Cultivated Plants
Fabaceae-Faboideae
Dipteryx odorata Aubl.
Tonka bean
Native to South America.
Old plantation, Park Estate, Laborie.
Dried seeds (beans) are locally used to flavour cocoa tea. Banned in USA and UK due to coumarin content, but permitted in France where it is used to flavour desserts and pastries.
Trees near Manaus have been shown by radioactive carbon dating to live over a thousand years, rare in tropical rainforests.(Jeffrey Q. Chambers & Niro Higuchi & Joshua P. Schimel, 1998. "Ancient trees in Amazonia," Nature, Nature, vol. 391(6663), pages 135-136, January.)
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