Moi Moi (Steamed Bean Pudding)

Soak the beans about 15 minutes — drier beans loosen faster than fresher ones, so go by the look of the skins rather than the clock.

💡 She makes this point explicitly: soaking time depends on how dry your beans are. When the skins look puffed and slip under your thumb, they are ready.

Tip the beans into a blender with twice their volume of water and blend in bursts of 3–4 seconds, repeating 3 or 4 times.

💡 Her warning, in her words: you are peeling the beans, not blending them. Short bursts strip the skins; a continuous blend purées everything and the dish is lost before it starts.

Pour the beans into a large bowl and add enough water to cover them completely. Agitate them with your fingers — the skins lift and float.

Quickly pour the floating skins through a sieve to separate them from the beans, and repeat until the beans are clean.

Put the peeled beans in the blender with the red pepper, habanero and onion, and blend to the smoothest consistency you can manage.

💡 Smooth is not optional here the way it is with akara. Any grain you leave in the blender stays in the finished pudding, and moi moi is judged on being silky.

Combine the blended mixture with the ginger, crayfish, oil, bouillon, minced fish and salt — everything except the boiled eggs.

Brush or spray your containers with oil — ramekins, small bowls or foil moulds all work.

Pour the mixture into the containers, set a hard-boiled egg on each, and cover with a lid or seal with foil.

Line the base of a large pot with foil, sticks or leaves, then add water — enough to steam, but not enough to submerge the containers.

💡 The lining is insurance: if the water boils dry before the moi moi sets, the containers sit on the lining instead of the scorching base. Traditionally this is banana or uma leaves, which perfume the pudding as it steams.

Arrange the containers in the pot, cover, and steam over medium heat.

Cook 45 minutes to 1 hour, depending on how much mixture is in each container.

💡 Check the water level halfway. A pot that boils dry will scorch and put a burnt smell through every container at once.

Test it: slide a toothpick into the middle of one. It should come out fairly clean, not wet.

💡 A wet toothpick means it needs another 10 minutes. Under-set moi moi collapses into a puddle the moment you turn it out.

Take them off the heat and serve — hot, with pap, rice, bread or on its own.