Annex - Some recipes based on sorghum and millets

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UJI
Thin porridge

Method

  1. Mix the flour with about 1/2 cup water.
  2. Place in a covered container and allow to ferment 24 to 48 hours in a warm place. Omit this step for an unfermented product.
  3. Boil remaining water and add fermented flour to it.
  4. Cook for 10 to 15 minutes until smooth and thick.
  5. Add sour milk (or water or banana juice), stir and boil for another 2 minutes.
  6. Add sugar and serve hot at breakfast or lunch. Serves 2-3.

Notes

A light colour, smooth, flowing, creamy consistency and bland to sour taste and aroma are preferred. A dark, lumpy, grainy product with off flavour is not desired.

Kenya
United Republic of Tanzania
Uganda

Ingredients

1 cup sorghum or millet flour
3-4 cups water
1 cup sour milk, water or banana juice
2 tablespoons sugar, or salt or lemon juice to taste

OGI
Thin porridge

Method

  1. Soak dehulled grains in cold water for 18 to 48 hours to soften and ferment the grains.
  2. Wash the grains and ground to a coarse paste using a grinding stone.
  3. Screen the slurry through muslin cloth and discard the bran and coarse particles remaining on the cloth.
  4. Let the strained slurry stand for 5 to 6 hours and pour off the excess water, leaving just enough to cover the settled paste.
  5. Bring water to boil.
  6. Pour the paste in the boiling water (2 tablespoons for every 6 cups water) and stir vigorously until the paste gelatinizes.
  7. Cover the bowl and cook for another 2 to 3 minutes.
  8. Serve the thin, hot porridge as it is or add sugar or salt to taste.

Notes

The product should be light in colour, either white or creamy. Traditionally ogi is not stored. Kafer, eko or ogide, thicker versions of ogi, are stored. Change in flavour, texture or aroma is unacceptable.

Nigeria

Ingredients

Dehulled sorghum grains
Water
Sugar or salt to taste

ALKALI TÔ
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. Boil about 4 litres water in a metal pot.
  2. Mix 10 9 wood ash in 650 ml water.
  3. Add about 500 9 sorghum flour and stir to form a homogeneous paste.
  4. Swirl the paste in the boiling water.
  5. Stir the boiling mixture about 8 minutes. (Sometimes this mixture is consumed as thin porridge.)
  6. Reduce the heat under the pot. Take out approximately one-third of the mixture and set it aside in a separate bowl.
  7. Keep the mixture in the pot boiling and add, in small lots, the remaining sorghum flour.
  8. After each addition beat the mixture vigorously with a flat wooden spoon. When the paste thickens too much to beat, add some of the thinner porridge that was kept aside. Again add flour and beat. Continue this cycle until all the flour and set-aside porridge are mixed in the boiling pot to form a homogeneous, thick paste.
  9. Reduce heat, cover the pot and allow the paste to cook over low heat for about 12 minutes.
  10. Remove the to from the fire, cool for about an hour and serve.

Mali

Ingredients

1.25 kg dehulled sorghum flour passed through 1 mm mesh
10 G wood ash extract

TUWO
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. Bring water to boil.
  2. Prepare a paste of the flour in cold water.
  3. Add the paste in small amounts to the boiling water and stir vigorously to prevent lump formation. For acid tuwo preparation cook the paste in water containing either lemon juice or tamarind pulp extract.
  4. Cool the thick porridge.
  5. Serve with vegetable sauce.

Notes

A product prepared from dehulled grains is normally preferred. Whole-grain tuwo is tough, non-elastic and dark in colour.

Nigeria

Ingredients

4 cups flour of whole or dehulled sorghum or millet
9 cups water Lemon juice or tamarind pulp extract (optional)

BOGOBE
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. For fermented bogobe (motogo-wa-ting or sing), mix starter with dry sorghum meal.
  2. Add 250 to 300 ml lukewarm water and stir to make a slurry.
  3. Cover and allow to ferment for 24 hours.
  4. Boil 1 500 ml water.
  5. Add fermented meal to the boiling water. Stir frequently.
  6. Cook for 12 to 15 minutes.

