In the Nigerian language Yoruba, "obe" means "stew" or "soup." In West African cookery generally, often it's difficult to distinguish between a stew, a soup, and a sauce; consistency, it seems, is not always the defining criterion. For their single offering, the proprietors of this stall skirted the issue. They portrayed their dish of chicken, spinach, and plantain over tomatoey joloff rice through then lens of an entirely different cuisine, as "Nigerian bibimbap" (with meat, $6).
Only an audience of virtual globetrotters would be expected to understand a West African dish in the light of an East Asian — specifically, Korean — culinary metaphor. Mexican and Italian are much more commonly employed for such purposes, at least in New York. See also "Burmese tamale w/coconut."
Obe
Queens International Night Market
Behind the New York Hall of Science, 47-01 111th St. (inside Flushing Meadows Corona Park), Queens
www.QueensNightMarket.com
Saturday evenings (in 2017, April 22-August 19, September 30-October 28; vendors vary from week to week)
