Akara-West African Bean Fritter

 

copied from   curiouscuisiniere

I was watching  The Joyful Cook on Facebook and she had a recipe that I thought would be easy, delicious and nutritious. It was for a dish known as akara, also known by other names in other regions of Africa and Brazil.  For the sake of simplicity let's just call it akara. I'd been saving the recipe since December 2, 2021. In her recipe she uses the term beans but, she uses black-eyed peas.  In other recipes which I consulted there are other legumes that can also be used.  I consulted three other sites,  Curious Cuisinere, The Kitchn,  and Ify's Kitchen.

copied from     Ify's Kitchen

The Joyful Cook's recipe is below.

Akara Recipe 

Beans 3 Cups

1 large onion

Fresh pepper to taste

Salt to taste( be Carey with the salt. 1 used 3 small teaspoons)

Oil for deep frying

I allowed an entire bag (12 oz.) of black-eyed peas to soak overnight in the refrigerator.  I followed various cook's suggestions as to the easiest way to remove the skins. I drained them and put one cup of peas into the blender with two cups of water. I pulsed 3 times and some of the skin came off.

The next step was to drain the peas separating the skin from the pea.   According to the various authors, the husks would float to the top because they are lighter than the meat of the peas. BTW- I did this several times and it is time consuming. See the video below to see how that turned out.

After numerous tries you see the beans on the left and the skins/husks on the right. 

copied from   love is in my tummy

 

⬅ Definitely not the white product the cooks I saw had.

I decided to continue on since one cook said it was okay to have a few flecks. I had more than a few.  The next step was to  whip the beans into an airy consistency similar to whipped cream. The airiness is what makes them puff up and float to the top when frying. Use a mixer with a whip attachment for this or do it by hand.(no)  Just before this I chopped my vegetable seasonings and put them aside.

I whipped and I whipped . That is to say; The whipping tool on the mixer did but, I was never able to achieve a light airy batter.  One  cook said that if there was too much water they wouldn't have the fluffy texture they're supposed to. SOOOOOOOOO, I took the batter and poured it into a clean cheese cloth and I wrung it as tight as I could. 

Look at all the water that came out.

I tried again but still no fluffiness.

Looks like cooked oatmeal

Finally, I gave up and tried frying it the way it was. Here is the result.

Fried up pretty, didn't puff up, Texture not as hoped for, tastes bland even with the seasonings. Not good.  This had been labor intensive and time consuming. The rest of the mixture went into the trash.

 

Things don't always turn out the way we want. No problem. The good thing is that I tried and got it out of my system. 

That's it👀👀

DOUBLE SWEETNESS CAKERY

 I do like sweets. It's one of my vices.  Imagine my delight when I came across this.

Located in Center Point right outside of Birmingham, Alabama, I knew I had to try it.

Just as written there were two sweet ladies who took my order and fulfilled it.

Here's a look at what else they were offering.

I haven't tried any of their other goodies. I have a tendency to stick with what I know I like. That way I'm not disappointed unless of course the recipe changes or the business changes. The business was clean with great customer service and a tasty product that you can tell was not skimped on with the ingredients.  I went back again the next week for another brownie.

Double Sweetness Cakery

1637 Center Point Parkway

Center Point, AL  35215

205.874.6350

Hours of Operation

During the Pandemic 

Sunday - Tuesday:  Closed

Wednesday - Friday: 12:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Saturday: 12:00 pm - 5:00 pm

That's it 🎂