Efere Etighi (Okro Soup the Oron Way)

I was at my sister-in-law’s house some time back and she took me way back to Oron with her fish Efere Etighi (fish okro soup). I am married to a man from Oron so naturally, seafood features prominently in most of the dishes we cook at home. If you haven’t quite figured out where Oron is, it’s a small town in the south east of Nigeria sitting at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean.

The famous dish from this part is Ekpang Iwa (grated cassava that is wrapped in plantain leaves and steamed). Smoked and fresh fish features quite often in soups. My stock of smoked fish is always sourced from Oron as I can guarantee the quality. When you have good quality ingredients then you don’t need much seasoning to bring out the taste of the dish. Things will simply blend well and the outcome is some finger-licking delight.

Oh well, we all can’t go to Oron to buy fish. The offering today is a soup that is cooked quite often and the secret to the nice flavour is the treatment of the oil. The palm oil is slightly bleached just as you will do for Ayamase stew.

Follow through the recipe and see how I did it and watch your diners go hmmmm and ahhhh.  Enjoy!

 

Recipe for Efere Etighi (Okro soup the Oron way)

Ingredients

About 4 cups of chopped Okro

8-10 pieces Fresh Fish (white or red tilapia or silver cat fish are good options)

8-10 pieces fresh Prawns

Yellow Cameroun Pepper to taste

Red Scotch Bonnet Pepper to taste

1 medium size chopped Onion

2 table spoons ground Crayfish

3 cooking spoons Palm oil

Seasoning cube to taste

Salt to taste

 

Method

1. Clean the fish, season with coarsely ground pepper, some of the chopped onion, salt and and little seasoning. Allow to marinate for about 30 minutes.
2. Steam the fish on low heat till cooked. Using low heat to cook fish keeps the texture soft. If you want to check that the fish is cooked through, pierce with a fork. If the fork goes though easily then the fish is cooked. I prefer to cook the fish to half done and allow the rest of the cooking to happen in the soup. When fish is cooked strain out the fish stock and set aside.

3. Heat the palm oil till it starts to smoke but not completely bleached. When oil starts to smoke allow about 3-4 minutes to smoke then lower the heat and fry the remaining chopped onion. Increase the heat so the onion fries and almost caramelizes.
4. Lower the heat on the onion, and add the fish stock, ground crayfish, fresh prawns, seasoning and some more water and bring sauce to boil for about 5 minutes.
5. Taste and correct seasoning, add the chopped Okro, stir and allow to boil for about 2 minutes. If the fish was half cooked, add to the soup at this time, lower the heat and cook for about 3-4 minutes. Avoid stirring soup vigorously when fish is added. You can shake the pot from side to side or use a wooden or non-metal spoon to stir gently. If fish was cooked add to the Okro for about 2 minutes before turning off the fire.
6. Serve the soup with any swallow of choice or white rice.

For more Okro Soup recipes click here