River state native soup is one of my favorite Nigerian soup, it happens to be my favorite native soup.
You can follow either my written instruction or the embedded video at the bottom of the page, I make videos for the majority of my recipes on this site.
I grew up in River state Nigeria, did both my primary and secondary education in a very popular part of the state. During this time, I tasted almost every indigenous food and also learned to make quite a number of them. The good thing is that they share similar recipes with the Igbos.
So if you are dating an Ikwerre guy or married to a man/woman from River State Nigeria you can go ahead and serve him/her some of our Igbo foods on this page.
Let’s get back to the topic of the day, River state native soup… here goes… Gbam!!!
Frankly, I can’t give a detailed account of the origin of this soup but what I do know is that it is very popular in River state and it is served in major restaurants and eateries. Although, they avoid some of the expensive ingredients like stock fish, ngolo and shrimps.
For some reason I just like to try new recipes once they appealed to me, I like to ask questions and try them out in my own kitchen, that is perhaps the reason I have learned to make virtually all the Foods Eaten In Nigeria.
How To Make River State Native Soup
Below are the ingredients for making the popular native soup in River state Nigeria, like I always assert; the ingredients would serve about 6×2 people, you can increase or decrease the quantity of each ingredient depending on the number people would be eating your food.
You can make this soup as simple as possible, if you can’t find the ngolo and prowns where you live, you can leave them out. I can’t find the english name for Ngolo, is it clams?
- 1KG of meat
- 10 pieces of stock fish ear (nti okporoko)
- 2 cups of sliced uziza leaves
- 2 medium size dry fish
- Cocoa yam as thickener (see image)
- 15-20cl of palm oil
- 2-3 cubes of maggi or knorr
- 1-2 cups of periwinkles
- 1-2 cups of ngolo
- 1 cup of ground crayfish
- Salt and pepper to taste.
- two handful of fresh prowns
- 2 spoons of ofor (alternative thickener)

What you find above is a plate containing Ngolo, Periwinkles (isam) and prowns, the exact way they are sold in Nigerian markets. You can purchase them from every major Nigerian markets, especially in the states sorrounded by water.
The cocoayam should be about 1KG, the ofor serves as alternative thickener (incase the cocoayam didn’t thicken the soup), in most cases, you wouldn’t use it (the ofor)
How to Prepare Nigerian Native soup
You might wanna start by parboiling the shrimps, wash and parboil with a small pot, add half cup of water, a cube of maggi and a pinch of salt, allow to boil for up to 5 minutes, remove the head and set aside in a clean plate.
STEP 1
I like to start by parboiling the meat with all the necessary ingredients, most cooks forget that parboiling the meat and obtaining the stock (water left after parboiling) is an important part of Nigerian cooking process.
I like to parboil the meat with just 2 cubes of maggi, 1 bulb of onions, salt and maybe a sachet of onga classic (a very popular Nigerian spice for soup). My choice of meat is hard to cook, takes about 50-60 minutes before you commence with the rest of the cooking.
Step 2
Use this time to prepare the other ingredients; wash and slice the uziza leaves.
Soak the stock fish and dry fish with boiled water and wash thoroughly to remove sand and center bone. Grind the crayfish and fresh pepper also, you can grind together or grind separately.
Step 3
Add the washed dry fish/stock fish in the boiling meat on fire, after about 30-50 minutes of cooking just the meat. Once they are soft and the water is almost dried (about 1 cup left) add about 5-7 cups of water, palm oil and the ground crayfish. This step was visually demonstrated in the video below, so if you like watching better than reading you can scroll down to see the video.
Allow the soup to cook for another ten minutes before adding salt to taste, a cube of maggi. Maggi is a natural food sweetener, used in making almost all the {foods eaten in Nigeria} you can refer to our ingredients catalogue for an in-depth understanding of all the ingredients used in making Nigerian foods.
