candlenut

The Candlenut (Aleurites moluccanus), is a tree in the family Euphorbiaceae, also known as Candleberry, Indian walnut, Kemiri, Varnish tree ,Kukui nut tree. In Malaysia, the candlenut is known as 'buah keras' liberally translated it means 'tough nut'. The nut is round, 4–6 cm in diameter; the seed nside has a very hard seed coat and a high oil content, which allows its use as a candle (see below), hence its name.

• The candle nut is similar (though "rougher") in flavor and texture to the macadamia nut, which has a similarly high oil content. It is mildly toxic when raw.
• The nut is often used cooked in Malaysian cuisine where it is used to thicken curries.
• Several parts of the plant have been used in traditional medicine in most of the areas where it is native. The oil is an irritant and purgative and sometimes used like castor oil.. It is also used as a hair stimulant or additive to hair treatment systems. The seed kernels have a laxative effect.  In rural Malaysia, the pulped kernels or boiled leaves are used in poultices for headache, fevers, ulcers, swollen joints, and gonorrhea. In Indonesia, the bark is used for bloody diarrhoea or dysentry.
• In ancient Hawai'i the nuts, named kukui were burned to provide light. The nuts were strung in a row on a palm leaf midrib, lit one end, and burned one by one every 15 minutes or so. This led to their use as a measure of time. One could instruct someone to return home before the second nut burned out.
  
• In Tonga and other South Pacific countries, ripe nuts, named tuitui are pounded into a paste, tukilamulamu, used as soap or shampoo.
• Candle nuts are also roasted and mixed into a paste with salt to form a Hawaiian condiment known as inamona. Inamona is a key ingredient in traditional Hawaiian poke. It's the Hawaiian state tree.Dead wood of candlenut is eaten by a larva of a coleoptera called Agrionome fairmairei. This larva is eaten by some people.

Modern cultivation is mostly for the oil. In plantations, each tree will produce 30–80 kg of nuts, and the nuts yield 15 to 20% of their weight in oil. Most of the oil is used locally rather than figuring in international trade.