Chicken Yassa, or Yassa Poulet, a simple yet favorite Senegalese dish, is a staple in many West African countries. Traditional Yassa poulet is made with lime, onions, and chicken to yields a fantastic flavor combination.
I grew up eating this dish every Sunday. I still recall how my mother expertly cooked each ingredient to produce different flavor profiles (for example, grilling vs. frying). One of the first traditional African meals I cooked was Yassa Djeun (Yassa with fish), which uses the same cooking concept and replaces chicken with fish. I was about 7 years old and frying that fish under the nanny's careful supervision. Yassa Yapp (with beef or lamb) is a delicious version of Yassa that is worth trying!
Tips for making the best Chicken Yassa (Yassa Poulet)
Using fresh ingredients is always essential to unlock the best possible flavors in your dish. Cooking the ingredients with love, patience, and a few tricks is another way to achieve the best results. Below are tips to make an excellent and flavorful Yassa.
1. Chicken
Skin: Trim extra fat and remove the skin to reduce the dish's fat content.
Marinade the chicken for a few hours to overnight with onions, lemon, salt, and pepper.
Roff (stuffing in Wolof) is a type of purée made with onion, garlic, salt, and pepper used to stuff the chicken and make it more flavorful. Just form 1 or 2 small holes in the chicken piece of your choice and insert a bit of roff. Roff is optional in this recipe.
To obtain the best-flavored chicken for your Yassa, use grilling (with coal or wood) as a cooking method. However, frying with oil or baking (and broiling for a bit of charring ) will yield a delicious result.
Upon assembly of the sauce, simmer the chicken in the onions and the juice from the marinade. Be careful not to throw away that marinade as it contains tons of flavor. If baking, conserve the liquid collected in the baking pan and add it to the stew.
2. Onions:
Tasty local yellow or red onions are always the best options.
Chop: Chop your onions in stripes or dice shapes. Submerge whole skinless onions in the water before chopping them to reduce tearing.
Remove extra juice: Before frying, remove excess liquid to make the frying process more effective.
Cook: Cook onions in hot oil until translucent. Monitor the cooking process to avoid burning the onions.
3. Give it time, and simmer:
It is no secret the longer you simmer most African stews, the better tasting the final result. However, if simmering for longer than an hour, you may need to add a few more layers of seasoning. In Senegal, we call seasoning nokoss, usually added at the beginning of the cooking and later on mid-cooking. The nokoss can also serve as the roff (optional chicken stuffing), made of pureed onions, garlic, salt, and pepper for the Yassa dish. Nokoss is not necessary for this recipe.
How to make an express Yassa Poulet with store-bought grilled chicken?
Express Yassa Poulet is my favorite version of the dish. It is easy and quick to make, and using grilled chicken imparts an additional layer of flavor to the dish.
To make this quick version of Yassa Poulet, directly skip to the onion step, and upon assembling the sauce, add 2 to 3 tbsp of mustard, chilies, Ijuices from 2 limes/lemon, spices, a bit of salt and pepper to taste, and the pieces of chicken. Cook for 45 min, and that's it!
Tricks to render the Yassa Poulet sauce slightly less acidic: