Akara – Bean Cake

Hello everyone! I made akara for the first time everrrrr! *Jumping up and down with excitement* I woke up this morning with only one thing on my mind…AKARA! I just had to have some. Some hot ‘crispy on the outside and soft on the inside’ akara. I thought of going to Iya Tinu down the road to buy some but I decided to try it out myself…besides i’m trying to be a better cook.  So I made a phone call to a friend of mine and she told me what to do. I might have done it a little different from the way she explained but it came out pretty good…if I do say so myself!

Ingredients:

Beans

Crayfish

Seasoning and salt

Cooking oil

Red chilli peppers

Onions

Method:

• Pick out any dirt from the beans and soak it in hot water for about 15mins or till the water cools down. I did it this way because I wanted a faster solution to taking off the skin. You can also soak the beans  over night. Either way will get the beans to double in size and also allow the skin come off easily.
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• Then wash the beans to take off its skin

• Blend the beans with red chili pepper and onions. Or you could chop the onions and peppers into the blended beans. It depends on how you like it. Please make sure you blend the beans with as little water as possible.

 

• Add crayfish, salt and seasoning and mix very well.

• Heat up some oil in a pot or deep pan. Please make sure its on low to medium heat so that the akara cooks all the way through. Use a spoon to drop the bean mix into the pan…I usually start by frying just one so I can taste to know if I need to add seasoning.
• So let it fry till its brown not forgetting to flip the akara so it can fry on both sides.

Serve with pap, custard, garri or whatever you like.