akara - Nigerian - food- breakfast-beans-unpeeled - acaraje - west africa

I am continuing on with the unpeeled beans trend today, this time we are using it to prepare traditional Akara. The moimoi version was extremely successful and those who have tried it have sworn off peeling beans again.

Notice I said traditional,yes, good old deep fried akara. If you prefer not to deep fry the recipe, try our Panfried Akara method #Pankara, it works with unpeeled beans as well.

Ingredients

  • 1 cup unpeeled brown beans ( Drum or Oloyin)
  • 1 raw hot pepper (Ata rodo) – chopped
  • 1/2 of a medium onion – Finely chopped
  • Salt – to taste
  • oil for frying (1 part palm oil to 4 part vegetable oil)*

Directions

 

  • Cover beans with generous amount of water and leave to soak overnight.
  • Rinse soaked beans. In a blender, combine the beans with 1/3 cup water, Puree to a smooth paste

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  • Pour the pureed beans into a bowl. add in the salt,chopped pepper and onions. Mix with a rolling pin or electric mixer  for 5-10 minutes (this is to incorporate air into the batter and make the resulting akara fluffy).
  • Set a deep pan on medium heat, add in some oil.
  • Once the oil is hot, scoop 1/2 cooking spoon of batter into oil – you do not want to spread out the batter in the oil, you want to pour batter directly on itself (the way you would pour water into a narrow bottle). Fry on each side until golden brown

frying - akara - shape- recipe

  • lift out the akara balls with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper. Repeat the process until everything is fried

Cook - akara - 9jafoodie

  • Serve with bread, garri, ogi(pap) or fried yam. Enjoy!!

Note:

  • The shape of the akara is affected by two factors: thickness of the pureed beans and your method of frying. Shallow frying  or watery batter will result in flat akara.
  • Palm oil is added to get the more traditional golden color, you can choose to use only vegetable oil
  • Black eyed beans may be used if brown beans is not available. There will be some black eye present but the effect is negligible.
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