Africa → Cape Verde → Santiago (Praia)
🥙 LUNCH
Canja de Galinha
A thick, comforting Cape Verdean chicken and rice soup with carrot, potato and a bright squeeze of lime.
Cape Verdean · easy · serves 6
prep 20 min · cook 55 min
~400 cal · 32g protein · 38g carbs · 12g fat · 3g fiber · 3g sugars · 3g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Canja is the mother of Cape Verdean comfort food, a thick chicken and rice soup eaten to celebrate, to mourn, and to nurse anyone back from a cold. Brought to the islands by Portuguese settlers, who share their own canja de galinha with Brazil, it has become entirely Cape Verdean in the cooking.
The ingredients are humble and rarely need a special trip to the shops: chicken and rice built on a base of garlic, onion and tomato, seasoned simply with bay, paprika and pepper, with carrot and potato diced in. It is the first thing offered to the sick and to new mothers, food as care.
It is finished with a squeeze of lime and a little parsley, and left to rest so the rice swells and the soup thickens into something close to a porridge.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally gluten-, dairy-, nut-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 6
- 1.5 lb bone-in chicken pieces
- 1 cup medium-grain rice
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 tomato, quartered
- 2 carrots, diced
- 1 potato, diced
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 lime, juiced
- 1 handful parsley, chopped
Instructions
- 1Brown the chicken in the olive oil in a large pot, then add the onion, garlic, tomato and bay and cook until the tomato collapses.
- 2Cover with about 8 cups of water, bring to a boil, then simmer 40 minutes until the chicken is tender.
- 3Lift out the chicken, shred the meat off the bones, and return it to the pot with the rice and carrots.✎ Chef’s noteStir every few minutes once the rice is in. Left alone it sinks and sticks, and canja scorches easily.
- 4Simmer 20 minutes, add the potato, and cook 15 minutes more until everything is soft and the soup has thickened.
- 5Rest off the heat for 15 minutes, then finish with lime juice and parsley and serve.
Santiago island home cooking.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Santiago (Praia). Grogue is distilled from sugarcane at small mills called trapiches, mostly on Santo Antao and here on Santiago, and it is drunk neat or as ponche with honey and lime. The islands are dry and volcanic, so a great deal is imported, and what the sea gives, tuna above all, does much of the work.
🗺️
Cape Verde. Cape Verde's island cuisine is anchored by cachupa, a slow-cooked stew of corn, beans, and meat or fish that's the national dish. Portuguese and African roots meet over grogue (sugarcane rum) and Atlantic seafood.
🌍
Africa. The structure repeats across most of the continent: one starch and one sauce. A grain or root is cooked stiff, torn or rolled by hand, and used to carry a stew of leaves, groundnut, okra or fish, usually from a shared bowl and with the right hand. UNESCO listings have followed that logic, inscribing couscous in 2020 as a shared Maghreb tradition and Ivorian attieke in 2024.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Cape Verde
CachupaThe slow-simmered national stew of hominy corn, beans, and meats, endlessly reboiled and always improving.
Cuscuz DoceA steamed cornmeal cake, faintly sweet, eaten warm with butter, honey, or milk for breakfast.
Pudim de Leite (Milk Flan)A silky baked milk custard under a dark caramel, one of Cabo Verde's most popular desserts.
Browse all Cape Verde recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Pot or saucepan.
Storing it: Soup keeps 3 to 4 days refrigerated and freezes well. Reheat gently and loosen with a little water or stock if needed.
Make it a Cape Verde meal
PoncheDrink
Pudim de Leite (Milk Flan)Dessert
CachupaDinner
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Frequently asked questions
What is Canja de Galinha?
A thick, comforting Cape Verdean chicken and rice soup with carrot, potato and a bright squeeze of lime.
Where does Canja de Galinha come from?
Canja de Galinha is a Cape Verdean dish from Santiago (Praia), Cape Verde.
Can Canja de Galinha be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Canja de Galinha recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions. Treat the substitutions as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Canja de Galinha safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we still count coconut as a tree nut to be cautious, although the FDA stopped listing it as one in 2025), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Canja de Galinha take to make?
About 75 minutes total (20 minutes prep, 55 minutes cooking), serving 6.
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