Chicken Yassa- Senegalese Style
Chicken Yassa is popular in the western region of Africa, originating from Senegal but also popular in The Gambia as well as Mali. This recipe is very easy to make. Chicken Yassa is basically chicken cooked with spiced/flavoured onions- lots of onions! The onions is the star of the show. In terms of the taste, because of the lemon and vinegar, it has a sharp/tangy taste together with the hint of spice as well . The only long part of this recipe is the process of marinating the chicken- it is best to marinade it overnight but if you are pressed for time, about 2-3 hours should be ok. Right, let's get into the recipe.
Equipment.
-Bowl
-Pot or large frying pan
-Strainer
-Cooking spoon
Ingredients
- 6 Pieces of Chicken thighs (or 1kg)
-6 large onions
-2 scotch bonnet (you can add less or more depending on your spice level)
-1/2 cup lemon juice
-2 tbsp Dijon Mustard
-1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
-1/2 cup groundnut oil (or any other type of oil)
-5 cloves garlic
-6 cubes of bouillon cubes
-1 tsp ginger powder
-2 bay leaves
-2 tsp black pepper
Process.
1) Start off buy slicing your onions into thin slices. Warning- you might shed some tears due to the amount if onions your slicing so do whatever trick that works for you to avoid that!
2)After slicing the onions, make the marinade. To do this, add the lemon juice, apple cider vinegar, Dijon Mustard, ginger powder, black pepper, garlic (minced), scotch bonnet (chopped), bay leaves, 1/4 cup of peanut oil, and the bouillon cubes all into a bowl. Give this a proper stir in order to mix all the ingredients well together.
3)Wash the chicken and place into a bowl. Add the sliced onions and the marinade into chicken and mix altogether. Leave to marinade overnight or if you are pressed for time- 3 hours.
4)After chicken & onions has been marinated, heat the pan up and add the remaining oil to the pan. Let the oil heat up for about 1 minute. Remove the chicken from the onions and the add the chicken to the oil to brown/fry it. Brown each side of the chicken for no longer than 5 minutes. After the chicken has browned, take the chicken out of the oil and set aside.
5)Strain the onions from the liquid of the marinade. Add this to the oil in the pan. Stir altogether and allow it to cook for about 10 minutes on medium heat.
6) Add the chicken and then also the liquid from the marinade. Stir altogether and then allow it to cook for 25 minutes on medium to low heat, making sure that you're stirring occasionally.
7)And there you have it! Your Chicken Yassa is ready! Enjoy with rice, couscous or whatever else you would like to enjoy it with.
Check out the reels section of my Instagram page for a quick video showing the process here.
Any questions, feel free to send an email or message on any of my social media platform.
