Ecadoi

 Ecadoi is a species of cleome (spider flower) that people eat as a vegetable in Uganda.  I really enjoy the dish and despite the fact that I've been growing this thing in my garden for months, I had never cooked it before.



You take tender leaves and stems of the plant, chop them up into small pieces, and boil them for quite a while, until they get very soft.  For me, it was about 45 minutes.  Once they are soft, you taste them to see if they are bitter.  If they taste bitter, pour off the water, put in fresh water, and boil them a little longer.


Once the leaves taste good, you make your peanut sauce, as with other greens such as cowpea leaves.
This involves slowly adding peanut butter (g-nut paste) until the sauce reaches the consistency you want (still runny), a pinch of salt, and some curry powder, if desired.


I have to confess that I did not taste the leaves after the first step so when my ecadoi was complete, it was really bitter.  I mean really bitter.  I tried eating it, and managed to get down half.  But I eventually had to put it in the compost.  Better luck next time.  (It looked the right way, though!)


Comments

  1. What is it called in English

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  2. Gyanandra gynanomlo or gynandropsis, cleome, spider flower

    ReplyDelete

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