AZÉZÉ: From The Wild To Dining Table As Sweetener

By Suleiman Ugbokhe

In terms of usage, azézé rivals honey as a sweetening addictive to foods for consumption.

Azézé, like honey, is from the wild. Whilst honey is produced by an insect - the bee - azézé is produced by human from a fruit (ulili) borne by a tree called ulili.

Ulili tree

Like honey, azézé can be used in garri (I think only my West African brethren understand that!), in tea, in pap, etc, as a sweetener.

Azézé Production Process: You cannot pluck the fruits. The fruits are green when they are not yet mature and turn dark at maturity at which point they fall to the ground to be picked.

 

The unripe (green) and ripe (dark) ulili fruits

One can pick a few for direct consumption. All you have to do is to wash the fruits, peel off the tiny skin covering the fleshy part of the fruit and put the fruit in your mouth to suck the sweet flesh and discard the hard kernel upon which the flesh is built.

To make the azézé, you need to collect the ripe fruits in large quantities in 50kg bags or big plastic or metallic bowls, depending on which is available.

When the fruits are brought home, they are washed and loaded into large cooking pots and left to cook for about an hour.

The cooked fruits are then put in a mortar and pounded. There are milling machines operated manually to do the same operation. 

A milling engine

The pounding is done in such a way as not to crush the inner kernel since the whole idea is to get the fleshy part into a pulp.

The pulp is then loaded into a basket, which inner wall had been dressed with plantain leaves. The basket is then placed atop a clean basin into which the sweet liquid of the fruits pulp drains into.

The process of extracting the sweet liquid

Water can be added to the pulp in the basket from time to time to ensure the sweet liquid is totally drained from the pulp. This process can last overnight or 24 hours.

Boiling the extracted liquid

The next step is to pour the collected liquid into a large cooking pot and place on fire to cook until it becomes slightly thick, which concludes the process of making azézé.

Pepper as a preservative

Red peppers are then added to the processed azézé to act as a preservative.

Azézé does not go bad. It can last for years.

- With Pearla Akemokwe