How to Make Shito

There are a number of articles already online about how to make Shito. One thing that’s lacking from existing recipes, however, is clarity on how to accurately measure each ingredient used to make Shito. This article uses weights of the ingredients rather than quantity (eg. 1000g of blended onion vs 3 large onions) to improve precision as far as how much of each ingredient is required.

Ingredients:

500ml vegetable oil 1 3tbsp salt
120g of ginger (blended) 1 tin of tomato paste
30g of garlic cloves (blended) 200g of fish powder
1000g of onion (blended) 200g of Chilli flakes 2
1 tin of tomato paste

1 Separate oil into two halves
2 200g of chilli flakes would make shito considered very spicy by non-Ghanaian standards. Adjust according to preference

Directions

  1. In a large saucepan pour half of your vegetable oil (250ml) and heat on medium heat until oil is ready to use for frying
  2. Pour in your blended onions, ginger, garlic and tomato paste and mix thoroughly until you have a puree with a single pinkish color
  3. Keep cooking this puree on medium heat, stirring intermittently for 30 minutes. The goal here is to prevent the bottom of your puree from burning, so stirring in 3 – 5 minute intervals should do the trick.
  4. After 30 minutes of stirring, add your chilli flakes and keep stirring intermittently until your puree starts to turn darker, this might take a while, but you want your chilli to be cooked through to prevent heart burn
  5. Once your puree turns darker, add the rest of your dry ingredients — the fish powder,  shrimp powder and salt to the mix and stir. You’ll find the consistency of your puree gets significantly thicker after you do this — don’t panic, keep stirring and pour in the remaining half of your vegetable oil.
  6. Mix thoroughly until you have an even consistency — you’ll notice your Shito starting to turn it’s signature black hue — keep stirring to get an even a consistency as possible.
  7. Leave to cook on low heat for about 25 minutes.
  8. You’re done. Enjoy the incomparable taste of your Shito Hot Sauce!
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