March is...

...for Ewa Agoyin!

This is one I've truly never made, 

at least not the specialty sauce that goes with it.

 Legend has it that this is actually a 

Togolese( specifically Cotonou) dish originally that the Yorubas adopted 

and made their own. 

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Ewa Agoyin ati Bread Agege

Actually agoyin is a term used to describe 

women from along the west coast of Africa 

mostly from Ghana, Togo, 

the Benin Republic and Badagry near Lagos too. 

And ewa agoyin originally referred to 

 "beans like those Agoyin women make"

I don't dispute this idea 

especially since there are Yoruba people 

across many of those countries 

along that egde of West Africa 

so  the fact that other people 

who live outside Yoruba land

 might make it or something similar

 is not totally surprising.

To make the sauce I hear is 

a labour of love

 and an exercise in patience

 - Of the Supreme kind. 

You have to slow fry the onions for ever before you can even add the other ingredients.

If you know anything about Ghanaian cooking, this sauce would remind you of how they make shito - a sauce that can be kept canned for months, to use later, over and over again.

One day when I'm brave enough for the challenge, 

I will summon forth the agoyin woman in me 

and conjure up the agoyin sauce

 that makes this dish one of the 

natural wonders of the modern world,

 - my very best friend from Ghana will be on speed dial of course, 

guiding me every step of the way...

F.A