Sancocho - Colombian beef soup recipe

Peel and finely slice half a head and 3 onions. Reserve a few cloves of garlic unsliced.Sauté 2 onions and sliced garlic in a squiggle of olive oil until nice golden brown. Add some fish sauce or salt as well as very finely sliced Scotch bonnet pepper towards the end, if you like it spicy.
In the meantime, put one sliced onions and whole garlic cloves in a pot with water (about 2 litres). Add some whole crushed black pepper corns, 2 carrots, peeled and cut into small blocks and a stalk of celery, sliced. Add meat at this stage if you are using bones or oxtail. Put on fire, bring to boil.Tip 2 into 3. Add the meatballs as well as fresh cassava, sweet potato and green plantain chopped into medium sized blocks. Simmer until the vegetables are soft enough to eat.Serve with chopped spring onions and coriander or parsley.