Moi moi is a Yoruba food prepared with beans. This dish is delicious, soft and fluffy and in this beans recipe you’ll learn all you need to know to prepare moi moi from scratch at home.
- Simple ingredients need to make moi moi at home
- How to prepare delicious moi moi elewe
- How to peel beans for moi moi
- How to clean moi moi leaves before use
- How to fold moi moi leaf well so that the beans mixture is well contained and doesn’t leak out while steaming.
This food is called moi moi elewe which means moi moi wrapped in leaves.
The special leaf for wrapping this food is called ewe moi moi and it can be easily purchased in Nigerian markets.
Over time, many people shy away from using ewe moi moi to wrap moi moi because of difficulty in folding the leaf well to contain the moi moi mixture before steaming.
As a result, many home cooks steam the beans mixture in reusable containers such as food grade pouches, ceramic pudding bowls or tin containers.
Ingredients
- 2 cups brown beans
- 2 eggs
- 1/3 cup groundnut oil
- 3 seasoning cubes
- 2 red bell peppers
- 1 onion
- 1/2 tbsp salt
- 5 shombo (cayenne pepper)
- Moi moi leaves
- 1/2 tsp salt
How to prepare moi moi from scratch at home
Step One: Peel the beans
- Measure two cups of oloyin beans in a bowl
- Fill the bowl with water till the water covers the beans
- Allow to soak for 5-10 minutes then transfer the beans and the water into your food processor
- Process the beans on the low setting till the beans skin is decently peeled
- Pour all the content to the food processor into a bowl
- At this point, the beans should be about 70-80 percent peeled
- Now peel the remaining unpeeled portion of the beans by hand
- Steadily remove the beans skin with the water used for peeling until the beans properly peeled
- To save water, the water used for the peeling can be recycled multiple times but ensure that the final cleaning is done with fresh water.
- After the final rinse, fill the bowl of beans with water, cover with a lid
- Put it in the fridge the overnight or for 12 hours to soften for easy grinding.
Step two : Prepare the leaves
To cook moi moi elewe at home the fist step is to ensure that the moi leaves are prepared the right way so that the moi moi mixture can be easily cooked in them with out worries
- Fill a big bowl with clean water
- Pour 2-3 tbsp salt in the water and mix well till it dissolves
- Untie the leaves and put them in the bowl of salty water
- Thoroughly clean both sides of each leaf with the water
- Then break the stick in the middle of the leaf in an upward motion
- Cut off the stick at the top of the leaf with a knife of scissors
- Repeat this process for each leaf until all the leaves have been cleaned
- Dispose the water used for the first cleaning
- Fill the bowl with a lot of clean water again
- Do not add salt in this water
- Clean the leaves the second time with the water
- Place clean leaves upright in a bowl or basket to remove water used for cleaning them
Step Three : Prepare moi moi mixture
For better context, red long pepper is called shombo in Nigeria.
- Get onions, scotch bonnet pepper or chilli pepper, bell pepper and red long pepper
- Clean everything with water, also remember to peel off the skin of the onions and set aside
- Bring the peeled beans out of the fridge
- Remove the water used for soaking them
- Rinse again with clean water
- Then put the peeled beans, onions and peppers in a bowl
- Put everything in a blender
- Add 3-4 cups water and blend till it is smooth
- Pour the blended beans mixture into a big bowl
- Crack 2 raw eggs into it and season with 1/2 tbsp salt
- Also crush three (3) seasoning cubes into it and 1/3 cup groundnut oil or any vegetable oil of your choice
- Mix well with a whisk or turning stick till everything combines well
- Moi moi mixture is now ready
- Place a pot of water on your stove and allow to boil
- While the water is boiling, fold moi moi leaves well to make space in the centre
- Scoop some moi moi mixture and carefully pour it into the space in the middle of the leaf
- Then the close the leaf and arrange it in a steaming pot
- Repeat the process until all the mixture have been wrapped up well
- Place the steaming pot on top of the boiling water
- Cover with the lid and steam for 35 minutes
- If water dries up while steaming, add more water to the pot and continue steaming
- After 35 minutes, delicous moi moi is ready
Allow to cool down, open the leaves to enjoy delicious moi moi. It can be served as it is, as side dish for any rice dish or with traditional puddings such as eko.
Readily available to you is a free recipe video on how to make simple moi moi elewe for your friends and family at home. In this video, you’ll learn a simple moi moi leaf folding tutorial on how to salvage leaves with holes in them for wrapping moi moi.