Step 4
Add the washed/cleaned ngolo, stir, add the cocoayam, allow to dissolve in 8-10 minutes, if it is still very watery you can add a spoon of ofor, cook for three minutes before adding the periwinkles, prown and sliced uziza leaves which is likely the last ingredient while making River state native soup.
Allow to simmer for another five minutes and you just made Nigerian’s most popular native soup.
The video is that of an earlier version of this soup, it should give you a clue as to how to make river state native soup, I used ofor as the thickener instead of cocoayam; I also ommited the ngolo.
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Continue Reading
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Comments
- 26 Comments
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March 3, 2014
God bless u o,my fiance happens to b frm rivers state.my question is ..I don’t enjoy eting Goat meat so I was wondering if I can use cowleg or beef.must it be Goat meat for the soup.so illd knw what exactly to stick to.thank u
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May 3, 2014
Hi! Pls I’ve nt tasted periwinkle b4 ΑϞ∂ my man gave ♍e an assignment to prepare his native soup he his frm ikwerre. With ∂ steps I’m sure I can make out something delicious buh ∂ periwinkle do I cook it wif ∂ shell or wht I heard it has meat in it how do I xtract ∂ meat dats my nightmare now pls save ♍e frm ∂ hard home work Tnx nd G̶̲̥̅Ơ̴̴̴̴͡D bless
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May 17, 2014
Hello madam,just wanna commend you for унυя great works,you’ve really improved me in the kitchen,I’m a yoruba lady but №ω i virtually knows how to cook most igbo soup,tαℓк of any soup,u r an angel,God bless u so much..Hαppiε weekend
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May 27, 2014
The traditional thickener for Rivers State Native soup is mostly coco yam. The Ofor and achi
were introduced by the Igbos. Not saying they can’t be used. Just pointing it out. -
June 7, 2014
Chy I must commend you for ur good work .I used ur recipe to prepare dis native soup it was finger licking even to the bottom pot hubby said I should leave the pot for him .his so much love periwinkle and I part great part of it thanks for dis gesture
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June 16, 2014
This is simply great! I’ll give it a trial.
Thanks for being there Chy. -
June 30, 2014
Am Yoruba married to an Igbo man…ur recipes have helped me in a long way in keeping him at home more.
Thanks Chy! -
July 31, 2014
Thx chy, I’m really excited now and can’t wait to prepare mine. Meanwhile I didn’t see or read where u added d uziza seed u grinded. Thx
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August 23, 2014
Chy keep d good works going, u are d bomb. My husband loves my cooking. Okoro if u want to marry a Nigeria girl dat can make all Nigerian food very well I have 2.
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October 7, 2014
I love you cos u help some women bring back their man home through good food. Am an igbo women i know some of the foods but i want to know more ,please can you help me with more through my email . Thanks and God bless i
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October 9, 2014
God bless u for d great work u are doing.
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October 25, 2014
Hi Chy, I just wanna say thank u so much for the great work you are doing.You have saved me from the bankruptcy of cooking and also increased my confidence in the kitchen and when serving my husband his food. Thank you so very much and God bless you.Keep up the good work
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November 18, 2014
Hello I am really happy i receive emails from U. I live at Onitsha in Anambra state,how can i get hold if ur book coz d online method is not working for me.
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March 17, 2015
Pls what’s ngolo and why did u omit it while preparing the soup.
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February 5, 2018
Ngolo is a kind of sea snail from the Mollusc family
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April 12, 2015
its cool buh dnt no wat is ngolo
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May 13, 2015
Thanks for impacting to Us what you got. Thanks for all your mails. You are TWODERFUL Ma. I enjoyed myself. LONG LIVE this vision. Pls where are you from.
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May 18, 2015
you are truly a good cook. thank you for this insight.
i want one of your book that covers river state, ijaw, ibos and yoruba native soup with other nigerian soup, most especially rivers, ijaw and ibo soup.
so which of the book is the right one for me.thanks.
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May 29, 2015
You are truly great. Hope to be a great cook soon. More grace
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June 6, 2015
GOOD JOB DEAR, WHAT IS THIS NGOLO… ANY OTHER NAME