Nkatenkwan is Ghana's groundnut (peanut) soup. The name comes from Akan in the Ashanti region — "nkate" means groundnut and "nkwan" means soup. Ghanaians widely credit its origin to the Hausa, though it is now enjoyed nationwide. Peanuts themselves arrived from the New World, brought to the West African coast by Portuguese and Spanish traders, gradually supplanting the native Bambara groundnut. Around the same era the tsetse fly made cattle-rearing impossible across much of Ghana; with little milk or dairy, cooks turned to ground peanuts to make their soups rich and creamy — and the soup took hold. It is chicken, goat or guinea fowl simmered in a deep peanut broth, served over rice balls (omo tuo) or fufu.
Velvety and full-bodied, it coats the spoon with roasted-peanut depth balanced by tangy tomato and a slow scotch-bonnet heat. The meat falls apart tender and the broth is at once nutty, savoury and gently sweet. Ladled over soft rice balls, it is the definition of Sunday comfort.
Peanut butter emulsifies into the watery broth as it simmers, thickening the soup and releasing its oils, which carry roasted, savoury flavour. Long simmering melds the chilli, tomato and meat into a unified, rounded depth.
Variations
with chicken (akoko nkatenkwan), with goat or oxtail, with boiled eggs added, made with garden eggs and mushrooms
On the Palate
Where Nkatenkwan (Groundnut Soup) sits in the Ghanaian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 5
How it's made
8 steps · 20 min
- 110 min
Season chicken or goat with salt, onion and ginger and brown lightly in a pot.
- 225 min
Add chopped tomato, onion, scotch bonnet and water, then simmer until the meat is tender.
- 35 min
Loosen peanut butter with warm broth until smooth and lump-free.
Watch outWhisk the peanut butter with warm broth until it's a smooth cream with no lumps before it goes in — lumps never dissolve later.
- 43 min
Stir the peanut butter into the simmering pot and lower the heat.
- 535 min
Simmer gently, stirring often so it does not catch, for 30 to 40 minutes.
Watch outStir often and keep the simmer gentle; peanut butter sinks and scorches fast, and a burnt bottom taints the whole pot.
- 63 min
Skim off the orange oil that rises to the surface as it cooks.
Watch outSkim the orange oil that floats up so the soup tastes clean, not greasy — that rising oil is the sign it's cooked enough.
- 73 min
Adjust salt and heat, and thin with water to your preferred body.
- 82 min
Serve hot over omo tuo rice balls or with fufu.
