Recipe : Maffe Tiga / Tiga Degae / African Chicken Peanut Butter Soup

I'd seen the recipe for African Chicken Peanut Butter Soup on Kadi's African Recipes, a couple of months ago and thought that it would be fun to make, so I'd bookmarked it.

Today, I was looking to make something "different" and remembered this recipe and since I had an open jar of peanut butter in my cupboard, our meal tonight had an African twist, which we quite enjoyed.

In her introduction, Kadi says "African peanut soup is enjoyed in many West African countries including Senegal, Guinea and Mali. The soup is also known as Maffe Tiga or Tiga Degae, there are a lot of varieties of peanut butter soup, it can be made with beef, fish, chicken or completely vegetarian."

While Kadi calls it a soup, it has the consistency of a curry / gravy and goes well with rotis and rice. Kadi also has a step by step video to make this dish uploaded on youtube. If African food interests you, do follow Kadi's Channel on youtube.

I have tweaked Kadi's recipe to adjust for our own tastes and to accommodate the ingredients that I had on hand.

Ingredients :
1kg chicken legs
2 tsp oil (and some leftover pork fat from some chops I fried the other day)

3 fresh tomatoes chopped
2 tbsp tomato sauce
2 onions chopped
6 garlic cloves chopped
8 green chillies - 4 chopped & 4 split
1 tbsp black pepper coarsely pounded
1 bouillon/soup cube
4 tbsp creamy peanut butter (not chunky)
3 cups (750ml) water
salt to taste

Method : 
Warm a wide mouthed pan and heat the oil in it.

Brown the chicken on all sides in this oil (fry in batches if necessary, but don't overcrowd the pan) Be careful, the oil will splatter, when the chicken releases its juices.

Remove the browned chicken and in the same pan and oil, add the tomatoes, tomato sauce, onions, garlic, the 4 chopped green chillies, black pepper and soup cube.

Fry it for about 10 minutes until the mixture becomes mushy.

Now, add the water and peanut butter and simmer on a low flame, stirring well until all the peanut butter is dissolved. Let it cook for about 15-20 minutes on a low flame, keep stirring to prevent the peanut butter from sticking and burning.

Add the 4 slit green chillies and salt to taste and simmer for another 5-10 minutes till it smells cooked.

Now add the fried chicken and simmer the mixture until the chicken is completely cooked, stirring frequently.

Serve hot with rice or rotis.

I loved the curry with plain rice, but my husband found it a little sweet with the rice, he preferred it with phulkas.