Food Safari - FIRE
Food Safari returns in a blaze of glory introducing all you need to know about fire, including an episode on smoking where Maeve learns all ancient art of making Shito from Kunle Adesua. In this flame-cooking master
Smoked fish is ‘food for the Gods’. In the worship of ancestral deities and divinities, smoked fish must be present at the alter. In the early days smoked fish were so valuable that, they were means of exchange. Smoked fish is a cultural icon and are still part of the bridal dowry settlement in many cultures across West Africa.
Kunle Adesua is the founder and director of Tribal Tastes Foods. He is a pioneer of physical food processing techniques. Kunle manufactures an array of foods that can last up to 12 months without use of preservatives or excessive salts. Kunle’s foods are naturally sugar, dairy, gluten free. These are not trends they are tradition.
Kunle mastered smoking techniques at a very young age and has been smoking food for Australians for the last 20 years and retails from his shop at Melbourne’s iconic Queen Victoria Market. At Kunle’s smoke house red gum logs are the preferred smoking wood. Why red gum? Red gum is a wood that can burn for a very long time in the smokehouse. The smoking lasts up to 24 hours and red gum completes the cooking process encompassing smoking, cooking, roasting and drying.
The word Shito, pronounced Shi-to is Ga word, which means chilli. The Ga people were Yoruba people who migrated to present day Ghana thousands of years ago. Shito is now universally interpreted to mean hot chilli condiment.
Shito is an aromatic pleasantly hot chilli-condtiment made from smoked fish. It is very tasty and versatile. Shito is traditionally served with fried plantains, blanched green leafy vegetables such as spinach or kale and steamed rice. It can also be used as a natural seafood flavor enhancer by adding to seafood soups or pasta.
