Hygiene/Health
How To Make The Best Nigerian Stew
by
Adekunle Olopade
Minute read
4 minutes
Published Date
Most men learn to cook late, or not at all, and when they do, a woman usually teaches them. So when Chef Otega, the former Big Brother Naija housemate, shared his own goat meat stew recipe, we took notice: a man showing men how it is done. Here is the method, what is in the pot, and what it does for a man's body.
Chef Otega, the former Big Brother Naija housemate, recently shared his goat meat stew recipe online with a bold headline: it is, in his words, the best stew you will ever taste. Whether or not you agree, he did something plenty of men never do. He put the whole method on the table, step by step, for anyone to follow.
We watched it with two questions in mind. Could a complete beginner actually cook this? And what is that pot doing for the man who eats it? This piece answers both and makes the case for why every man should be able to cook at least one dish like it.
The Skill Nobody Handed Him
Ask a room of grown men who taught them to cook and plenty will name a mother, a sister, an aunt or a girlfriend. A lot will say nobody. That is not a criticism of the women who did the teaching. It is a gap in how boys are raised: the kitchen got treated as someone else's room, and boys grew up learning to be served.
The cost shows up quietly. A man who cannot cook has little say over what he eats. He takes whatever is cheapest, fastest or nearest, pays for it twice, in money and in how he feels, and when whoever usually feeds him is not around, he is stuck. A man who can make one good pot has a basic form of independence that nobody can switch off.
It also matters who does the showing. When boys only ever watch women do the cooking, it can quietly teach them it is not their job. Watching a man do it, calmly and well, tells them it is a man's skill too, and one worth owning.
The Pot, Step by Step
This method is built from Otega's own recipe and written so a first-timer can follow it. It makes a big pot (of goat meat), which is the point: cook once, eat for days. Of course, you can use your own protein.
1. The goat. Season 1.5kg of goat meat with a large onion, a teaspoon each of thyme and curry powder, half a teaspoon of black pepper, one small cinnamon stick, and salt and seasoning to taste. Add water and cook until tender. Keep the stock: Otega treats it as the backbone of the whole dish. The cinnamon is his one secret. It is not there to taste like cinnamon, only to add a quiet warmth and depth.
2. The pepper base. Roast 1kg of ripe tomatoes, 500g of red tatashe, 3 to 5 scotch bonnets, a large onion, and a red bell pepper until they are lightly charred and blistered. Blend them with as little water as possible.
3. The stew. Heat 350 to 450ml of neutral oil, fry a sliced onion, then stir in 2 to 3 tablespoons of tomato paste for a few minutes. Add the blended pepper and cook it patiently, without rushing, until it darkens, thickens, and the oil rises back to the top. Pour in 1 to 1.5 litres of the reserved stock gradually, add a teaspoon each of rosemary and curry powder, and season with salt, seasoning, and MSG to taste. Return the goat and simmer for another 15 to 20 minutes, then taste and adjust.
4. Rest it. Otega's golden rule is not to serve it straight away. Let the stew settle, and if you can manage the patience, eat it the next day when the flavour is deeper. Served over white rice with the goat, he calls it a dangerous combination.
What It Does for Your Body
The recipe is built for flavour first. The good news is that most of what goes into it does real work for a man's body, and a few small changes, covered in the next section, tilt it further toward health.
Goat meat: protein, iron and zinc. Goat is a good source of high-quality protein, which men need to build and keep muscle, and it is generally leaner than beef. It also carries iron, which supports energy, and zinc, which the body needs to produce testosterone and healthy sperm. Getting enough zinc matters. Taking more than you need does not make you superhuman.
Tomatoes and peppers: lycopene and vitamin C. Tomatoes are rich in lycopene, and cooking them with a little fat, as a stew does, makes it easier for the body to absorb. Some studies link diets high in tomato products with a lower risk of prostate problems, but the research is not conclusive, so treat it as a bonus and not a shield. Red tatashe and bell pepper add vitamin C and carotenoids, and roasting them builds flavour without extra oil.
Heart, blood flow and sex. A man's sexual health is closely tied to his blood vessels. Erectile difficulty is often an early warning sign of cardiovascular trouble, and the habits that protect the heart, such as more vegetables, lean protein, less salt and less fried or processed food, also support circulation. No stew is a miracle, but a man who eats this way consistently is looking after the same system his performance depends on.
Onions, herbs and spices: small amounts, real flavour. Onions bring fibre that feeds the good bacteria in your gut, plus antioxidants such as quercetin. Thyme, rosemary and black pepper add flavour and plant compounds, but at stew quantities their health effect is modest. The same goes for the cinnamon: lovely depth, no medical claims. Their real value is that good flavour makes it easier to keep eating well.
Energy, weight and control. Cooking at home means you decide how much oil, salt and seasoning goes in. That matters because excess sodium pushes up blood pressure, and extra fat around the waist, where men tend to store it, raises heart risk. A stew you cook yourself, portioned and eaten with vegetables, is far easier to manage than whatever the roadside or a delivery app puts in front of you.
"Save the stock. That's liquid gold." - Otega
Make It Lighter Without Making It Boring
A stew fried down in a generous amount of oil is a special-occasion pot unless you adjust it. These simple moves keep the flavour and cut the load.
Measure the oil. Start at the low end of the range and measure instead of pouring. When the oil rises back to the top, skim off the excess before adding the stock.
Lift the fat off the stock. Let the stock cool, or chill it, and remove the layer of fat that rises before you use it.
Trim the goat. Cut off visible fat before cooking. Goat is lean, so there is little to remove.
Taste before you salt. Salt, seasoning cubes and MSG all add sodium. Add them in stages and stop earlier than you think you should.
Build a better plate. Serve a smaller portion of rice with vegetables or beans on the side, so the plate is not just stew and starch.
Cook once, portion for the week. Divide the pot into containers and freeze them. This is how a man eats well on the days he does not feel like cooking.
Cook it on a weekend, let it rest overnight as Otega advises, and you have lunches and dinners sorted for days without a delivery app.
Learn One Pot
For most men, the honest answer to "who taught you to cook?" is a short one. This piece is a small attempt to change that answer for the next generation.
It connects to the work at PTBCI. A boy who is shown how to feed himself grows into a man who does not have to outsource a basic need, and who can one day feed someone else. It is a small skill with a big return, and exactly the kind of thing that never gets taught when no one is in the room.
So here is the challenge: cook this stew this weekend, let it rest overnight, and teach one boy or young man how you did it.
