Description of the candle tree and numerous names of valuable fruits. Their calorie content, useful and dangerous properties. How kukui is eaten, what dishes are prepared from them. Interesting facts about tropical nuts, the value and beneficial properties of the oil. Unripe nut juice helps women get rid of thrush. Extract from ripe fruit relieves teething pain in babies and helps cure stomatitis. The sweet extract from the leaves and ripe nuts is used to treat tonsillitis and eliminate bad breath.
Tinctures from the leaves are used for poisoning, causing an attack of vomiting to cleanse the stomach.
Reproductive health benefits of Kukui have been proven in official research. At Vali do Itajai State University (Brazil), scientists have found that extract from fetuses increases sperm production and improves sperm quality. True, there were mice in the experimental group so far.
Kukui oil stops age-related changes, improves skin tone, stimulates collagen production, and is used to treat burns.
Dried flower tea prevents infants from developing SIDS, a sudden breathing disorder during sleep. What causes a dangerous pathology has not yet been clarified.
Contraindications and harm of kukui nut
The main harm of the product appears when the fruit is eaten raw - due to the too high content of saponins, the pulp is poisonous.
Local residents used raw nuts to treat dysentery and other intestinal infections. Recent studies have proven that such use is life-threatening.
You cannot use kukui when treating children under 3 years old, during pregnancy and lactation. You should not try a new product if you are prone to diarrhea and hypotension. Allergy to nuts is quite common, so they should be introduced into the diet with caution.
How to eat and what to cook with kukui nuts
Raw nuts, whether ripe or not, are poisonous. If you want to feast on oily kernels, they are fried in a preheated oven at a temperature of 200 ° C. The fruits become harmless when they turn golden brown.
There is also a way how kukui nuts are eaten - they are soaked for 1, 5 hours in running water. This method is used when in the future a complex dish will be prepared from the product, for example, a sauce, or added to a side dish.
The powder of the fruit of the candle tree is added to baked goods or desserts; in Java, the pulp is used as an ingredient for gravy. Ripe roasted nuts are also used to make oil, which is then used to season salads.
Kukui Nut recipes:
- Inamona is a popular condiment … To prepare it, 12 nuts are fried, chopped and mixed with 1 chili pepper pod, a teaspoon of fine sea salt is added.
- Pork in nut sauce … Cut pork, 0.5 kg, into small cubes, 1 pc. red and green bell peppers in strips, grate carrots and finely chop a bunch, about 100-150 g, of green onions. Open a jar of canned pineapples. Hawaiians prefer to soak fresh pineapple slices in a vinegar marinade with red and white pepper for 3 hours, but this lengthens the cooking process. Pineapples together with syrup need 250 g. First, the meat is fried in sunflower or corn oil in a deep frying pan, then, when it is half ready, put all the vegetables and pineapples in the pan, drain the juice. Add 3-4 cloves of crushed garlic and stew under the lid, salt to taste. While the meat is cooking, the sauce is made. Pre-fried kukui, 3 pieces, pounded, mixed with pineapple juice, 200 ml, 2 tablespoons of starch and soy sauce, 6 tablespoons. The sauce is boiled so that it boils 1/3 and thickens. It is poured into a frying pan just before it is turned off, it is boiled all together for 3 minutes. The same sauce can be served with fish. Traditional boiled rice is served as a side dish for pork.
- Peanut butter … The soaked kukui nuts are peeled and spread on a baking sheet. The oven is heated to 230 ° C and baked for 15 minutes. Then the fruits are crushed and placed in a glass jar, adding refined sunflower oil so that the nuts are covered. Soak for 2-3 days in a cool place and make sure that the mixture does not go rancid. Ready oil can be seasoned with vegetable salads and added to rice.
