Shito is the most popular Ghanaian condiment eaten with a variety of dishes. It is a savoury, umami spicy condiment that is made of aromatics, a tiny bit of tomato paste (optional) dried smoked seafood like herring and crayfish, and dried spices to taste. Shito is enjoyed with a number of rice dishes like Jollof Rice, Waakye or other dishes like kenkey, banku, and snacks like boiled eggs, fried plantain, fried yam and the list goes on and on. All the ingredients in shito are simmered for several hours to remove all the moisture and meld all these ingredients until a very dark thick condiment forms. Shito can be stored for months at room temp and lasts for months in the fridge. Simmering and removing the moisture from the ingredients that go into this condiment, and topping the finished product with oil in glass jars, extends the shelf life of this condiment. After you open your jar and begin using your shito, I recommend storing it in the fridge. If you are looking for a typical Ghanaian that adds so much flavour to any dish it is paired with, check this recipe out. There are a lot of tips and tricks to help you succeed when making this.

Ghana Shito

The only ingredients that may be hard to find are dried and smoked shrimp/crayfish, and dried and smoked herring. Both of these are staples in West African cooking and can easily be found in West African or Caribbean grocery stores. These two ingredients can be substituted with dried, and not smoked versions of both the shrimp/crayfish and herring. Asian grocery stores and supermarkets (Chinese, Korean and Japanese) carry a lot of dry seafood.

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Prep Time 30

Course Condiment

Cuisine Ghanaian

Servings 1.5 litres

Ingredients

The measurements are written in grams for accuracy but this recipe is forgiving if you do not have a kitchen scale and go only by estimates or the units written in brackets, your shito will still taste delicious.
960 grams (4 cups) of vegetable oil, canola oil or sunflower oil, and more as needed
130 grams (3 tablespoons) tomato paste (optional)

Aromatics

1140 grams (2 very large) onions, peeled and largely chopped
50 grams (½ head) of garlic, peeled
70 grams (½ cup) chopped ginger
62 grams (7 smal)l scotch bonnet, stems removed

Dried Seafood

55 grams (1 cup) dry smoked crayfish or shrimp
265 grams (3 whole medium sized) dry Smoked Herring, preferably unsalted

Seasoning

2 teaspoon anise seeds
1 tablespoon paprika
3 teaspoon allspice powder
1 heaping tablespoon dried thyme
1-2 shrimp cubes or to taste*
1 tablespoon red pepper flakes Optional**

Instructions

Prep Your Ingredients
Blend in the order that it is written.
Blend dried smoked shrimp or crayfish. Place your shrimp/crayfish into a clean dry blender or food processor and blend until a powder forms. Pulse several times until all the dried shrimp or crayfish bits are pulverised and the largest pieces in your blended mixture are very small shrimp/crayfish flakes (no bigger than ¼ of the size of a pencil eraser). Set aside.
Blend dried smoked herring. Leave the fish skin on and you do not need to remove the bones or the head of the fish. (You may remove the bones and head if you want to). Blend your dried fish pulsing several times until it pulverised, and an oil crumbly powder texture. Your blended herring will be harder to blend than your dry shrimp/crayfish so make sure you pulse as many times as necessary to really break down the fish.
Blend onions: In a food blender or food processor blend your peeled and largely chopped onions. You can rinse your blender or food processor after you have blended your seafood but you do not need to give your blender or food processor a good wash. Everything will all eventually end up in the same pot so a bit of cross contamination is okay.
Blend the rest of your aromatics: Blend your garlic, ginger, scotch bonnet together until very smooth. You can add a bit of the total oil in the recipe into your blender to help you blend all these ingredients together but remember, you are adding oil just to assist you with blending, you still want the general blended mixture to be thick. You are adding oil and not water because the point of cooking down your shito is to remove as much water as possible so it is shelf stable.
Add all ingredients to your pot
In a large pot add your oil and heat on medium to high.
Add your tomato paste to a pot of oil. Fry tomato paste until it is fully mixed into oil, stirring constantly.
After about 4 minutes add your blended onion. Mix for about 10 minutes until the onions start to brown and dry out in the oil.
Add your ginger, garlic and scotch bonnet blended mixture to the oil. Stir periodically until it is all combined. Simmer on low stirring every 5 minutes for about an hour and a half until the mixture darkens and reduces in volume. At this stage, it may bubble depending on your pot so make sure your lid is nearby and it is partly covered. Bubbling subsides after about 30 seconds after stirring but keep the lid partly over your pot to avoid splatter. Another tip is whenever you remove the lid, try and avoid dripping the condensation back into your shito.
Add your dried herring and shrimp/crayfish powders. Stir to combine. Make sure your
Simmer for an additional hour stirring every 10 minutes so it does not burn. Your mixture will turn very dark after an hour or so of simmering.
Add all your seasoning after the hour. Bouillon cube, paprika, thyme, anise and allspice. See note about bouillon cubes.
Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary.
At this point your shito should be very dark in colour with lots of oil on top, and well seasoned. If your shito is very light in colour, cook on low stirring often until it is a deep dark brown almost black in colour. Make sure you keep stirring so it does not burn but cooks slowly.
Once your shito is done, allow it to cool slightly and store in a glass jar. There should be alot of oil in your shito and this is to preserve the shito. If after making your shito, there is not a lot of oil settled on top of your finished product, add up to a cup or oil into your shit in the pot, simmer for 30 minutes before jarring.
Place your slightly cooled shito in a clean mason jar, make sure there is oil at the top, and let your shito cool to room temperature before closing the jars.
The jars can be stored at room temp but once you open the jar and use any of the shito, store in the fridge. If this is your first time making shito, I suggest just storing all your jars in the fridge.
Whenever you are using your shito it is very important to always use a clean dry uncontaminated spoon when scooping out this tasty condiment.

Notes

*Note, the shrimp cubes may be completely unnecessary especially if your herring or smoked shrimp you are using happens to be salted. Taste your shito part way through cooking and determine the salt level of your shito before adding shrimp bouillon cubes.

**Red pepper flakes are added if you taste and want more heat to your shito. Adding dried blended pepper flakes or blended red chillis is an easy way to add some more heat to the shito later on in the cooking process.

Keyword black pepper, condiment, Ghana, Pepper, Shito, spicy

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