Welcome to the summary page for FabulousFusionFood's Spice guide to Dawadawa along with all the Dawadawa containing recipes presented on this site, with 16 recipes in total.

This is a continuation of an entire series of pages that will, I hope, allow my visitors to better navigate this site. As well as displaying recipes by name, country and region of origin I am now planning a whole series of pages where recipes can be located by meal type and main ingredient. This page gives a listing of all the Cornish recipes added to this site.

These recipes, all contain as a major flavouring.

Dawadawa (also known as Carob, Daddowa, Dawa dawa (Nigeria), Irú (Nigeria), Khinda (Sierra Leone), Kpalugu (Ghana), Locust Bean Cakes, Néré, Nététu (Senegal and The Gambia), Soumbara or Soumbala (Francophone West Africa), and Ugba (Nigeria)) represents the fermented oily seeds of the Parkia biglobosa tree, a member of the Fabaceae (legume) family of flowering plants. Parkia biglobosa is a perennial, deciduous tree that ranges in height from 7m to 20m and bears a large crown with branches that spread wide and which, typically, are attached low down onto the stout bole. The bark is a grey-brown, thick and fissured. The leaves of the tree are alternate, bipinnate, dark green and about 30cm in length. There can be up to 17 pairs each with between 15 and 60 leaflets. The flowers are hermaphrodite, orange in colour and secrete nectar. When fertilized these develop into pods that are dark brown when mature and can extend up to 45cm long and 2cm wide. The ripe seeds have a hard testa, and are embedded in a yellow pericarp. Each seed is quite large (up to 0.25g each in weight).

The tree is native to Central and West Africa (but was introduced to the West Indies and India during the 18th century) and can be found in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Cote d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo and Uganda.

The seeds themselves, when fresh, are slightly oily to the touch and have a distinctive, slightly unpleasant odour, hence the common names stink bean (English), stinkboon (Dutch), but a slightly sweet taste. Typically each tree produces approximately 25 to 52 kg. of pods per year, which in turn yields around 6 to 13 kg of fermentable beans. For human consumption, the seeds are fermented to produce the spice and the fermented beans are then dried either as a powder or in cakes (these will keep for up to a year without refrigeration).

The fermentation process itself is by bacterial action, which dramatically improves the food quality of the beans (a recipe for fermented oil beans is given on this site). Principally, this makes the proteins in the beans much more digestible. Though it is used principally as a flavouring enhancer (particularly in Nigerian cuisine) dawadawa also adds thiamine and riboflavin to diets and acts as a protein source. Fermentation also makes free lysine available in the fermented bean mix, which is a boon for diets traditionally rich in maize (as this is deficient in the plant).

In markets, Iru is typically sold in dried form as balls or cakes, with each one ranging in size from about 1 tbsp to 2 tbsp. A single cake or ball is usually added to one batch of soup or stew.