20 Ghanaian dishes to try

The famous plates: rice, beans and swallows

Ghana's headline dishes are the ones you will have heard of, and they live up to the hype. Jollof rice, cooked in a rich tomato-and-pepper base, is the flag-bearer and the subject of a friendly rivalry with Nigeria. Then there is waakye, the reddish rice-and-beans breakfast; plain rice with a deep, oily tomato stew; and fried rice with a chicken thigh and a slick of shito.

The swallows come next: fufu (pounded cassava and plantain), banku and kenkey (both fermented corn), and tuo zaafi from the north. These are eaten by hand with soups and stews, and they are the heart of Ghanaian home cooking. Our full Ghanaian food guide breaks each one down in more detail.

If you only master ordering one thing, make it banku with grilled tilapia and hot pepper, a coastal favourite that shows Ghanaian food at its freshest and most sociable. Each region has its own tilt too, from the fermented tang of kenkey on the coast to the northern love of tuo zaafi, so no two food days feel quite the same.

The stews and soups that do the heavy lifting

Behind every swallow is a great soup or stew. Light soup is a clear, gingery tomato broth with goat, chicken or fish; groundnut (peanut) soup is deeper and nuttier; and palm nut soup is rich, orange and unforgettable. Kontomire, made from cocoyam leaves, is the green everyone should try, often served as palava sauce with egg or fish.

Red-red deserves its own mention: a soft, palm-oil-rich bean stew served with fried plantain, and one of the best vegetarian meals in the country. Okro (okra) stew, garden-egg stew and the smoky, meaty abenkwan round out the everyday table.

These dishes are where Ghanaian cooking gets serious. For a proper sit-down version of any of them, several spots in our best restaurants in Accra guide do them beautifully. Try to have at least one soup with a swallow while you are here; it is the meal Ghanaians would most want a visitor to understand, and it rewards a little patience with the technique.

The snacks and street food you will crave

Some of the best eating in Ghana happens on your feet. Kelewele, ripe plantain cubes fried with ginger, chilli and spices, is the snack visitors fall for hardest. Bofrot (fluffy fried dough balls) and koose (spiced bean fritters) are morning and evening staples, and roasted plantain with a handful of groundnuts is the perfect walking snack.

Add chinchinga (grilled, spiced meat skewers, also called kyinkyinga), roasted or fried yam with shito or pepper, and boiled corn with coconut when it is in season. These are cheap, quick and everywhere, and they make up a big part of our Ghana street food guide.

As a team based in Kasoa who eat this way every week, our one tip is to follow the queue. Busy stalls mean fresh food and fast turnover, which is exactly what you want from street eating. Prices are pocket-money small, which makes grazing your way through an evening the cheapest fun in town.

Drinks and the sweet finish

Wash it all down like a local. Sobolo is a tart, ruby-red hibiscus drink often spiced with ginger and pineapple; asaana and lamugin are traditional favourites; and fresh coconut water straight from the shell is sold on almost every corner. Palm wine, tapped fresh, is worth a careful try in the right setting.

Sweet endings are simpler here than in some cuisines, but they exist: think tatale (sweet plantain pancakes), coconut toffee and seasonal fruit like mango, pawpaw and pineapple that puts supermarket versions to shame. Round off a food day with these and you have covered the full spread.

Before you plan the eating, it helps to know the best time to visit Ghana, since fruit and some dishes are seasonal, and to sort out getting around Ghana so you can reach the good spots. A cold sobolo after a plate of jollof is a small ritual worth adopting for the length of your stay.

Turn this list into a trip

Twenty dishes sounds like a lot, but you can knock off most of them in a well-planned week, especially with someone who knows which sellers are worth the detour. We do exactly this for visitors, weaving markets, chop bars and coastal fish grills into a comfortable route.

Tell us whether you are chasing street food, sit-down meals or both, and we will shape the days around it. It slots neatly alongside sightseeing from our top things to do in Accra list.

Ready when you are: browse our tours, arrange an airport pickup, or message us on WhatsApp with your food wish list and we will build the itinerary around it. Whether you have three days or two weeks, there is a version of this list that fits.

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