The peppers, tomatoes, garlic and shallots are ground with salt in an Asanka bowl, a Ghanaian mortar and pestle. (Josephine McRobbie)
Samantha Kotey has a Southern take on Kosua ne Meko, a food typically sold by street vendors in Ghana. It is usually made with a boiled egg, cut in half with the pepper sauce in the middle. Sort of an egg sandwich--easy to grab on the go.
In her version, Samantha fries the egg, and serves the egg with pepper sauce (Meko) on glazed cream biscuits.
Below is the recipe for the pepper sauce but you can hear about Samantha's Southern spin on the whole dish, on this episode of Earth Eats.
Ghanaian Meko
INGREDIENTS:
- 1 small shallot
- 8-12 Kpakposhito (Petite Belle)
- 2 Roma tomatoes
- Salt to taste
- 1 garlic clove
PREPARATION
- Peel and cut the shallots and garlic clove
- Roughly chop the tomato
- Using an asanka (large mortar and pestle) mash/grind the garlic and onion first until it begins to lose its form and turns into a paste
- Add the Kpakposhito and mash/grind until it also turns into a paste
- Add half of the tomatoes and salt and mash all the ingredients together until you have a salsa-like consistency (or any consistency you prefer). If it's too spicy, add more tomatoes until the heat is at a comfortable level.
- Garnish with chopped tomatoes and shallots.