Non-fermented bogobe (mosokwana)

  1. Boil about 1 litre water.
  2. Add about 250 9 sorghum meal to boiling water, stirring frequently.
  3. Cook for 20 to 30 minutes.

Notes

Motogo-wa-ting is normally consumed with meat and vegetables in the morning and evening. Mosokwana is generally eaten at lunch with meat and vegetables. Bogobe with medium to coarse texture is preferred. Dark colour of the product resulting from grain pigments is not acceptable.

Botswana

Ingredients

300 g coarsely ground dehulled sorghum meal
30 g starter (sorghum meal fermented in water for 48 hours)
1 500 to 1 800 ml water

UGALI
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. Bring water to boil (in a clay pot).
  2. Sprinkle a small amount of flour on the surface of the water. Continue heating.
  3. As soon as water begins to boil again, add remaining flour in small amounts. Stir constantly to avoid lump formation.
  4. Allow to cook for 2 minutes and remove about half of the hot slurry to another container.
  5. Vigorously mix the remaining slurry in the pot using a wooden stick with a flattened cylindrical handle.
  6. Add the set-aside slurry and continue boiling until the right consistency is obtained.
  7. Continue cooking on a reduced fire for about 4 to 5 minutes.
  8. Remove the ugali to a basket made for this purpose. The whole process of ugali preparation takes 15 to 20 minutes.
  9. Serve with meat or vegetable sauce or stew, or green vegetables. Serves 2-3.

Notes

Ugali should be light in colour. It should not be sticky when eaten and should maintain the same characteristics in storage for 24 hours.

Kenya
United Republic of Tanzania
Uganda

Ingredients

2-3 cups sorghum or millet flour
4-5 cups water

AMBALI
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. Bring water to boil.
  2. Mix the flour in cold water.
  3. Add to the boiling water in small amounts.
  4. Stir to prevent lump formation.
  5. Cook until thick.
  6. Leave overnight to ferment.
  7. Add water or buttermilk. Mix well and serve.

India

Ingredients

1 litre water
250 g sorghum or millet flour
Salt to taste
Buttermilk (optional)

SANKATI
Stiff porridge

Method

  1. Sieve the flour through a 20-mesh sieve and separate grits from fine flour.
  2. Boil water in a vessel.
  3. Add grits to the boiling water while stirring.
  4. Continue boiling and after 10 minutes gradually add the fine flour.
  5. Continue stirring and cooking for another few minutes.
  6. Pour the sankati on to a moist plate and prepare balls of approximately 10 cm diameter by hand.
  7. Serve fresh with sauce, dhal, pickles, chutneys, buttermilk, curd, vegetable curries, etc. according to taste.

Notes

Sankati should be light in colour and slightly sweet in taste. It should not be sticky or pasty and should remain firm when stored in water.

India

Ingredients

Coarsely ground whole-grain sorghum flour, winnowed and free of bran
Water

Roti
Unleavened thin flat bread

Method

  1. Mix flour, water and salt to form a firm dough. Knead it thoroughly.
  2. Shape it into a ball.
  3. Sprinkle some dry flour on a wooden board and place the dough ball on it. Flatten the dough by hand, pressing into a circle of fairly even thickness.
  4. Bake the flat dough on a hot shallow pan or grill. After about half a minute, sprinkle water on the baking dough.
  5. Turn the rob over and bake it on the other side for 30 seconds or until it puffs.
  6. Serve it with pickles, chutneys, dhal or vegetable sauces.

Notes

A thin, soft, light-coloured roti is preferred. For up to 24 hours of storage it should remain soft. A dark product is not desired.

India

Ingredients

Whole-grain sorghum or pearl millet flour
Water
Salt to taste
Oil (optional)

TORTILLAS
Unfermented bread

Method

  1. Prepare mesa by mixing lime solution and sorghum grain in 3:1 proportion and cooking for 3 to 10 minutes at the boiling point.
  2. Steep for at least 4 hours.
  3. Prepare balls from the mesa and press them into circles of about 15 cm diameter and 0.5 cm thickness.
  4. Cook the tortillas on a grill or a traditional clay comale.
  5. During cooking turn the tortilla once to brown it lightly on both sides.
  6. Leave the cooked tortillas on the floor to cool a little, then keep them in a container lined with a cloth to cover.

