Mafé: Beninese cuisine v.2

I introduce another Western African dish, mafé!

I love discovering different cuisines. I confess, my palate is not really open to strong tastes, and I am having difficulty adapting to new tastes, but still I love discovering new tastes. Especially I enjoy eating the tastes that I know prepared in a completely different, surprising way. And this recipe is one of them!

Mafé

As you may remember, I have already shared a recipe from Benin, a stew called Agushi. Mafé is a stew prepared similarly. It is a dish that you us whatever you have at hand. Use the vegetables at hand, add the meat you want, spice with whatever you enjoy and that’s almost it. The only key point is peanut butter. You know, the unsweetened peanut butter. Add the peanut butter to the completely familiar stew to turn it into a whole new dish, with a completely different balance of flavours. Apart from adding nutritive value to the dish (I think this is common for many Western African dishes), it also creates a new and very delicious taste.

It is such a joy to discover a whole new dish with such a small change! By the way, I am sure we need to look into more dishes with peanut butter, it has a huge potential! But for now here is the Mafé recipe.

Before I forget, I would like to thanks once more to Christophe and his lovely mother Isabelle for this great recipe. Without them I would not be able to discover neither mafé, nor agushi! Here is hoping to meet more poeple to add new cultures into our palate!