Akpukpa

A Tiv delicacy prepared from bambara nuts or beans, often formed into a pudding or steamed cake. It is a traditional local food enjoyed with soups or sauces and is prized both as a protein source and a cultural delicacy.

Bambara nuts or beans

Bambara nuts or beans are soaked, ground, seasoned, and steamed or boiled in leaf wrappers to form a firm pudding or cake.

Enjoyed with local soups or sauces. Can also be eaten on its own as a snack or light meal.

Recognised as a traditional Tiv delicacy and a staple protein source in Tiv cuisine. It represents the resourceful use of locally available legumes in Tiv food culture.

Akiga Sai, writing in 1935, describes a closely related dish, akpekpa, which he calls a kind of bread. Women made it while maize was still fresh, and most people prepared it from maize mixed with ground Bambara nuts. He adds that, unlike other peoples, the Tiv have few dishes made from maize. A 2024 food guide describes akpukpa as a steamed dish of beans or Bambara nuts, similar to moi-moi but with a deeper, earthier taste, and says it is often eaten with bier, a fermented guinea-corn drink.

The Bambara nut (Vigna subterranea) is well suited to such dishes. According to the Useful Tropical Plants database, its seeds are often soaked in water and ground into a paste that is then fried or steamed, or ground to a meal and added to bread and porridge. Ripe seeds are very hard and take longer to cook than most legumes. The plant has been grown as a food crop in Africa since at least the 14th century, and Akiga records that it came to Tivland from the Ugenyi.

The Tiv food guide tivpeople.com describes two kinds. Akpukpa u ahi is a loaf made from Bambara-nut flour, palm oil and salt, filling enough to be eaten as a meal; akpukpa u alev is made in the same way from beans (black-eyed peas), and looks much the same but tastes different.

Note on sources: Akiga's akpekpa is made with fresh maize and Bambara nuts; the 2024 guide and this entry describe a pudding of beans or Bambara nuts. They may be versions of the same dish or two related ones.

Sources: tivpeople.com, "Tiv Food" (Internet Archive copy, 25 January 2025); Akiga Sai, History of the Tiv (1935), translated by Harold M. Bergsma and Martin L. Akiga, Africa 85(4), 2015, chapter two; sisiyemmie.com, "Unpopular Nigerian foods that everyone needs to know", 24 October 2024; Useful Tropical Plants database (Fern, K.).

See the Tiv people and the Tiv language in our Nigeria Heritage Archive: the states and local government areas where Tiv communities live, neighbouring peoples, population figures and sources.