Peanuts: A Revelation

If you knew me before I moved to Mali, you probably knew that I HATED peanuts. Most or all peanut products, actually. And I should tell you that before I came to Mali I was legitimately concerned at the prospect of making peanuts a major part of my diet, since they're everywhere here. The truth is, I've never liked peanuts. I can remember eating PB&Js as a kid and thinking that they tasted funny. As I got older my friends would joke that I had a sixth sense for finding the source of anything remotely peanut-smelling from a ridiculous distance. Whether I just didn't like peanuts or I actually have a small allergy to them, I couldn't stand to be around them. In college, my cross-country teammates would look at me as if I had two heads when I routinely turned down a customary pre-race breakfast, a banana with peanut butter. Once, I scared a freshman at an early morning practice by demanding that whomever was eating the peanut butter crackers I smelled had to stop immediately. Poor freshman. She didn't know. On a camping/volunteer trip with my college, I toted around my own jar of Nutella while everyone else lived off PB. At school, sometimes I'd bring Nutella to the cafeteria for my morning toast. I mean, maybe I'm crazy for Nutella as much as I disliked peanut butter, but you get the idea. Up until very recently, peanuts and I were not on good terms.

My mom maintains that my deep hate of peanuts started in infancy. As she tells the story, she had left my older brother, Evan, in charge of me (rookie mistake). From the next room, she hears my three-year old caretaker sing "One for me! One for you! One for ME and one for YOU!" As my mom thinks to herself, "Hmm, now that doesn't sound right..." Evan is popping peanuts into my gorgeous cherub cheeks while he munches away on his half of the jar. By the time my mom figures this out this is going down, my face is red, I can't breathe, and there are so many peanuts in my mouth that my cheeks are puffed out. I mean, I understand that Sesame Street was teaching about sharing that week, but I still don't know whether this act was in the spirit of altruism or was he plotting to reclaim his stolen only child status. (This isn't the only time he tried to finish me off- telling me he'd "catch" me as I "flew" from the top of the stairs was original but poorly executed, as I escaped with nothing more than a dislocated elbow). We'll never know, but I think this early exposure to the dangers of peanuts certainly didn't do anything to help my future aversion to them.

Right before I came to Mali, I had the privilege of spending a few days working in the gardens of Blackberry Farm, an upscale resort in Walland, Tennessee. There, my friend Jeff showed me my first peanut plant and encouraged me to try an un-ripened one, straight from the gorgeous black earth of East Tennessee (oh how I miss Tennessee!). I was pleasantly surprised to find that it tasted like a fresh cucumber, probably allowing to its high water content. It was my first positive peanut experience in recent memory. Little did I know that this was the foundation for a revelation that I never expected to find:

I believe I have finally come to terms with the fact that maybe I don't hate peanuts any more.

Here in Mali, there is a popular sauce called tigedigena (literally "peanut butter sauce") that is commonly served with rice for lunch or dinner. When I first tried it at homestay, I expected to have to choke it down out of politeness, but I ended up really liking it. Even more recently, I spent an entire afternoon cooking tigedegena from start to finish with my host family. First, my sister, Bintu, and I shelled and sorted peanuts. This took about an hour or more. Next, my second host mom, Jata roasted them in a big, rounded cauldron over a fire. Next, she used a giant mortar and pestle (called a "susu", absolutely essential to Malian food preparation) to make a course, chunky peanut butter. After that, she used a grinding stone and a smoothed piece of wood to run the raw peanut butter over the rock. This made it into a fine paste. The rest of the afternoon and evening were dedicated to making the actual sauce. In the end, it was really delicious, and I didn't get sick from it. Making tigedegena took a lot of physical labor and effort. It made me appreciate just how much work and energy and time it takes to prepare meals from scratch.

Now I eat peanuts whenever I can get them. I still get headaches from time to time when I'm eating them or I'm around them, but perhaps I can eat them now because my body recognizes that I need the protein. Thankfully, my dislike of peanuts is nowhere near as bad as it used to be. I wouldn't say that I love them, but I at least like them enough to eat them regularly. My family farms them, so I'm excited to see what other ways peanuts are prepared here. In case you're inspired, the recipe for tigedegena is below:

1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 bay leaves
2 medium yellow onions
1 cup or so of any or all of the following: carrots (coined), eggplant (cubed), shredded cabbage
1 or 2 hot peppers
1/2 kilogram (about a pound) of fish or chicken, if desired
4 fresh tomatoes, chopped OR 1 tablespoon tomato paste, mixed with some water
1/4 cup oil
3 heaping tablespoons of peanut butter
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
salt to taste


Grind cumin and pepper together, set aside with the bay leaves. Cut the onion and pound into a paste in a mortar and pestle. In a large pot (or a cauldron over an open fire, if you have one), cook the fish or chicken in the oil with the onion. Add the cumin/pepper/bay leaf mixture. Add the tomatoes and a half cup of water OR the tomato paste mix. Cook five to ten minutes. Use about a liter of water, and rinse the mortar and pestle well to get out the tasty onion remains. Let the pot come to a boil. Add the peanut butter, veggies, and crushed garlic (mortar and pestle works well with this too). Add salt (or Maagi powder, which is pure MSG, if you really want to get authentic with it) to taste. Cook well (45 minutes or so?) until the oil rises to the top. It goes the best on a bed of white rice, in a communal bowl, eaten using only your right hand.


Let me know if any of you try it!