Akassa

fermented maize dough steamed in leaves: the sour white staple of the Beninese coast, eaten with everything and made every day

Origin: Cotonou, Porto-Novo & Southern Benin

From the journey of Corn.

Akassa is what the maize of southern Benin becomes. The grain is soaked for a day or two, milled wet, and then left to ferment for another two or three days before it is cooked into a stiff paste and wrapped, still hot, in leaves. The fermentation is the whole point. It gives the dough a clean lactic sourness that cuts through the very rich sauces it is eaten with, and it does something the cook cares about more: it makes the maize keep, and digest, in a climate where neither could be assumed. Maize is American and reached the Bight of Benin with the Portuguese in the sixteenth century, but the technique applied to it was already ancient. West African cooking had long fermented sorghum and millet into sour porridges, and the new grain was pushed straight into that mould. The result belongs to a family that runs the length of the coast: Ghanaian kenkey and banku are close cousins, and the differences between them are matters of how long the ferment runs and whether the dough is cooked before or after wrapping. The leaf wrapping is not decoration. Akassa is sold from basins in the market as small wrapped cylinders, and the leaf is the packaging, the mould, and a faint additional flavour. Togo makes it identically, under the same name.

Ingredients

  • 700 g white maize meal, medium grind
  • 2 litres water, plus more for the ferment
  • 1 tsp salt (optional; traditionally omitted)
  • 12 banana leaves or maize husks, softened in hot water, for wrapping

Method

  1. Put the maize meal in a large bowl and cover with cold water by 5cm. Stir, cover with a cloth, and leave at room temperature.
  2. Leave to ferment for three days. Change nothing and stir once a day. A layer of water will sit on top and the smell will turn distinctly sour and slightly sharp, like a mild sourdough starter. In a cool kitchen give it four days.
  3. Pour off the surface water. Stir the settled dough smooth and divide it in two.
  4. Bring 1 litre of water to the boil in a heavy pan. Whisk in half the fermented dough and cook, stirring hard with a wooden spoon, until it thickens into a smooth stiff paste that pulls away from the sides, about fifteen minutes.
  5. Beat in the remaining raw dough a little at a time, working out every lump. Cook for a further ten to fifteen minutes over a low heat, stirring constantly. The paste is ready when a spoon stands up in it and it no longer tastes of raw flour.
  6. Spoon portions onto the softened leaves while still hot, fold into parcels, and leave to set for at least thirty minutes. They firm as they cool.
  7. Serve at room temperature with a groundnut sauce, a tomato and chilli sauce, or fried fish.

Notes

The ferment cannot be rushed and cannot be faked with an acid; the sourness of akassa is lactic and develops over days. Warmth speeds it, so a kitchen at 28°C may be ready in two days and a cold one may need five. Trust the smell rather than the clock. If a pink or fuzzy growth appears, discard and start again. Without leaves, small bowls lined with cling film will shape it acceptably, though the flavour the leaf gives is lost.

The Gastrographer

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Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control
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