Notes

Sorghum tortillas are off coloured compared to those made with white maize. A tortilla prepared from a 1:1 mix of sorghum and maize is well accepted.

Central America
Mexico

Ingredients

Sorghum grain
0.5 percent lime solution

INJERA
Leavened round flat bread

Method

  1. To prepare dough for 31 injera of 390 9 each, sieve 4.5 kg sorghum flour into a large bowl.
  2. Add 1 litre water and knead well by hand.
  3. Stir in the ersho (starter).
  4. Add more water and knead well.
  5. Transfer the dough into a previously used buhaka (dough container). Cover and let stand for 48 hours.
  6. Sift 1.6 kg flour into a large bowl to prepare a batter.
  7. Heat 1.7 litres of water to boiling.
  8. Pour the boiling water over the flour and mix well with a wooden spoon.
  9. Let the mixed batter stand until it cools to approximately 55°C.
  10. Add the batter to the fermented dough in the buhaka.
  11. Add 2 litres water and mix well.
  12. Let stand for about an hour until air bubbles form.
  13. Heat a clay griddle (meted) over a fire half an hour before baking.
  14. Grease the metad by sprinkling ground rapeseed over it and polishing with a folded piece of clean cloth. Dust away all the rapeseed. Grease in this way before baking each injera.
  15. Pour the batter on to the hot greased meted using a circular motion from outside towards the centre to make a circular injera. Use about 0.5 litre of batter for each injera.
  16. When holes begin to form on the top of the injera, cover with the griddle lid (akenbala) and bake for 2 to 3 minutes.

Regional variations

Mixing cooked dough (absit) with fermented dough:

  1. Ladle out about 800 9 of the fermented dough.
  2. Add 350 ml water and mix well.
  3. Boil 750 ml water and stir in the above dough and water mixture.
  4. Cook, stirring constantly, for 10 minutes.
  5. Remove from heat. Cool to about 46°C.
  6. Add the cooked dough to the fermented dough in the buhaka.
  7. Mix well with a clean stick or a clean hand.
  8. Add 2 litres water and mix well.
  9. Let stand for about an hour to allow the batter to rise.
  10. Bake as described before.

Fermenting together a mixture of three parts uncooked and one part previously cooked dough:

  1. A few hours after the initial dough is mixed, take out one-fourth of the dough and cook it until it reaches the consistency of a porridge.
  2. Mix the cooked dough thoroughly into the remaining initial dough.
  3. Leave it overnight in the dough container.
  4. Thin the dough with warm water and bake.

Notes

Injera is consumed with wot, a stew made from meat, pulse, vegetables or their combinations. Milk and milk products can also be served with injera. Desirable parameters include uniformly distributed "eyes" or perforations and a slightly sour flavour. A soft, thin, slightly moist and flexible product is accepted.

Ethiopia

Ingredients

6.1 kg sorghum flour
0.5 litre ersho (starter), a fermented thin yellowish fluid saved from previously fermented dough
Water

KISRA
Thin pancake-type leavened bread

Method

  1. In an earthenware container, mix flour, starter and enough water to form a paste.
  2. Allow to ferment overnight, i.e. about 18 hours.
  3. Thin dough to the consistency of a batter.
  4. Spread about 100 ml of the batter on a hot iron plate, using a rectangular spatula (15 x 5 cm) to form a very thin layer.
  5. Bake for about half a minute.
  6. Remove and store in a container one on top of the other.
  7. Cover with a cloth and store for use on the same or next day.
  8. Serve with vegetables, legumes, meat stew or soup.

Notes

A soft, thin, slightly moist and flexible product is preferred, with uniformly distributed "eyes" or perforations and a slightly sour taste.

