By Jimoh Babatunde

Chef Ernst Lothar Frank, the German-born executive chef, at the Lagos Continental hotel, does not hide his love for Nigerian food as he admitted the influence of the country’s food culture on his presentation.
He said ‘‘what we have in the hotel is more of traditional Nigerian food. I try to learn about it and it is very rich, which is what I found out about it.’’

Despite the richness of Nigerian food, the international chef is not so impressed with the undocumented nature of it, ‘‘unfortunately, it is not very, very well documented. There is a need to document it and recognise it for what it is.

‘‘You have to concentrate on what you have as a national food. It is about the culture, and like language and culture, it is evolving. So, if the culture is changing then the food is changing as well as.

‘‘I think it is not as much mechanised as it should be here in Nigeria. Everybody can tell you where there is a good Italian restaurant, Chinese restaurant, but if you ask them where is the best Nigerian restaurant where you can go out for fine dining, it is not that easy to answer.

‘‘Because I ask this question but I don’t get the answer. The concentration is actually on foreign food.’’
Chef Frank said, ‘‘but we want to tap into Nigerian food culture and also take Nigerian food into another level, we don’t want to reinvent the potatoes or something like that but in the way it is presented and the way that it is looked at so that it can be at par with any other national food in the world as well.’’

The German-born executive chef said in trying to change the narrative, the hotel chose to experiment with Chiamaka Nwakalor-Egemba, popularly called Chef Amaka, an emerging Nigerian chef that is well known for her Afro fusion and promotion of Nigerian cuisine, experimenting with authentic indigenous ingredients from the various parts of the country, to create amazing recipes that offer great and harmonious flavours to one’s palate.

While speaking on the partnership with Chef Amaka and other chefs in the pool of the hotel as its looks to deepening its culinary offerings and ensure that guests have immersive experience, Chef Frank said ‘‘we want to tap into her expertise, she is brilliant for what she does and she is an independent chef. We would like to have a working relationship with her.

And enters Chef Amaka, brightly and colourfully dressed in her signature chef attire ready to create authentic Nigerian recipes and meals for the delight of the guests.

What she came up with for the guests was tagged Discovery of contemporary Nigerian Cuisine by Chef Chiamaka Nwakalor-Egemba, which took the guests into discovery journey of the country using different ingredients.

The first offering of Chef Amaka was the Agege Roll, with Ewa Agoin Butter. It was the normal Agege bread, but so colourly presented that none of us were able to tell the combination of the ingredients until Chef Amaka made the introduction. The bread was so soft and combined with the Ewa Agoin Butter making it quite tasteful.

Next on the bill was Stir Fred Cous-Cous Salad – pickled sumbo, balsamic cherry tomato and yaji dressing. Again, just like the Agege Roll, this was innovatively presented. It came off very tasteful, with rich flavour.
Seared Seabass With Coconut Ofe Akwu Risotto – made of ehuru chili oil, efin oil and kpekerel greens came next. It is a porridge meal by her using the Italian Risotto technique, but with local ingredients that made it is so enjoyable and agreeable to your taste bud because of its rich flavour as well.

Then came Pami and Curry Leaf Granita. Colourful, with rich flavour, you will never know until told by Chef Amaka that the local palm wine juice is part of what was blended to make this offering that sat well with everyone at the table.

Lastly, came the dessert; Dodo Ikire Ice Cream and Robo Cake-Sweet agbo reduction, kokoro cookie crumble stewed strawberries. This was the climax of it all, totally beating everyone’s imagination as no one could easily tell the ingredients that were used for this offering, particularly the cake.

For her, there are different ways of using different ingredients, applying her technique, which has made her very unique with her culinary creations. As noted by her, studying at culinary school has enabled her to be creative and apply herself.

Saying, ‘‘because I went to a culinary school to be trained, it was best that I apply the Nigerian ingredients because I believe that Nigerians and Africans have the upper hand because we have a lot of flavours that are yet to be explored.’’

She added, ‘‘that is the thing about afro fusion, which is a combination of the Nigerian or African ingredients, with other cooking techniques and it has been in existence over the years.

‘‘There shouldn’t be one particular way an ingredient should be used. Egusi shouldn’t be used for equsi soup alone as you can see that I used it as cake. So we can turn our ingredients into different uses.
‘‘We can turn our ingredients into very relatable uses and flavours.’’