Prepare this affordable Nigerian 🇳🇬 palm oil, local jollof rice with me. Super delicious and very easy to prepare. You'll definitely love it!

This Nigerian local jollof rice is one of the tastiest meals in the world. It’s a food that reminds us of our roots and identities. Join me as I introduce our unique local jollof rice. Cook with me.

Ingredients we would need : 

▪︎ 3 cups of rice (preferably de-stoned local Nigerian rice)

▪︎ I/2 kilo of beef 

▪︎ 4  large pieces of dried fish

▪︎ 1 medium-sized oil bean lump

▪︎ 2 sizeable onions

▪︎ 6 sizeable fresh tomatoes

▪︎ 4 sizeable red chilli peppers 

▪︎ 1 cup of Nigerian red oil 

▪︎ 4 seasoning bullion cubes

▪︎ Salt for taste

▪︎ Crayfish

▪︎ 8 -10 sizeable scent leaves (you can substitute with spinach if you can’t access scent leaves)

▪︎ Water. 

Recipe:

▪︎ Measure out the rice in a clean bowl and wash thoroughly ( up to 4 times) to get rid of any dirt attached to the rice.

▪︎ In a clean pot , pour in the washed rice and add water to the level slightly above the level of the rice in the pot.

▪︎ Light up the fire source and keep the pot of rice on the fire. We will parboil for 7 minutes. We wouldn’t want to rice to get soft and soggy.

▪︎ Time to prepare the vegetables, wash the onions (one to be blended, the other to be sliced) tomatoes and pepper thoroughly, peel off the onion back, remove the pepper pedicel (the stem that looks like a stick) and tomatoes sepals (the green flower attached to the tomatoes).

▪︎ In a neat blender, blend the prepared vegetables ( 1 onion,  peppers, and tomatoes) and keep aside.

▪︎ Keep water on the fire to boil, wash the dried fish up to three (3)  times to get rid of possible dirt, then keep in a plate while you wait for the water to boil and when it’s boiled, soak the washed dried fish in hot water, making sure the water covers the fish. Cover the plate and allow the fish to soften.

▪︎ Cut the beef into sizeable cuts, wash thoroughly with salt to get rid of all the blood and germs, and in a neat pot, add half of the blended vegetables to the meat, add 2 seasoning cubes, salt then  stir and cover to marinate for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, start cooking until it’s very soft and chewy.

▪︎ Don’t forget you’re parboiling the rice, check if it’s 7 minutes already, put off the fire source and carefully bring down the pot of the rice, gently place your sieve in the sink and sieve out the water from the rice and immediately replace with cold water, while making sure the cold water is highly above the rice. This will help in the washing of the rice while making every possible stone to move down to the bottom of the pot, to be discarded.

Follow this detailed method in washing your rice if they contain tiny stones. This will make it possible to get rid of all the stones without it interfering with your food. 

If you’re using rice free of stones, they this part isn’t for you. Carefully move to the next step.

- Add enough water to the sieved rice, make sure the water covers the rice so well, use a smaller sieve as shown below, start shopping out the rice little by little from the water, scoop and pour into another bowl by the side, don’t rush it if you don’t want to pack in all the stones.

- Scoop little rice, pour into another bowl, repeat this process gently while making sure the pot is sitting at a particular point, don’t move it around, this is to avoid getting the stones to be mixed up with the rice. 

- You will notice some stones settled at the bottom of the pot, make sure to extract as much rice as possible from the water before throwing away the stones; don’t discard your rice with the stones, that’s why you need to be a bit patient and do it without rushing.

Let's continue.....

▪︎ In a mortar, pound the oil bean and thoroughly sorted and washed crayfish, then pound together, making sure the oil bean is thoroughly pounded to avoid having it’s lumps in the food. You can add a pinch of salt while pounding would help it to disintegrate easily.

▪︎ Slice the remaining onion in a medium size; it's not too tiny and too big, either. 

▪︎ chop the scent leaves after washing thoroughly with salt and rinse with clean water.

▪︎ In a clean pot, enough to cook the meal. Add red oil and allow to heat up to 3 minutes. Do not bleach, please.

▪︎ Add the sliced onions and stir for 3 seconds, add the blended vegetables then stir for another 5 minutes allowing the tomatoes mixtures to dry up in the oil; this might take up to another 10 minutes, keep stirring to prevent it from getting burnt.

▪︎ When the tomatoes is properly dried up in the oil, add half of your chopped scent leaves and keep the other half, then stir a bit while adding your pounded oil bean and crayfish, followed by the beef and softened dried fish, stir for a bit , add the proteins stock (water used in cooking the beef and water used in socking the fish) check if the water is enough to cook the rice till it’s done, if it’s not, add a little water to measure up. 

▪︎ Taste for salt before adding more salt and seasoning cubes.

▪︎ Cover and allow the content of the pot to come to a boil. When it’s boiled, pour in the rice, stir, and cover tightly to cook.

▪︎ After 10 minutes, uncover to check the rice, and when it’s soft and cooked, sprinkle the other remaining chopped scent  leaves, cover, and allow to heat for 2 minutes. Turn off the fire source and turn the rice thoroughly to allow the sprinkled scent leaves to get to all the corners of the rice.

Food is ready, dish and enjoy with any healthy drink of your choice.

Follow this blog for more updates on tasty Nigerian meals.

Like, share and comment!