West African Style Peanut Stew with Chicken, Sweet Potato and Kale

The other day (when I ended up making my Baseball aka Kale Soup instead) I was searching and searching for an African Peanut Stew recipe that included more veggies than just onions and the occasional sweet potato (although those are necessary too!) when I found this recipe by Cookie and Kate that included collard greens. I liked the look of her recipe and although I used many for inspiration in this recipe, this was the main one I looked at. I added her site to my blog reader. Looks like she has lots of great recipes!

I added some stuff as I tasted and also threw in chick peas (aka garbanzo beans) and diced chicken thigh. I think the thigh meat holds up better in soups. As always, feel free to make this vegetarian, as it is in the original recipe, and to sub in or out and ingredients you like!

West African Style Peanut Stew with Chicken, Sweet Potato and Kale

This makes a big pot, so halve it if you don't feel like having leftovers and/or freezing some. I won't make soup unless I have a ton of leftovers!

Ingredients:

3 32oz boxes of chicken stock (or vegetable stock if you prefer)
2 red onions, diced
6 garlic cloves, diced
1/4 minced fresh ginger (less if you don't like ginger, the piece I used was about 4" long and 2" wide)
2 red bell peppers, diced
4 medium sweet potatoes, diced (or 2 ginormous ones like I had)
1lb boneless skinless chicken thighs, cut into small bites
14oz can of diced tomatoes w juice (preferably salt free)
14oz can chickpeas
1lb bag of frozen chopped kale
6oz can tomato paste
1 1/2 cup peanut butter
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp black pepper
3-4 Tbsp white vinegar
hot sauce to taste (I used Sriracha)
salt to taste
green onions (scallions) chopped for garnish

Put the chicken stock in a large pot and turn it up to boil. While its getting to a boil, chop up your onion, garlic, and ginger and throw that in. I didn't wait for the stock to get all the way to a boil and it was fine. Next chop your bell pepper, sweet potato and chicken thighs and add that to the pot. Add the can of diced tomatoes with their juice, chickpeas, kale, cumin and black pepper and let all of that come to a boil for about 20 minutes. Turn down to a simmer. In a large heat safe bowl, mix the peanut butter and tomato paste. Add some broth from the stew to thin it out and then add the peanut/tomato paste mixture to the stew. Simmer for at least another 20 minutes and add the vinegar. Start with 3T and add the 4th if you want after tasting. Add the hot sauce and salt to taste. Serve with chopped green onions (and more hot sauce if you want!).