Colophon Café, a local eatery, serves African Peanut Soup. It’s very tasty, and I’d like to try making my own. I found this recipe and it looks like what Colophon Café’s tastes like. Only, Colophon Café doesn’t mention sweet potatoes and it does mention ginger. Neither recipe contains rice (at least I don’t remember any rice in the soup at the café), which is an ingredient in other recipes I found before I found Legasse’s.
Questions:
What kind of peanut butter should be used? I like Skippy because I like the sweetness. But I wonder if a ‘natural’ brand that contains no sugar might be better, with the sweetness coming from the potatoes.
Should I add ginger? Grated? Or sliced and removed after cooking?
Heh. I’ve just noticed that Colophon sells a cookbook, which includes the peanut soup recipe. Since I like their soup, I should get the cookbook and use the recipe there.
But I’m still curious about what kind of peanut butter to use.
My recipe for Chicken, Peanut & Yam Stew. This is some seriously good stuff. You can certainly use chunky peanut butter. I’m also partial to Skippy:
2 pounds chicken meat, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 tsp salt
1 15 oz. can whole tomatoes in juice
¼ cup water
2 TBSP tomato paste
¼ cup peanut oil
1 medium onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced and mashed into paste with 1 tsp salt
1-1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
½ cup smooth peanut butter at room temperature
1-3/4 cups reduced sodium chicken broth
1 lb sweet potato or yam, cut into 1 inch chunks
Sprinkle chicken with salt and let stand for 30 minutes.
Pulse tomatoes with juices in a food processor until finely chopped.
Stir water into tomato paste in a small bowl until smooth.
Pat chicken dry. Heat oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high until hot, then brown chicken. Remove from pan. Pour off excess oil, leaving about 2 TBSP, then add onion and cook over medium heat until lightly golden, about 2-3 minutes. Add the chicken, tomatoes, tomato paste mixture, garlic paste and cayenne to pan (or use a pot, if needed).
Whisk together peanut butter and one cup broth in a bowl until smooth, then add to chicken along with remaining ¾ cup broth, stirring to combine well. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, covered, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking, about 30 minutes. Add yam chunks and simmer until tender, about 10-12 minutes. Serve over rice, if desired.
The first time I make it, I’ll use the ground turkey.
The first time I had the soup I was with friends who had read about the café in a travel book, and who wanted to try the peanut soup. Unfortunately for them, they’re vegetarians. So if I’m successful making the carcass version, I’ll make another batch without corpse so I can share it with them.
We made a veggie version for our meatless friends; they pronounced it good. It might benefit by punching up with curry. This is a common dish in West Africa, as their cash crop is ground nuts and yams. Chickens are fairly numerous, also. Turkeys not so much.
The most authentic version would use a smooth, relatively thin unsweetened peanut butter. Ginger would probably be crushed with a mortar and pestle. And it would, without question, include the most essential ingredient to any west African cuisine…Maggi cube.
And that’s what I’m making now. Unfortunately, I’m out of garlic so I had to use the stuff in the jar. Alas! But I did use up some of that leftover ginger.
I don’t have a proper food processor, so I used my hand-cranked Smart Chopper (As Seen On TV!) that dad bought me when I got my first apartment. Worked like a charm, although the ingredients only just fit. I processed in stages, starting with the peanuts and some of the (canned) tomatoes. I do have a processor that attaches to my stick blender, but it’s very small and I didn’t want to wake the roomie (who works nights). I decided to use chicken since it was at-hand. I have a half-pound of breast fillets cooking in the oven. I’ll make the roux after the chicken is done.
Oh, good. I’m glad to see I’m not the only ones who likes Skippy for peanut soup. The natural stuff just isn’t, strangely, “peanutty” enough for me. And the extra sweet just makes it taste even better.
This is my favorite peanutty goodness recipe that happens to have curry in it:Mchicha - Tanzanian Spinach & Peanut Curry. If I’m feeling decadent, I put in some grilled chicken strips that have been marinating in coconut milk for a bit.
FTR, I didn’t use Skippy this time. Instead I used dry-roasted, unsalted peanuts from Trader Joe’s and ground them up in the Smart Chopper. I figured I’d stick to the recipe (except for the garlic, dammit!. I also saw that I didn’t have two cups of the canned tomatoes left to put in at the end, so I diced a tomato I had in the fridge to add with it.
I’ve finally had a bowl of the soup. It’s hard to compare it to Colophon Café’s, since I haven’t had theirs in many weeks.
The soup is pretty tasty, but I think it needs… something. I was going to put curry powder in it, but all I have is the hot stuff. I’m out of the ‘supermarket’ kind. Maybe the sweetness of Skippy would add the layer I’m looking for. It’s fairly close, AFAICR, to Colophon’s. Just… needs something. The ‘heat’ is just about right. The café’s isn’t very spicy, but you know it’s there. Same with mine.
The test will come when the roomie wakes up and decides to try some. I’ll eat anything I cook and like it. I’ll have to use her taste buds.