Ingredients

9 parts sorghum flour, generally white variety
2 parts water
1 part starter (yeast inoculum from a previously fermented batch of kisra batter)

SORGHUM OR MILLET "RICE"

Method

  1. If using whole grain, soak it overnight in water and rinse it clean.
  2. Boil or steam the dehulled or soaked whole grain until soft (20 to 40 minutes).
  3. Serve hot with meat or vegetables.

India

Ingredients

1 volume dehulled or whole grain
3-4 volumes water

SORGHUM OR MILLET GRAINS WITH PULSE

Method

  1. Bring water to boil.
  2. Add pulse and boil until partially done.
  3. Add sorghum or millet grain and continue boiling until tender.
  4. Season as desired.
  5. Serve hot with greens and lemon or orange slices.

India

Ingredients

2 cups whole or cracked grain
1 cup green gram dhal, peas, beans, cowpeas or other pulse
7 cups water

PATE
Dehulled cracked grain

Method

  1. Bring water to boil.
  2. Add bean cake, onion, tomatoes, chill) peppers, salt and pepper.
  3. Add coarsely ground grain.
  4. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes.
  5. Add spinach and continue cooking for another 2 minutes.
  6. Serve hot.

Notes

A sticky product with poorly defined grains is not desired.

Nigeria

Ingredients

4 cups coarsely ground whole or dehulled sorghum or millet grain
7 cups spinach
2 large chill) peppers (chopped)
6 medium-sized tomatoes
2 medium-sized locust bean cakes
1 onion

KICHIDI

Method

  1. Heat oil in a pot.
  2. Add spices.
  3. Fry onion and garlic.
  4. Add water and boil.
  5. Add dehusked millet, rice, soaked chickpea dhal, groundnuts and salt.
  6. Cover and cook until done.
  7. Serve hot, garnished with grated coconut and green coriander leaves.

India

Ingredients

2 cups dehusked sorghum or millet
1/2 cup rice
1/4 cup chickpea dhal soaked in water
1/2 cup groundnuts soaked in water
2 small onions
6 cloves garlic
50 g vegetable oil
2 teaspoons mixed spices: mustard, cumin, asafoetida and turmeric
Salt to taste

COUSCOUS

Method

  1. Wet the finely ground flour with cold water and knead it until flour particles agglomerate.
  2. Force the mixture through a fine screen (1.5 mm mesh).
  3. Place the grains in a perforated pot fitted over another pot containing boiling water.
  4. Put a cloth seal at the joint between the two pots. Heat the lower pot to steam the grains above for about 15 minutes. They will form a single large chunk.
  5. Take out the chunk, break it into small aggregates and transfer them back to steam for another 15 minutes.
  6. Remove the chunk, break it into aggregates and sift them through a sieve (2.5 mm).
  7. Dry and store for future use.
  8. To prepare couscous for serving, sprinkle cool water on the aggregates.
  9. Mix thoroughly with fingers.
  10. Mix the grains with ground baobab leaf powder and other ingredients such as peanut paste, okra, etc. and give it a final steaming for 15 minutes.
  11. Allow it to cool slowly
  12. Serve with sauce or milk, or dry it and use as a convenience food.

West Africa

Ingredients

Finely ground sorghum or millet flour

FURA
Snack preparation

Method

  1. Mix flour, water and spices.
  2. Prepare small round balls (2 to 3 cm in diameter).
  3. Drop them into boiling water and cook for 30 minutes.
  4. Pound cooked balls with water and spices until a smooth, elastic and cohesive lump is formed.
  5. Again prepare small balls, rolling between the palms of the hand or on a wooden board dusted with dry flour.
  6. Serve as it is or with nono, yoghurt or sour milk, as a snack.

Nigeria

Ingredients

4 cups millet or sorghum flour (sifted)
2 teaspoons hot spices
6 cups water
2 cups nono (fermented milk), yoghurt or sour milk

POPPED SORGHUM

Method

  1. Moisten the grains by sprinkling with water.
  2. Heat the grains in a covered pan over the fire.
  3. Serve the popped grains as a snack after sprinkling with salt and pepper.
  4. Other serving ideas: add some sugar syrup and butter and shape into balls; or serve with milk and a little sugar.

India

Ingredients

Sorghum grain (popping variety)

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