Baked Kelewele (Spicy Plantain Chops)

Kelewele is a spiced plantain street snack that is soft, sweet, spicy and delicious. It was one of the defining foods of my childhood as I remember my uncle would bring some with him every time he came to visit our family, and they were literally gone within 3 minutes. While traditionally deep fried, this version is baked in the oven to offer a similar taste with less oil.

The Run Down

The recipe is essentially sweet ripe plantains with an onion and ginger spiced mix. The onion is crushed with the ginger and a variety of spices, then mixed in with all the plantains. The plantains are marinated for about 30 minutes to allow the flavours to really meld together then usually deep fried, but in our case, we are baking these. 

What you will need

• Ripe plantains: There is a bit of a debate on what type of ripe plantains are best for kelewele. Most of the kelewele sold as a street snack are made with super soft plantains (plantain A in the photo below), but some prefer firmer ripe plantains (plantain B or a plantain between A or B). Use whichever you prefer. Just make sure they are ripe. If you want to learn more about plantains (how to purchase them, where to purchase them etc, make sure to check out my ultimate plantain guide)

• Onion and ginger: these are essential for flavour and extra sweetness. The onion and ginger are grinded and mixed with spices to make a paste that is then used to marinate the plantains.

• Spices: Traditionally, a mix of indigenous spices are used along with cloves (some even add star anise). Everyone has their own blend. I prefer using the spices displayed above. Sometimes, I add one star anise. Cloves and chilli are essential, calabash nutmeg is very very popular for these spice blends. The rest are all up to you. You can even opt for black peppercorn too instead of the grains of paradise and remove the grains of selim.
• Chillis: usually dried chillis are used. The african bird’s eye chili are very spicy. You can also use scotch bonnet or habanero and grind it with the onion and ginger first. If you cannot handle intense heat, you can use other forms of peppers like jalapeno. You can remove all the peppers if you do not like spicy food. Not my first choice, if you can even use a pinch of cayenne pepper that will be great.

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Print Recipe

Baked Kelewele

Sweet and Spicy plantains

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time25 minutes mins

Marinating Time30 minutes mins

Total Time1 hour hr 5 minutes mins

Course: Snack

Cuisine: Ghanaian

Keyword: plantain

Servings: 2

Ingredients

• 3 large ripe plantains
• 1 thump size of ginger
• 1/3 medium red onion
• 1/2 teaspoon grains of paradise*
• 3 calabash nutmeg hwediaba/ehuru*
• 3 grains of selim hwentia/uda*
• 1/2 teaspoon cloves
• 1-2 tablespoons of dried birds eye chilli or 1 scotch bonnet/habanero pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt add more or less depending on your preference
• 1-2 tablespoons of vegetable oil or melted coconut oil

Instructions

• Grind up the dry spices in a mortar and pestle (or spice grinder) then set aside
• Mash up the onion and ginger (you can either use a small blender or grate the onion and ginger and mix them together)
• Combine the onion and ginger paste with the dry spices and salt. Mix everything well.
• Wash, peel and chop the plantains into bite size pieces. To do this cut it in half along the seed line. Then cut along the seed line again till it looks like four sticks from each plantain. Cut pieces diagonally for bite size pieces.
• Mix the spice blend and plantains and set aside for at least 30 mins.
• After marinating, mix the plantains with the melted coconut oil and place on a lined tray (I use a silicon mat because it is more eco-friendly and non stick, but parchment is a great alternative).
• Bake in the oven for 25 minutes at 425 F. Check on the plantains just to make sure they are not burning. You can flip them halfway for an even browning but be careful as soft plantains can be harder to flip. If you want to use an airfryer, 20 minutes at 350°F is a good alternative.
• Once the time is up, serve with roasted peanuts for a sweet and savoury snack.

Notes

• spices are always customizable; the cloves are essential, and calabash nutmeg is also very important to have but you do not need it (please do not use nutmeg instead, the flavours are different). The grains of paradise can be swapped for black peppercorn and the rest you can leave out.