Thiéboudienne (also ceebu jën — literally "rice and fish" in Wolof) is the national dish of Senegal and one of the most technically accomplished one-pot dishes in African cooking. Fish (usually a firm white fish like grouper or thiof) is stuffed with a rof (paste of parsley, garlic, Scotch bonnet, and stock cube), seared, then braised with tomato paste, vegetables (cassava, eggplant, cabbage, carrot, okra, bitter tomato), and tamarind. The rice is then cooked in the braising liquid, absorbing the fish-tomato-tamarind flavour. The dish is assembled on a large communal platter: rice as the base, fish and vegetables arranged on top. Everyone eats from the same platter with their right hand.
- **The rof (stuffing paste) is the flavour engine.** Without the rof, thiéboudienne is just fish and rice. The rof — pounded parsley, garlic, Scotch bonnet, sometimes dried fish — is stuffed into slits cut in the fish, and as the fish braises, the rof perfumes the entire dish. - **The rice must cook in the braising liquid.** This is not rice served alongside fish — it is rice that has absorbed the entire flavour of the braise. The rice should be slightly crunchy on the bottom (the xoon — the Senegalese equivalent of tahdig, socarrat, and jollof bottom crust). - **Thiéboudienne was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2021.** It is officially recognised as a living cultural tradition.
REGIONAL CHINESE BEYOND SICHUAN + AFRICAN CONTINENT DEEP