- Hawaiian fish … Sprinkle 2 tuna fillets generously with salt and sprinkle liberally with lime juice. The juice is drained from the coconut, and half of the pulp is cut into cubes. The fish is laid out in a cast iron mold, poured with coconut milk and baked in the oven for 20 minutes at a temperature of 160-180 ° C. While the fish is baking, they make a side dish. Rice, 100 g, cook until half cooked. Pour olive oil into a hot frying pan, spread the slices: onion, leek stalk, celery stalk, a tablespoon of roasted kukui nut powder, as well as semi-cooked rice. When it becomes soft, but has not yet turned into porridge, you can turn it off. Mix the sauce: a little vegetable oil, lemon or orange juice, half a chili pod. Separately mix the pulp cubes of half a coconut, 2-3 chopped green salad leaves, pieces from half a pineapple, pour the sauce and interrupt everything with a blender. This sauce is poured over the fish when serving.
Pieces of fruit are added to the granola - an assorted mix. The rest of the healthy breakfast: hazelnuts, wheat germ, pine nuts, goji and dried mulberry berries. Tikami in Hawaii are called the idols of the local Gods. But the same name was given to cocktails, which often include the fried fruits of the Lumbang tree.
Hawaiian tiki:
- Zombie … Passion fruit pulp is squeezed into a shaker. Add Bacardi Superior and Bacardi 8 rum in equal amounts, about 2 tablespoons each, 1 spoon of Demerara rum and a little more sandalwood liqueur. The amount of ingredients is specified depending on the size of the passion fruit. Pour freshly squeezed grapefruit juice, about a tablespoon, and 2 servings of bitters. This is the name of alcoholic beverages, which, in addition to vermouth, include herbal tinctures. This cocktail uses Amargo Chuncho. Stir in a special way, pour into a glass. Sprinkle with 1, 5 tablespoons of Bacardi 151 float on top, add a mint leaf and sprinkle with crushed kukui.
- Beer … First, ice cubes are placed in a glass, then in layers, without mixing, 2 varieties of local beer in equal quantities, usually light, light and dense, dark, in a glass of 100 g. Sprinkle with grated kukui on top.
Fried kukui is not mixed with milk, although, according to experts, the taste of such a drink resembles a macadamia cocktail. However, the products are not substitutes. Such drinks are drunk by children, and if the nut is not processed thoroughly enough, the remains of saponins can provoke intoxication.
Interesting facts about the candle tree
In May 1959, the kukui was declared the national tree of Hawaii. The total cultivation area of the evergreen candle tree in tropical climates is 205,532 hectares.
The botanical name Aleurite comes from the Greek "aleuron", that is, "covered in flour". This is what a plant looks like with young silvery leaves.
The tree was called candle tree, since the fruit, due to its high oil content, has long been used instead of candles. The nuts were strung on sticks, set on fire, and they burned for a long time like oil lamps. Such lamps hardly smoke.
From charred nuts, paint is made for tattoos on the body, oil is added to the pigment instead of drying oil.
Fishermen chew raw nuts and spit them into the water - nut juice improves visibility and eliminates ripples.
The trunks are used to make canoes and portable huts.
If you use kukui 2-3 times a day before conception, a boy will be born.
Tongan natives still make detergents from ripe raw nuts. The fruits, which are called tuitui in this area, are ground into a tuquilamulam paste and a mild cosmetic soap, which tourists are happy to buy, is boiled.
Kukui oil is very popular. It nourishes and moisturizes dry skin, stops age-related changes, eliminates flaking, and fights dermatological diseases. It is used to treat burns and open wounds. On its basis, cosmetic creams and medicinal shampoos are made.
Cold-pressed oil is used to prevent rotting of wooden structures and fishing nets. It was because of industrial use that the Lumbang tree was once completely destroyed. In the early twentieth century, an almost extinct species had to be restored in Hawaii.
For this, the nuts were imported from Panama, planted, and only then, thanks to man, they returned the plant to its natural environment. People walked through the jungle themselves to spread the fruit. Birds cannot swallow large seeds, and new growth does not take root from pieces of pulp.
Watch the video about kukui nuts:
In the photo, the kukui nut looks more like a fruit, and this is not surprising if you remember its size. When walking on your own through the forests of Indonesia and Hawaii at the end of December, you should not choose a place for a halt under a spreading candle tree. If the nut hits the head, the journey ends at the hospital. Also, do not try nuts that have already fallen from the tree, although the pulp of ripe fruits is sweet. As already mentioned, they are poisonous when raw. This must be firmly remembered if you independently travel to "hot" countries.
