Roadside Foods in South-Eastern Nigeria

We’ve talked about the roadside delicacies common to all regions of Nigeria, now we want to focus on the South-east states. A migrating food culture brings these foods to other states in Nigeria, but their ancestral lineage is in the Southeast and you will usually experience them at their best tastes here. These are some of the foods that if you come across, you should delve in unremorsefully;

1. Okpa

This is a traditional, renowned delicacy made from Bambara nut flour. The flour is mixed with palm oil, crayfish, spices and water, and boiled in banana/plantain leaves till it is evenly cooked through. Served piping hot, it is usually eaten alone, straight from the leaves but can also be combined with stews and sauces. It has soft texture which when bitten into, assails all senses, and it goes quite well with a steaming cup of tea. It has an acquired taste, which once gotten, is so hard to let go – I know some foreigners that have longed for it to the extent that they went on Amazonto buy the Okpa flour and cook it for themselves at home. This delicacy though found in most eastern states, finds its palace in Enugu, people claim that the Okpa offered in Enugu cannot be replicated elsewhere.

1. Abacha

This is also called African salad, and is a native food of the Igbo people. It is usually eaten as in-between meal but can be as filling as a main meal. *Abacha *is prepared from shredded, dried cassava.  The dish involves tossing of its ingredients, some precooked, hence the name “African salad”. It includes a mix of *Ugba/Ukpaka *(made from oil bean seeds), palm oil, edible potash, onions, crayfish, mackerel or stock fish, garden eggs, local spices and herbs. It offers a contrasting bowl of flavours and textures; the crunchiness of the garden eggs and stock fish contrast with the softness of the cassava, as the herby taste mixes with slight astringent and almost sweet, you will feel your mouth flood with saliva in anticipation of more of this staple food.

1. Corn and Ube

During the rainy season, you’re bound to find numerous makeshift shacks of women roasting corn and *Ube. Ube *is a purple African wood pear that must be roasted over hot coals or cooked in boiling water to be edible. When cooked they taste like avocado, but a lot creamier. The corn season, lies mid-rainy season, between the months of June and October, and it brings golden, white, yellow kernels of hot cobs, well roasted and soft with flavour. The cobs may be roasted or boiled and usually have *ube *or coconut as an accompaniment. A serving of two cobs and a handful of pears comes wrapped in newspaper; a paper bag of sorts, the corn should be eaten hot and combined with the pears. As your teeth tears into the flesh of the pear and meets seed, you will be transported into a parallel universe where corn and guacamole is revamped. The tartness of the avocado skin meets the extra creamy *ube, *and mashes with the sweetness of fresh corn to produce an avalanche of flavour that you won’t be forgetting soon.

1. Abacha mmiri

This is also called* Bobozee* or Air Condition. This is wet cassava chips, cooked and rewashed in cold water. Some varieties involve fermenting the cassava strips and soaking in cold water overnight. Whichever the variant, these snacks are a little bland and are best eaten with the accompaniments of roasted groundnuts, coconut or palm kernels. They are sold in little polythene bags and are excellent at cooling the body down on a hot day, hence its name.

1. Roasted plantain, yam and fish

This is a fairly common delicacy that can be enjoyed singly, or in combination, usually with a spicy sauce. The plantains are soft and sweet, the yams are crunchy and salty, the mackerel is soft and crunchy in different parts; and all this is topped off with a sauce made from lots of onions, tomatoes and peppers. Uziza leaves, which have a slightly bitter taste, can be added, to ramp up the flavour mix.

1. Nuts and seeds

Mkpuru okpa *are boiled Bambara nuts that are cracked open to enjoy the salted nuts. *Aki Hausa/Ofio is the local name for tiger nuts sold in heaps on wheel barrows and accompanied with coconuts. *Aki n’ukwa, *this is a combination of coconut and parboiled African breadfruit seeds. These are mostly hawked on the streets or in traffic and can be bought on the go.

This is not an exhaustive list of the roadside foods found in the South-east, some foods are common in all regions of Nigeria. These foods are very cheap, costing about N50-N500 depending on the size of your appetite. They are enjoyed by Nigerians and foreigners, and must be tried to experience the fullness of Eastern Nigeria.