hmmm,looks sweet right,well thats Vegetable soup (EfoRiro) and how to prepare it aswell...

One of your New Year resolutions should be to eat a healthy meal at all times or at least, twice a day.

The bad habit of eating junk and food with ridiculous calories and fat should be gone with the past year. This is a New Year and as such, you ought to begin the year with healthy and nutritious meals.

And what better way to start this resolution than eating green vegetables. Nothing really beats it. Be it ugwu (pumpkin leaves), spinach or water leaf, green vegetables will certainly be healthy nutrients to your system.

You may not have the luxury of making the Ibibio/Efik vegetable soup popularly known as Edikainkong, but nothing stops you from cooking simpler forms of vegetables.

The good thing about vegetable is that it can go as a side meal with any other meal. That yam or even beans would give you more nutrients if you complement it with vegetables.

Vegetable soup (EfoRiro)

Ingredients

• 2kg Shoko/ Spinach leaves(about 8 wraps if you buy in Nigerian market)
• 250 grams assorted meat (tripe, cow skin(ponmo), beef)
• 250 grams assorted fish (stock fish, smoked fish)
• 3 Fresh tomatoes or 2 bell peppers(tatashe)
• 2 Scotch Bonnets pepper (atarodo)
• 1 teaspoon Iru /dawadawa/ogiri (fermented locust beans ) (optional)
• 1- 2 spoonful palm oil
• 1 medium sized onions
• 1 tablespoonful ground crayfish
• 2 stock cubes
• Salt to taste

Preparation

• Before cooking Efo Riro, pick and wash the vegetables; shred/cut into tiny bits. To get less liquid in the soup, you can blanch the vegetables and set aside.
• Wash the assorted meat and fish. De-bone the smoked fish and set all aside.
• Blend the peppers and tomatoes, and set aside.

Season and cook the assorted meat and fish with onions, one stock cube, a little salt and other seasoning of choice. Remember to cook the tougher meat first.

• Cook until the liquid in the pot is well absorbed(dried up) and the meat and stock fish are tender.
• In another dry pot, heat up the palm oil, until it begins to smoke a little. •Add the ground tomatoes and peppers and fry until the mixture loses its sour taste; this takes about 15- 20 minutes.
• Now add the cooked meat and fish. Add ground iru, ground crayfish and stock cube. Mix thoroughly, cover and leave to boil for 10 minutes.
• After 10 minutes, add the vegetables and salt to taste. Mix well and leave to simmer for five minutes and your delicious Efo Riro is ready.