We also made vegan mint ravioli cookies using the recipe Shari’s mom used back in December, only veganized. They didn’t turn out nearly as tasty as the non-vegan versions so we’ll have to keep trying. I think they would be better with store bought mint chocolate rather than our homemade version, and we’ll need to find a vegan shortbread recipe as well. Still, they aren’t bad and I’ll probably go eat one as soon as I finish this blog post!
Before I say goodnight, I wanted to share the picture of Elisabeth with her very own snake plant. I took this picture on Saturday but didn’t have room to post it in the previous blog. Look how excited she is to have a live plant that is, hopefully, hard to kill. I have faith in her!
Just Lauren 