the dark Yoruba swallow of yam flour: elubo stirred into boiling water until it turns glossy brown, eaten with ewedu, gbegiri, and pepper stew
Origin: Ibadan, Oyo & Yorubaland
From the journey of Yam.
Àmàlà is made from elubo, yam flour, and the flour is made by peeling yam, slicing it, drying it in the sun until it turns from white to brown, and milling it. That browning is what gives the dish its colour: amala is not a dark food that has been coloured, it is a white tuber that has been dried. Stirred hard into boiling water with a wooden turner, the flour swells into a smooth, glossy, elastic swallow, softer and stickier than pounded yam. The dish belongs to the Yoruba of Oyo and Ibadan above all, and its classic service is abula: amala with ewedu, the mucilaginous jute-leaf soup, gbegiri, the smooth cowpea soup, and a red pepper stew, ladled side by side so that the eater mixes them on the plate. The buka, the roadside eating house that serves it, is called an amala joint, and Lagos argues about which is best. There is a white version, amala funfun, made from flour milled from peeled yam that has been dried out of the sun, and a cassava version, lafun, which is a different food under a borrowed method.
Elubo is sold in African grocers as yam flour; check the label, since cassava flour (lafun) is sold in similar bags and behaves differently. Amala hardens quickly. It is made to order, eaten immediately, and never reheated well.
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