Liberian Salads

Liberians use the vegetables, greens and fruit mostly boiled, fried or stewed, so salads are not too common. There is a wide range of salads ingredients in Liberia, though, a range that includes: cassavas, hot red peppers, sweet potatoes and yams, tomatoes, plantains, greens, okra, coconut, pumpkin, mangoes, ginger and eggplant. A great salad, which is also served as a dessert is the stewed mango with cloves, which is prepared out of fresh or canned mangos, peaches and apricots, and a lot of syrup. Other salads are based on tomatoes, which are consumed whole, chopped or as paste, with chicken leftovers or other meat (ham, pork, seafood), with rice or served with all kinds of traditional breads. A meal similar to salad is fufu or foo-foo, which has the consistency of mashed potatoes or polenta and it served with stews, like egusi or different soups. The recipe includes root vegetables, like yams, cocoyam and cassava, but fufu can also be prepared out of grains and plantains.