Egusi Soup and Water Leaf

You can choose to use the vegetable fresh or blanched before adding to the egusi soup. If you want to blanch the vegetable,

In a blender, add red bell pepper, scotch bonnet chillies and onions with little water and blend till smooth. Empty into a bowl and set aside (you can blend the locust beans with the pepper if you want)

Add washed meat to a pan, add salt seasoning and chopped onions and bring to boil till tender, reserve stock for the soup.

Mix the ground melon with warm water to form a paste and set aside

Place a pan on a medium heat, add the meat stock and palm oil and bring to boil for about 5 to 10 minutes

Add the melon paste to the pan in bits and stir into the stock/palm oil mixture and stir gently to combine.

Add the locust beans.

Add little water if need be and continue to cook for another 10-15 minutes making sure you stir intermittently till well cooked and almost lump free.

Add the blended pepper and cook for another 5-8 minutes

Add crayfish, the meat, seasoning and salt (be careful when adding salt to soup that contains stock as you might not be needing salt if the stock was well seasoned

Add half of the smoked fish to the egusi soup and stir to combine and cook for another 5 minutes

Add the waterleaf (gbure) to the egusi and stir to combine, add the remaining smoked fish, chopped basil and carefully stir into the soup and cook for another 5 minutes. Take it off the heat and serve with swallow of your choice