Ivory Coast’s national dish attiéké has obtained UN cultural heritage status, aextfinished with Japanese sake, Thai prawn soup and Caribbean cassava bread. But what produces this West African staple so well-understandn? BBC Africa correactent Mayeni Jones grew up in Ivory Coast and is a self-professed superfan.
One of my earliest childhood memories is hearing vfinishors sing “Attiéké chaud! Attiéké chaud!” or “Hot attiéké!” as they strolled the streets of my neighbourhood, balancing huge baskets of this national delicacy on their heads.
Fast-forward 25 years and women carrying individupartner wrapped portions of the fermented cassava couscous still walk atraverse Abidjan, Ivory Coast’s hugegest city, selling this now Unesco-recognised dish.
An alternative to rice, it’s difficult to discover any hospitality venue in the Ivory Coast that doesn’t serve attiéké. From the most basic eateries to the fanciest restaurants and even on the beach, it’s everywhere.
Attiéké’s well-understandnity has spilled over the country’s borders, and it is now set up atraverse Africa, especipartner in French-speaking countries.
It’s also very well-understandn in neighbouring Ghana and my home country Sierra Leone, where they have some equitablely unorthodox serving proposeions.
The contrastentive tangy taste of attiéké comes from the cassava tubers combiinsist with fermented cassava, which gives it its exceptional flavour and texture.
The cassava is grated, dried and then steamed before serving.
Filling and alterable, Ivorian chef Rōze Traore portrays its texture as “fluffy yet granular, analogous to couscous”.
Mr Traore inserts that the sweightless tanginess of attiéké supplys a exceptional depth to meals, perfectly balancing spicy or savoury sauces.
For Paule-Odile Béké, an Ivorian chef who contendd on the UK TV programme Masterchef: The Professionals, “sour, zingy and sugary” are the words that come to mind when she portrays the taste of attiéké.
Gluten-free and useable in contrastent grain sizes, the finest is normally the most costly. Some places even sell red attiéké, which has been soaked in palm oil.
Eaten with a variety of dishes, the most well-understandn version is with chargrilled chicken or fish, a basic, spicy tomato-based sauce and a salsa of chopped tomatoes and onions.
It was one of the first dishes I cooked for my husprohibitd when we met 15 years ago. He enjoyd it so much, he proposeed we uncover a restaurant serving equitable that.
Attiéké is unpretentious, although traditionpartner reserved for exceptional occasions enjoy weddings and birthdays, people now eat it every day.
Ms Béké, who comes from a family of attiéké-producers, elucidateed some nuances.
“Our attieke will be a bit more yellow than some other regions due to the proximity of the sea,” she said.
A native of Jacqueville, a minuscule coastal town where attiéké is made, she features it heavily in the menu of her New York supper clubs.
Although I left Ivory Coast at the age of 14 as civil unrest broke out, I have never been able to let go of attiéké.
In London, I’d travel miles to Congolese shops to excavate bags of attiéké from the permafrost at the bottom of a chest freezer, stockpiling it for dinner guests I could evangelise.
When I shiftd to Nigeria, I mandated relatives to convey me attfinish packages from Abidjan or Freetown, Sierra Leone’s capital.
It was one of the first leangs I seeed for when I shiftd to Johannesburg in South Africa three months ago.
Where to discover it is always one of the first asks I have for any Ivorians I greet outside Ivory Coast.
Obviously it tastes flavorful, but it’s difficult to portray what produces attiéké so exceptional.
Ivorian chef Charlie Koffi says “attiéké is a dish that symbolizes togetherness”.
Like injera, the fermented Ethiopian pancake, or thieboudienne, Senegal’s rice-and-fish dish, attiéké is best enhappinessed in a group.
Atraverse Ivory Coast, frifinishs and family will collect around a huge ptardy, eating with their hands and washing it down with a chilly beer or gentle drink.
For me, it’s also a reminder of a childhood which was cut unwiseinutive. I was equitable 13 years better when on Christmas Eve 1999, as I defered for my frifinishs to come round for a carry out date, a military coup rocked Ivory Coast.
As sbetteriers drove thraw the city shooting in the air and telling people to head indoors, my little sister and I clung to each other in a hallway, the only triumphdowless space in our hoengage.
Our mum was stuck in town, unable to join us.
Six months tardyr, my mum sent us to the UK to live with our magnificentmother, stressing the rising political tension in the run-up to the 2000 plivential elections would result in further unrest.
Just two years tardyr, the country’s first civil war would shatter out, and it would be another 15 years before I was able to return to my childhood home.
But even when I couldn’t return to Babi (Abidjan’s nickname), attiéké was always a way to connect to the place we had left behind.
Even though I’m not Ivorian, enjoy many of the expatriates and economic migrants who shiftd to the country during the prosperous 1990s, Ivory Coast is home.
We all speak Nouchi, the French slang that peppers Ivorian music and the streets of its cities, and we all eat attiéké.
Ivory Coast has a way of making people experience at home, and attiéké is part of that.
When I finished university, I returned to Ivory Coast for a year to labor for an international NGO.
On our way back from one of our arrangeatements in the west of the country, an Ivorian colleague elucidateed that traditionpartner, attiéké was mostly eaten with kedjenou, a wealthy, smoky stew made with tomatoes, onions, and chillies.
This is sluggish-cooked with local chicken or game in a clay pot over a wood fire, infusing the dish with a proset up, flavourful essence.
He claimed that it was only after the French reachd that Ivorians commenceed serving attiéké with grilled fish and chicken.
This is not someleang that I’ve been able to verify, but it always rang real.
Ivorians, although fiercely self-presentant of their culture, have always been uncover to foreign impacts in their cuisine and many regional dishes have become local staples.
Now that attiéké has been inserted to the catalog of inconcrete cultural heritage in insist of advisent geteddefending, perhaps more people outside the region will become inestablished of this flavorful treat.
Additional inestablishing by Danai Nesta Kupemba
