African food is hard to find in Ireland, but there are a few shops selling it and at least one restaurant serving it. Corinna Hardgravetastes some Nigerian home cooking
"Nobody knows exactly how many Africans there are in Ireland," says Chinedu Onyejelem, editor of Metro Eireann, a Dublin-based newspaper for Africans. "But the figure that is most commonly used is 30,000, with 50 per cent from Nigeria and the rest from Ghana, Uganda, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Senegal, among others. About half of the African community lives in Dublin."
So how does the community find African food in Ireland? There are a number of food shops, and restaurants in the Parnell Street-Moore Street area of Dublin serving African food. That food is mostly Nigerian-influenced, says Onyejelem.
In the Oceanic Superstore in Moore Street the shelves are stocked with bags of various types of flour - from ground melon seed to pounded yam - and the freezer is packed with frozen fish and chickens. Further down Moore Street is Mercy Newti, a Nigerian restaurant, up two flights of stairs over a hairdressing salon. It has four tables, and the well equipped kitchen is larger than the diningroom. "Most of the people who come here are African," Mercy Newti tells me, "but there is one Irish woman who drops in regularly for the jollof rice, which is made with tomatoes and chilli. I do three Nigerian dishes each day, and they cost €7 each. To takeaway, it's €5."
In Charlie C4, on Parnell Street, African music is playing. There are children's shoes in the window, hair extensions and beauty products near the front of the shop, plantains, okra and African chillies half-way down, and shelves and freezers of food at the back.
"When I started working here six years ago, it was called Tropical and it was the first African shop in Ireland," says Charlie Domingo, who is Angolan. "I bought it two years ago and renamed it Charlie C4. The C4 is because it was in 2004," he adds. Much of the frozen fish - catfish, titus and tilapia - is imported from Thailand, and there are shelves of beans and flours from Nigeria, Cameroon, Angola, South Africa and Kenya.
Tunde Adebiyi, a Nigerian, is a medical scientist who has been working in Monaghan General Hospital for the past year. He comes down to Domingo's shop at least twice a month to stock up. "These are the starchy staples of Africa," he explains as he shows me various bags of flour: garri made from ground cassava, pounded yam and ground tapioca. "We eat them with our meal just as you eat mashed potato."
Stephanie Ogbeiwi from Edo Province in Nigeria is the shop's next customer. "You're lucky I came into the shop," she says. "I love to cook. If you want, I will show you some typical Nigerian dishes." She's 17 years old and she looks young, but there is a maturity about her that is unusual for her age.
A few days later, we meet in Ogbeiwi's house in Fairview, Dublin 3. Displaying incredible knife skills, Ogbeiwi deftly joints a chicken and tosses it and some beef pieces into a pot of simmering water. Spinach leaves are rolled and held in the air with one hand while the other is used to shred them into a bowl with a knife. Ogbeiwi barely uses the chopping board. Cans of tomatoes are opened with the same knife. "This is how we do it in Africa," she says, "but over there only the rich people have meat. We just eat whatever we have that day."
It is very important for an African girl to know how to cook, she tells me; otherwise she will find it hard to get a husband. She has no problem with this. She loves cooking and can't understand why "rich" people in Nigeria hire someone to do the cooking for them.
As she cooks and we chat, her story gradually unfolds. When she was 12 years old, her mother was shot dead in the market where she worked. As her father had left them, her only brother ran out to avenge the killers and he was shot, too. Concerned neighbours brought Ogbeiwi and two of her sisters to a refuge. Her third sister, Bridget, was elsewhere at the time and was protected by a priest, who then helped her to get out of the country.
After working as a cleaner in Dublin, Bridget paid for her three younger sisters to visit her. They applied, not for asylum, but to stay on as students. Bridget, who is now married, supports the girls, who are studying for their Leaving Certificates in Dennehy's Community School in Donaghmede. Stephanie wants to become an accountant.
The cooking continues. Dried, smoked catfish and two chicken stock cubes go into a pot of simmering water for the egusi soup. Ground marrow seeds and saffron-coloured palm oil are mixed together and stirred in. The boiled chicken and beef is deep fried and added to the pot, followed by the shredded spinach and bitter leaves.
When we eat it later, using balls of pounded yam, I find the taste interesting, but a little bit strong. The stew, made from tomatoes and chillies, is the sauce that goes on jollof rice. Ogbeiwi says all her Irish friends prefer the stew, and that's why she wanted to make the two dishes. u