Cameroon – Yam Tubers With Green Vegetable Leaves

by Joella Eve

Yam tubers with green vegetable leaves is a common meal in Cameroon. It is a common meal in that it tells the story of a people that live by Divine Instructions, tilting the soil. Having yam tubers is not a small job. It starts from the planting to the cooking. Yam tubers is being cultivated in harsh conditions since it can live on its own. What makes it hard is the planting and the harvesting of this God given food. Planting yam tubers demands so much energy. The soil is being dug during the dry seasons when it is extremely hard, thus demanding so much physical power. The good thing about yam tubers is that, with the help of its roots, it can easily extract water from the soil and store it up. As the planting of yam tubers is extremely hard and tedious, it is the same thing that applies with harvest time. To have yam tubers, you have to dig the ground again in order to remove it from beneath the earth. It also demands with physicality. It is not meant for the weak, but for the strong. Getting yam tubers is hard, cooking it another story. Yam tubers though can be cooked with different things, it is more often prepared with green vegetable leaves. Green vegetable leaves is very bitter, so it gives a taste of bitterness when cooked it with yam tubers as the people that eat this food do not care much about the taste but the wellbeing it offers them after they eat this food. This is story of the people of Nanga-Ebogo in Cameroon.

Cooking method

The method used to cook this delicious meal is boiling and mixing. There is no frying, just boiling and mixing.

Cooking Ingredients

1. Half bucket of 5 liters of yam tubers
2. A packet of fresh green vegetables leaves
3. Red oil
4. Salt

No Maggi or any other substance is needed in cooking this meal, only salt is enough to cook this food.

Cooking procedure

1. Remove the peelings off the yam tubers.
2. Use a knife to do that. If you have something else, you can still use it.
3. Cleaning the yam tubers can take twenty minutes or more.
4. Dip the yam tubers in a bowl or basin of water after cleaning it.
5. Allow inside water for like five minutes.
6. After five minutes in a basin of water, wash it thoroughly.
7. After washing, rinse it.
8. Prepare the green vegetables leaves by washing the leaves. Do not cut it, just wash it. That’s all. Wash it many times over and over till you feel it is less bitter.
9. Begin boiling the yam tubers. Boil for thirty minutes. After thirty minutes, send the green vegetable leaves in the food.
10. With a lid, close the pot.
11. Since the food is good by boiling, when the vegetable leaves have stayed on fire for ten minutes, pour in salt and red oil and close your food.
12. Make sure to lower the fire since you will be cooking on low heat fire to avoid the food from burning.

This is how Yam tubers with green vegetable leaves is prepared.