When I am cooking Banga Soup it has to be made from freshly squeezed palm fruit juice. After all palm fruit is available in most of our southern markets in Nigeria. There are some processed foods I am yet to bring my self to use. And canned palmfruit sauce is one of them. I have actually tried it once and the taste was awful. I practically wasted my money on that soup. The texture and taste of freshly squeezed palm fruit is completely different from the canned ones. All I can say is that there is still some work to be done in improving the texture and taste of the brands sold in the s in the Nigerian market. Until then it is freshly squeezed for me.
Banga soup, if you are a Nigerian is quite familiar by now. The soup is largely consumed by people from Delta state, that is the Itshekiris. But as with many Nigerian soups today, some of us like to try out recipes and dishes from other parts of Nigeria.So what makes Banga soup so special? It is actually the flavorful spices which are Ataiko , Erereje and the dry leaves Beletete.
The rest of the process is just like Abak Atama soup from the Efik / Ibibio tribes of Nigeria.
Banga is originally eaten with starch, but I will spare you the challenge of battling with pulling the starch or the starch pulling you. You can just settle for any swallow of choice and enjoy the array of seafoods you can assemble in one pot.
Recipe for Seafood Banga Soup
Ingredients
5 cups Palm Fruit Juice
1 table Spoon Ataiko
1 1/2 teaspoons Erereje
2 tablespoons Beletete
1 medium Size Fresh Fish (cut into 4 pieces)
1/2 cup Clam
1 cup Calamari
1/2 cup Periwinkle (shelled or left in shell)
1/2 cup Fresh Prawns
1 tablespoon ground Crayfish
Dry Pepper to taste
A little fresh Pepper (to season sea food for steaming)
Crayfish Seasoning to taste
Salt to taste
Method for making Seafood Banga Soup
1. Season seafoods with salt, a little fresh pepper and crayfish seasoning . You may want to use yellow Cameroun pepper as this brings a nice aroma to the seafood. I added periwinkle to this dish which is my twist.
2. Allow sea food to marinade for about 20 minutes .Then steam on low heat so that the seafoods cooks gently. You should make the seafood half cooked as you will compete the cooking in the soup.
2. Blend or pound the Ataiko and Erereje into smooth powder and set aside.
3. Boil palmfruit till cooked or flesh of the fruit falls off the nut easily. Pound the palmfruit to seperate the flesh and using warm water squeeze out the juice. This is the same way you squeeze out juice from coconut. If you do not have a mortar you can squeeze with your hands.
4, Next, bring palm fruit sauce to boil, add the crayfish powder, seasoning , pepper and salt and cook for about 10 minutes
4. Add the spices and beletete and cook for another 10 minutes. The soup starts to thicken at this point
5. Pour in the steamed seafood gently and the little stock lower the heat and allow the Banga sauce to simmer and permeate the sea food . 6, Shake the pot round instead of stirring so you don’t break up the fish.
7. Cook for about 5 minutes and the soup is ready.
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Hello ma. I am truly in love with your site ever since I stumbled upon it. It’s totally awesome with beautiful colourful pictures to go with every tasteful dish you warmly teach us. Your recipes are truly out of this world and you may me thank God every day that I am Proudly Nigerian! However may I ask if you could do Nigerian dishes that are gluten free and dairy free, fit for autistic kids? I am sure many worried parents of autistic children here in Nigeria would forever be grateful and truly benefit from your wealth of knowledge on nutritional meals fit for these amazing kids we have been blessed with.
Hello Chastmeir, Let me see what I can do to your request. I will endeavor to find
Some interesting meals for this purpose. I share your burden.
This site is really good and educating. I didn’t know I can use seafood for Bangalore soup, I always use Biscuit bones, meat, crayfish, Dry fish and Goat meat to prepare mine. More grease to your elbow.