Okra Stew · Slimy Texture
Delele
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Cooks sometimes add a small amount of baking soda specifically to intensify, not reduce, the dish's characteristic slipperiness.
Fresh okra is chopped and boiled down, sometimes with a pinch of bicarbonate of soda, into a deliberately slick, mucilaginous stew that's spooned over nshima. It's a polarising dish — locals either love the texture or avoid it — sold at nsima stalls around Ndola's markets.
Why it's made this way: Delele's texture is the point rather than a flaw: the sliminess is prized for how easily it helps nshima go down, valued in Copperbelt households much as okra dishes are prized across West and Central Africa.
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Part of World of Street Food — 3248 dishes from 118 countries.
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