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Easy Nigerian vegetable sauce, simple and flavoursome, looking pretty in a black bowl

Easy Nigerian Vegetable Sauce

gaga
It is a minimalistic vegetable sauce that is nutritious and rich.
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Course Dinner, lunch, Main Course, Soup, stew
Cuisine Nigerian, world
Servings 4

Ingredients
  

Meat

  • 500 g chicken
  • 2 cubes chicken seasoning cubes
  • 1 teaspoon curry powder
  • 1 teaspoon dry thyme
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1 inch root ginger
  • salt
  • 1 small onion
  • 1 scotch bonnet

Vegetables

  • 1 medium onion
  • big carrot (200g)
  • 1 small red bell pepper or tatashe (paprika pepper) (40g)
  • 1 medium green bell pepper (150g)
  • ½ small cabbage (100g)
  • 40 g green beans

Others

  • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
  • 1 seasoning cube
  • 2 teaspoons light soy sauce
  • 2 teaspoons oyster sauce
  • 2 teaspoons white pepper
  • salt
  • 3 tablespoons cornflour

Instructions
 

The Meat

  • Cut chicken into bite-sized chunks with or without the bones, put them in a pot. Roughly cut up onions, garlic, ginger and scotch bonnet, add to the chicken. Add seasoning cubes, curry, thyme and salt, stir, cover and place over medium-low heat.
  • Cook until the chicken is soft and has yielded its own liquid. Add a little water if it is getting too dry.
  • Meanwhile, chop the medium-sized onions, scrape and cut the carrot into quarter-inch slices.
  • Deseed and cut up both red and green peppers, cut green beans and shred cabbage roughly, set aside.
  • Remove the cooked chicken from the pot into a plate, set aside.
  • Add 1 cup of water to the stock and strain into a bowl using a fine sieve. Rinse out the pot to be sure there are no bits of bone etc. Pour the strained stock back into the pot, you should have about 2 cups, if not add water to make up the difference.
  • Add soy sauce, oyster sauce, seasoning cube and white pepper. Bring to a boil, taste, add salt and 1/2 teaspoon each of curry and thyme, if needed. Boil until spices are well blended about 3 minutes.
  • In a small bowl, mix cornflour with 3 tablespoons of water making sure there are no lumps, Set aside.
  • In a deep frying pan, put vegetable oil, when hot, add onions, carrot and green beans, add a little salt and saute over medium heat until the onions are transparent and carrot and green beans have softened a bit, about 5 minutes.
  • Add green pepper and red pepper saute for a few minutes. Then separate cabbage bits, add and stir around, take off the heat. (Do not overcook because it is still going to be cooked further in the stock.
  • Dump the vegetables into the well-seasoned stock, stir and taste.
  • Place over medium-high heat, stir the cornflour and pour into the sauce stirring all the time so that no lumps will form.
  • Leave to boil until thickened and there is no rawness from the cornflour, about one minute. Take off the heat.
  • Serve with rice, potatoes, pasta, couscous etc.

Notes

  • The times given are for thickly cut vegetables. If you cut your vegetables into small sizes, the timing will be considerably shorter.
  • Do not cover while still hot because the steam will settle on the pot cover and go back into the sauce as water making it watery.
  • Also do not leave your metal spoon in your sauce when you have taken it off the heat, this will also make it go watery.
  • Chicken can be substituted with beef. Goat meat will be too gamey for this sauce.
Keyword chicken soup, health food, nigerian sauce, nigerian soup, sauce