Every tribe has their native greetings, I'm a proud "Igbo" boy, planning on becoming a proud "Igbo" man. ….. Igbo Kwenu, Kwenu, Kwezu enu ooooooo". You will not understand this unless you are an "Odogwu", a lion from the Igbo tribe. The Igbo tribe is one of the prominent and highly organized tribes in my country. We have several local dishes that even other tribes secretly enjoy without telling us, hehe.
I love all our local dishes except this one, the Bitterleaf Soup. From the word, "bitter", it is clear that everyone who hates bitter things is in my class. I hate bitter things. Therefore I detest bitterleaf soup. Though there are several advantages of the bitterleaf and the soup made from it. The bitterleaf soup helps in bowel movement, sugar level balance, and lots more. If you want to know more about the health importance of the bitterleaf, check up on my post in the @agriculturalmindset community. Here is the link…LINK
Though it is an easy soup to prepare, I still don't enjoy it because of the bitterness. Another reason I don't like the bitterleaf soup is because of the leaves. After the soup is done, the leaves are often still tough and can be chewed. I don't love eating soup or most foods with lots of chopped vegetable leaves. Most times when I don't have any other option than to follow my family to eat this soup, I often close my nose to eat. I learned that whenever you want to take in something bitter, closing the nostrils while swallowing will make one not feel the bitterness so much. I learned this when I was sick and I was given bitter drugs to swallow and I refused. I was advised to use that strategy.
My parents love this soup so much as they love chewing the roughly chopped leaves which were chopped by scrubbing with hands. I hate this so much. The only reason I enjoy this meal is because my parents often buy all sorts of condiments such as beef, chicken, stockfish, hides and fish to cook the soup as it is their favorite soup. I often concentrate on eating the meat and other thirsty components of the soup like crabs and snails.
I am often sent to get the bitterleaf processed before every meal and I am always happy whenever I'm sent to do this task because I would try my best to squeeze out all forms of bitterness from the leave. But I often end up not succeeding because the taste will always be there, that's why it is called bitterleaf.
This is just a simple write up of how the leaves can be processed before the main soup preparation. We have the bitter leaf plant planted everywhere in my compound. If you have access to the plant, just pluck the leaves from the petioles and put them in your bowl.
Soak the leaves in water to aid the scrubbing. You can spray the leaves in the sun to wilt, this is the best way to ease the scrubbing. Scrub till the leaves are chopped into small sizes, though my parents love them big so that they can chew them. They believe it whitens the teeth.
After changing the water used for the scrubbing, sieve the leaves out. The bitter leaf soup is made with cocoyam corn which has been ground. Steam your meats and add the cocoyam, and other condiments and seasonings. After a little heating, add the bitter leaf and leave the soup on fire for about seven minutes.
After you have done all these, make your "garri/fufu/swallow" and descend on the mighty local dish which will make your day.
That's the only local dish of my tribe that I detest and I have explained why. Thanks to everyone who has read my post, I appreciate your time and effort sacrificed. This is my entry for the for the #hivenaija weekly prompts.
Thanks and have a great day.
All the photos are mine, those having a time stamp shows that I carried out the processes and took the photos today, 1/05/2024.