Yellow starchy garri | farinha

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Garri is a staple in many African countries and  Brazil. It is known as farinha in Brazil. It is made with cassava roots. The roots are peeled, ground and moisture is squeezed before pan frying it. Garri can be soaked in water  with sugar, salt, roasted groundnuts and sometimes milk and consumed as a meal. It can be made into what Nigerians call eba which is paired with any Nigerian soup. Garri can also be used to make other quick dishes. Starch is a by-product of garri making. The starch can be used as a thickener or to make what the Urhobos call Usi. Usi is a form of what is popularly known as fufu. The starch is mixed with water and palm oil and cooked until it forms a very thick and stretchy mass. It is eaten with the popular banga soup or  Oghwo evwri

• Wash and peel the cassava. Cut them into smaller chunks so that it would be easier for the blend to them. Use a specific amount of water to blend everything so as not to extract too much starch.
• Pour the blended cassava into a strainer lined with a chiffon cloth or cheese cloth and let it drain into a bowl. After exhausting the initial quantity of water, you can reuse the drained starchy water to continue to blend the remaining cassava.
• Use the chiffon cloth to squeeze out as much water as possible from it. Place weight on the blended cassava to remove the remaining water. Let it sit for three days so that it can ferment and give it that signature garri taste. Each day for three days, you can manually try to squeeze out more water.
• Starch is a by-product of cassava. The starch is extracted with the water. The starch settles at the bottom of the bowl. Decant the water, collect the starch and either refrigerate it or spread it out to dry and turn it into powder.
• On the third day, it would have formed a solid mass because most of the moisture had  been removed.  Place it into a large bowl and break it down, add a little bit of palm oil at a time and rub it in until you have achieved a light yellow color. The color is always darker after it has been fried. Pass it through a strainer or colander by rubbing it against the side. This would separate each granules and fluff it. Throw away whatever could not pass through the colander.
• Use a wide pan to fry the garri over medium heat. Start with a small quantity and stir it continuously at first so that the granules would not stick to the bottom of the pan. Add more to the pan when the first batch looks dry. This acts as a buffer by preventing the subsequent batch from sticking to the pan and makes it easier to fry the rest.  Fry the garri until it feels like sand to touch. It should feel like beach sand. Remove from heat and let it cool as you repeat the same process until you are done. Store the garri in a dry place.

Ingredients

• Cassava
• Palm oil