In the Ghanaian town of Tamale, about 650 kilometres north of Accra, chef Khadija Iddi Yussif is reinterpreting the foods of her childhood into what we might call nouveau cuisine du Sahel.
Working with local women and mostly hyperlocal ingredients, Iddi Yussif is still in the early experimental stage. While her husband, the artist Ibrahim Mahama, is busy turning what seems like the whole city into a series of interlocking art spaces, her focus is on how to bring local cuisine into the modern era.
Tamale’s economy revolves around agriculture, particularly cattle rearing common to the Sahelian belt, but also grains and shea cultivation. Not surprisingly, traditional cuisine is fashioned around these products. Food has been mostly prepared in the same, stripped down way for generations.
Iddi Yussif, who trained in Accra, wants to make Tamale a dining destination in the same way that her husband sees the role of his massive installations. As she walked me around the Red Clay Studios campus one exceptionally hot afternoon in mid-April, she spoke excitedly about repurposing shipping containers and old train cars into dining rooms. A model traditional rondavel has been installed for this purpose.
At nightfall we sat down to a sumptuous five-course meal, prepared with the assistance of the pastry chef Kobby Brown, who had flown up country for the occasion. It’s nice to be a guest of the Mahamas! We dined on:
- Millet prawns cocktail (ingredients: millet, dawadawa, tamarind vinaigrette, prawns, yaji).
- Aleefu avocado salad (ingredients: amaranth leaves, known locally as aleefu or Chinese spinach; locally produced cheese called wagashie; and hibiscus vinaigrette).
- Wasawasa and white fish fillet (wasawasa is a staple of northern Ghana, made out of yam peels).
- Clove light soup with pinkaso.
- To finish: kpahala mousse, moringa macarons, gauss crumble.
This being a Muslim household, Khadija served no alcohol. Instead, she offered a vibrant zobo drink—made from dried hibiscus petals infused with local spices—that brought its own celebratory flavour to the gathering.