Due to the diversity of Nigerian food recipe, we often have many different ways of preparing one staple food. It is common to hear the question; fried rice or Jollof rice at parties. In Nigerian restaurants, the question; which soup? Often follows a request for fufu recipe. I have never understand this diversity until I was posted to the capital city of Nigeria for my one year National Youth Service.There,we have the full presence of different restaurants serving different kinds of Nigerian cuisine. With my frequent patronage of these restaurants, I realised that Nigerian food is essential to Nigerian culture. It defines us base on our tribe. For instance, I was born in the South-Western part of Nigeria. Our tribe’s name is Yoruba. I grew up eating different kinds of our local delicacy. The most common dish among them is Iyan.It is a starchy food that is made from yam tuber.
Generally, Nigerian food consists mainly of rice,yam,plantain and beans. They are prepared and eaten with various soups and stew recipe. They can also be prepared in porridge or jollof form. The most common Nigerian food eaten in homes are fufu recipes. These are food you swallow without chewing them. You make a lump of the food,dip the lump in the soup or sauce and swallow. They include cassava fufu,pounded yam,garri(eba),amala and semolina. Rice is also a popular Nigerian food but it is reserved for special occasion. You will not be surprised to see rice recipe served at Nigerian weddings, funerals and birthday parties. This is the Nigerian food that most families eat on special days of the week such as Saturdays and Sundays.
As a typical Nigerian, I have to wake up as early as 5 A.M.I
begin my day with a small breakfast. It usually consists of rice and mangoes or
stewed soy-beans. Dodo (fried plantain) is also a common dish, as well as left
over from the night before. Lunch is considered as the most important meal of
the day. I take my lunch around 11 A.M.As far as I am concern, a late dinner
may be served with dishes similar to those offered at lunch. Soup and stew are
common lunchtime foods, eaten with hands cupped like a spoon.
We also enjoy eating different kind of snacks throughout the
day. Some examples are fried yam chips, boiled groundnut and meat
pastries.Akara,which is a puffy,deep-fried cake made with black-eye peas, is
sometimes eaten with chili. Other snacks are kulikuli(small deep-fried ball of
peanut paste),suya,a hot and spicy kebab and a few sweet like chinchin(fried
pastries in strips).
Warri is a small town I visited in 2005.I accompanied
my friend who is a native of that town to celebrate yam festival. Yam is a
staple food in Nigeria. It has brown tough skins and flesh that vary in colour.
It can be served as mashed yam with plenty of butter and seasoning as an
accompaniment to meat stew. The festival usually holds in the beginning of
August which is the end of the rainy season. On the first morning of the celebration,
our host (my friend’s parents) make an altar in honour of their ancestors, the
earth god Ala. It is a way of expressing gratitude to the gods for helping them
to witness another festival. After that, all the men in the town are expected
to go to the farm to harvest all the new yams and give thanks in the Town square.
On the second day, we gathered to watch young men in wrestling contest. This is
one of the most important event of the festival. Earlier in the morning, the
wrestler ate roasted yam, which they believe it will give them strength and the
town elders are chosen as judges. Drum welcomes the wrestler to the town square.
When a wrestler win a round, drummers beat their drums again and young women
come into the circle and dance. The festival is close with eating of yam and
drinking of palm wine in the evening.
