My favorite Ghanaian foods!

Ghanaian food!

This was my first meal:


(clockwise): Chicken, fried yam, fried plantains, some type of veggie peppe, stir-fried vegetables, jollaf rice.

If I could describe Ghanaian food in three words, I would say.. filling, satisfying, tasty. However, it is definitely something that I had to grow on me. When I first had the true varieties of Ghanaian food, I found it very heavy, carb-y, and oily. After realizing though, that many Ghanaians only ate once a day, with perhaps, a small breakfast of bread and tea, I could understand why they offered such big portions.

Here are some of my other favorites!


Fufu with groundnut stew and light soup and a piece of Chicken. Best eaten at lunch time to avoid sleeping on a full fufu baby stomach.

Fufu is pounded cassava-I actually made some on my last day there at a friend’s house. Goundnut stew is like.. a peanut buttery soup. However, I found it a bit too creamy and fatty for my liking, so I like to mix it with some light soup (spicy chicken broth of sorts) to lighten it up. Top it off with a piece of goat meat or chicken meat and I am a happy camper. :)

This mean costs about... (average 40 cents per ball of fufu, .60-2.00 for a piece of meat depending on where you go and how big the piece of meat is)


Alice and Megan special: two hardboiled eggs, a few pieces of fried plantain, salad with ketchup and salad cream, spaghetti noodles with tomato stew, on a bed of jollaf rice and waachye. Best for dinnertime when you wanted something on the “light” side.

Megan and I would always split this dish after class at the night market (eatery near the International Student Hostel). It would cost us about 2 ghana cedis (less than 2 US dollars), be completely vegetarian, and we would get our fix of raw veggies (via cabbage salad).

It was sooo good!


in the back: Red-Red (deep fried plantains with oily beans). Usually only served at lunch, best for lunch in case the beans don’t sit well :)

This was another lunch-time favorite for me. I would usually get it with a side of avocado to mix up the flavor. My favorite place to order red-red was at the one stand right when you enter bush canteen. I would get 40 cents of plantains, 40 cents of beans, 20 cents avocado and a side of pure water. I would be full till dinner, sometimes even the next day.


Here’s another special- vegetable stew with rice- that we would cook all the time in our room. Vegetarian friendly!

There are usually a set variety of things that Ghanaians eat. I would usually purchase from various stands on and off campus, and each stand would sell a specific type of food. It was all so cheap, so simple, and with such fresh ingredients--I definitely miss it. Top off a meal with a 10 cent orange or some fresh cut pineapple and I was ready for the rest of the day. :)

These were my four favorite Ghanaian dishes. There are more Ghanaian varieties in the Cooking entry. :)

I wish I took more pictures. Some of these shots are courtesy of friends who went to Ghana. :)