I’ve noticed a good number of these grow in our area of West Africa but local people seem to only use them for medicine. Does anyone have recommendations for how different cultures use this trees leaves in their cuisine?
@Rick_Burnette, I was told you might know.
It is commonly used in our cuisine in Thailand. And I love it so much when it is cooked with our curry paste, coconut milk and pork, especially with crunchy pig skin. We use mostly young and semi young leaves together, but some people add young flowers too. If we use only young leaves the curry will turn to be too sour and the semi young leaves have a mixture of sour and bitter tastes. So, we mix them together to have a better blend between the sour and better. However, both kinds of leaves, before using them, we need to boil them nicely and squeeze them in cold water 2-3 times in order to take out the bitter taste. Then the leaves are ready to be used in the curry. It has been my first choice of dishes after a stressful day, like after exams and other exhaustive days of work. For it is believed that the dish has laxative and sedative values in it. Try it!