Another week, another dish to cook! Back to the big and diverse Africa. And this time, I prepared two interesting dishes. Let’s dig into: Angola!

Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country on the western coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest Portuguese-speaking country after Brazil and ranks seventh in Africa in both total area and population.

Angola has a lot – really a lot – of history, as it has been inhabited since the Paleolithic Age. After the 13th century, much of its territory was part of the Kingdom of Kongo. Portuguese colonization began in the 16th century (which is why Portuguese is spoken there today). Angola gained independence in 1975, but soon after fell into a civil-war which lasted until 2002. 

Since then, Angola has emerged as a relatively stable constitutional republic. Its economy is among the fastest-growing in the world, with China, the European Union, and the United States being its largest trade and investment partners.

Angolan cuisine features several popular dishes, most of which are a fusion of indigenous African and Portuguese influences.

Staple ingredients include beans and rice, pork and chicken, various sauces, and vegetables such as tomatoes and onions. Garlic and other bold spices are frequently used. One of the most important staples is Funge, a type of porridge made with cassava flour.

Speaking of Funge… that is one of the two dishes I prepared this week. 

Funge is extremely simple. It’s a porridge made with just two ingredients: water and cassava flour. It’s not typically eaten on its own as a main dish, but rather served as a side for chicken, pork, or soups. That’s why I decided to prepare Funge — to accompany my second (and main) dish: Muamba.

Muamba is an aromatic chicken stew flavored with garlic, chili, vegetables, and cooked in palm oil.

Now, palm oil has had a bad reputation for a while — concerns about not being eco-friendly, saturated fat, and overall health effects. However, in recent years, that narrative has started to shift, with some sources even labeling it as “better for you than butter.”

I found my bottle of palm oil on Amazon, and after reading the label, I noticed it contains fats (as expected — it’s an oil), but no trans fat, cholesterol, or sodium. It’s 100% natural and contains no artificial ingredients.

And I’ve heard that in the U.S., it’s available at Trader Joe’s, which makes it even easier to find.

450g (0.99 lbs) of cassava flour

½ cup of water (minimum)

1.59kg (3½ lbs) chicken cut into pieces

Juice of half a lemon

1 tsp white pepper

1 tsp minced garlic

½ tsp dried thyme

1 tsp salt

½ tsp smoked paprika

½ tsp chicken bouillon powder

¼ cup canola oil

¼ cup palm oil

4-5 garlic cloves, minced

2-3 onions, sliced

2 tomatoes, diced

1 whole hot pepper, pierced (Scotch bonnet is recommended; can be substituted with habanero)

230g–450g (½–1 lb) butternut squash, cut into large cubes

18–20 okra, sliced in half

2 cups chicken broth or water

Salt to taste

From the list, I had a bit of trouble finding the cassava flour and palm oil since they weren’t available at my usual supermarket. Thankfully, Amazon saved the day with next-day delivery.

On the other hand, I was actually surprised at how easy it was to find okra — and relieved, because they’re essential to the dish. I read that okra is very popular and widely used in African cuisine, so I have a feeling it might show up again in a future recipe.

No prerequisites for this dish!

If anything, just make sure your vegetables are chopped and diced before you begin.

Two dishes mean, two results: “Amazing” and “eh… not bad, but let’s try again” – at least in my opinion.

This time I cooked at my mom’s house, so I was able to share it with more people than just my girlfriend and me.

The general consensus was that my Muamba was incredible! From the moment I started cooking it, I knew it was going to be different — and great — because of the foreign aroma the palm oil gave the chicken along with the mix of the other ingredients. I personally loved the okra, and I’d really like to explore more recipes with it. As for the rest of my family, they also enjoyed this new flavor. Plus, the chicken was tender, and the combination of spices made it incredibly flavorful.

As for the funge… I didn’t love it. According to the recipe and a couple of videos I watched, it was supposed to turn white at some point, but mine never did. It stayed a weird gray-brownish color. The texture seemed fine, but the color didn’t convince me.

However, my girlfriend loved it and said that while it maybe needed a bit more cooking time, it was exactly what she expected. And as for my family, they enjoyed it more when mixing it with the Muamba rather than eating it by itself.

So yeah – different opinions. And I don’t take this as a defeat. I take it as an opportunity to try again in other African country. At the end of the day, this is what this cooking challenge is for. 

Something interesting I learned is that ingredients can really change the perception and taste of an entire dish. In this case, the three things that made me feel like I was truly preparing — and tasting — something African were the palm oil, the okra, and the butternut squash.

I’ve always used the typical canola oil — and more extensively olive oil, coconut oil, grape-seed oil, and avocado oil — but this was my first time using palm oil. I knew it was different from the moment I opened the bottle and smelled it for the first time. It really brings a unique aroma and flavor.

The same happened with the okra and squash. I didn’t even know okra existed, and I had no idea what to expect in terms of flavor and texture. It turned out to be a delicious vegetable. If I had to compare it, I’d say it’s close to Mexican cactus. And while I had seen butternut squash before, this was also the first time I worked with it and tasted it.

This is precisely why I want to use recipes from locals and stick strictly to them. I might be missing the little tricks passed down through generations or learned by watching grandma cook… but at the end of the day, if I can use exactly the ingredients required and avoid replacing them with “something similar,” I can get closer to my goal: exploring other cuisines authentically.

Another thing I learned — which may be outside the cooking scope — is to take better pictures.

I’m in this journey to learn at least three things: how to cook, how to write, and how to take pictures. Those three are the things I enjoy the most, and I want to be better.

If you noticed, the pictures in this post are different from the ones in my last four posts. I don’t know if they’re better — I’ll let you judge that — but at least they’re different.

For the pictures in this post, I did’t use my iPhone and instead used my Sony Alpha 6100 camera that my girlfriend gifted me two years ago. I read about the basics of photography and practiced with a bowl of soup and some panoramic shots from the roof of my building, and got a small camera light for better lightning, just to level up my food photography and keep improving.

I saw different results than with the automatic mode of my phone and so far I’m happy… but I know I can improve in both my method to take pictures, and the aesthetic. 

And just like the list of countries, this is also just getting started.

With this, it’s time to wrap up Angola and travel to a new continent. In the next post, I’ll explore the first country in America: Antigua and Barbuda.