A delicious, bubbling pot of African Peanut Stew with eggplant, sweet potatoes and crunchy peanuts is the ultimate fall comfort food. The spicy-sweet vegan stew is loaded with flavor from simple spices and garlicky harissa paste. It’s a dish no one will be able to resist!
This vegan African Peanut Stew is so, so, so very good!
Stews are perfect fall food, and this is the time I love to cook up hot, satisfying stews in my kitchen, including classics like this vegan gumbo, vegan mushroom stew, vegan Irish stew and this African Peanut Stew.
The stew is loaded with healthy veggies like eggplants and sweet potatoes, and loaded with flavor from simple spices, including fenugreek, coriander, cumin and a garlicky, fiery harissa paste. It is both yummy and nourishing, especially when served over a bed of brown or white rice.
If you still aren’t convinced you should make this African peanut stew recipe, here’s what this dish really boils down to: a delicious, bubbling pot of peanut butter with tasty spices and veggies. Now how could you say no to that?
Table of Contents
Why you’ll love this recipe
- It’s full of flavor. There are so many layers of flavor in this stew, from a simple dry spice mix of fenugreek, coriander and cumin, from the peanut butter, from the veggies, and from the harissa paste. The stew comes together quite quickly but the flavors make this appear a greater labor of love than it really is.
- It’s easy to put together. Although it sounds exotic, the ingredients in this stew are easy to find anywhere in the world, and it is just as easy to make it.
- It’s soy-free and gluten-free. There are peanuts in this recipe because the peanuts form the main flavor base. If you are allergic to peanuts see the “variations” section below.
Ingredients
- Vegetable oil. Any oil, including avocado oil, peanut oil, sunflower oil or grapeseed oil. Olive oil is not preferred for sauteing but if that’s what you have you can use it.
- Aromatics: Ginger and onions
- Spices: Chili peppers like scotch bonnet, serrano or jalapeno, fenugreek seeds, coriander seeds, cumin seeds and harissa paste.
- Vegetables: Tomatoes, tomato paste, eggplants and sweet potatoes,
- Nuts: Creamy peanut butter, whole or halved raw peanuts. Check out the “variations” section below for nut free alternatives.
- Vegetable stock or water
- Salt to taste
Variations
- You can use potatoes, winter squash like pumpkin or butternut squash and cauliflower or other veggies of your choice in the stew. I have often used okra in this recipe and it’s delicious. The sliminess of the okra helps thicken the stew without making the dish slimy.
- If you are sensitive to heat don’t use scotch bonnet peppers and opt for a milder chili pepper. Also be sure to deseed. Remember you will be adding in the harissa paste, and that has plenty of heat. If you had to pick either the harissa or the fresh chili peppers, pick the harissa.
- If you have a peanut allergy but can consume other nuts, you can use almond butter or cashew butter instead. Or try this stew with pumpkin seed butter or sunflower seed butter.
How to make African Peanut Stew
1. Place the fenugreek seeds, coriander seeds and cumin seeds in a blender bowl or spice grinder.
2. Blend the spices into a powder.
3. In a large pot, heat the oil. Add the onions and saute over medium heat for about 7-8 minutes until they’re soft.
4. Add the ginger and minced peppers, stir to mix.
5. Add the powdered spices and mix.
6. Stir in the tomato puree and tomato paste. Mix and cook 2-3 minutes.
7. Add paprika and peanut butter and mix them in.
8. Add all the vegetables and peanuts along with 3 cups of vegetable broth or water. Mix and bring the stew to a boil. Cover, lower heat to a simmer, and cook 20-25 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.
9. Finally stir in the harissa. I add a couple of tablespoons first, taste, then add more if I want to.
10. Garnish with cilantro, if using, and serve hot.
Recipe FAQs
This stew is excellent served over rice. Use a plain boiled brown rice or white rice, like basmati rice. Garnish with cilantro and, if you like, with more roasted peanuts.
You can also serve it with a chunk of crusty French bread.
You can also thin out the stew to serve it as an African peanut soup!
Actually, no. You might think that the harissa and the chili peppers would make the stew very hot. But the flavors are balanced perfectly with the sweetness of the peanut butter and sweet potatoes and what you taste is a yummy, flavor-packed stew. Remember you can also control the heat by adding as much or as little harissa as you like. If you like a lot of spice, you can add a spicier pepper, like habanero pepper or scotch bonnet pepper, to the stew.
Various versions of peanut stew or groundnut stew are cooked across West African nations like Senegal, Togo, Nigeria, Ghana and Gambia, where they go by gorgeous names like maafe, nkatenkwan, domoda, akitiwa and miyan taushe. But I call my version an “African peanut stew” and not a “West African Peanut Stew” because I tie all the flavors in the peanut stew together with the spicy North African sauce, harissa.
If you don’t have harissa, add 4 cloves of crushed garlic to the pot along with the fresh ginger. Use red pepper flakes or any hot sauce of your choice for heat.
Storage instructions
- Refrigerate: This stew can be stored in the fridge for up to three days.
- Freeze: Freeze the stew for up to three months in a freezer-safe container.
- Reheat: Thaw and reheat over the stove until warmed through.
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African Peanut Stew
A delicious, bubbling pot of African Peanut Stew with eggplant, sweet potatoes and crunchy peanuts is the ultimate Fall comfort food. The spicy-sweet vegan stew is loaded with flavor from spicy, garlicky harissa paste. It’s a dish no one will be able to resist! Recipe is soy free and gluten free.
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Servings: 12 servings
Calories: 203kcal
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Instructions
Place the fenugreek seeds, coriander seeds and cumin seeds in a blender bowl or spice grinder.
Blend the spices into a powder
In a large pot, heat the oil. Add the onions and saute over medium heat for about 7-8 minutes until they’re soft.
Add the ginger and minced peppers, stir to mix.
Add the powdered spices and mix.
Stir in the tomato puree and tomato paste. Mix and cook 2-3 minutes.
Add paprika and peanut butter and mix them in.
Add all the vegetables and peanuts along with 3 cups of vegetable broth or water. Mix and bring the stew to a boil. Cover and cook 20-25 minutes or until the vegetables are tender. You can add more stock if you wish to thin out the stew.
Finally stir in the harissa. I add a couple of tablespoons first, taste, then add more if I want to.
Garnish with cilantro, if using, and serve hot.
Recipe notes
- You can use potatoes, winter squash like pumpkin or butternut squash and cauliflower or other veggies of your choice in the stew. I have often used okra in this recipe and it’s delicious. The sliminess of the okra helps thicken the stew without making the dish slimy.
- If you are sensitive to heat don’t use scotch bonnet and opt for a milder chili pepper. Also be sure to deseed. Remember you will be adding in the harissa paste, and that has plenty of heat. If you had to pick either the harissa or the fresh chili peppers, pick the harissa.
- If you are allergic to peanuts but can consume other nuts, you can use almond butter instead. Or try this stew with pumpkin seed butter.
Storage instructions
- Refrigerate: This stew can be stored in the fridge for up to three days.
- Freeze: Freeze the stew for up to three months in a freezer-safe container.
- Reheat: Thaw and reheat over the stove until warmed through.
Nutrition
Calories: 203kcal | Carbohydrates: 19g | Protein: 7g | Fat: 13g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 6g | Sodium: 487mg | Potassium: 515mg | Fiber: 5g | Sugar: 8g | Vitamin A: 4530IU | Vitamin C: 7mg | Calcium: 42mg | Iron: 1mg