Tamarind Juice

Tamarind juice is made by soaking the pulp of the tamarind pod in water, working it loose from the seeds and fibre, straining it and sweetening to taste. It is sharp, dark and genuinely refreshing, and it is drunk across a very wide stretch of the world. The tree is African. Tamarindus indica is indigenous to tropical Africa and grows wild across Sudan, Cameroon, Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia, Somalia, Tanzania and Malawi. It has been cultivated on the Indian subcontinent for so long that it is frequently reported as native there, and India is now among the largest producers, but the origin is African, and the confusion is a good example of how completely a crop can be absorbed somewhere it did not begin. The fruit is a long pod with a brittle brown shell. Inside is a sticky, dark, intensely sour pulp packed around hard seeds. That pulp is what everything is made from: the juice, and also the souring agent used across African, Indian and Southeast Asian cooking. It is drunk across the Sahel under a range of names, and in West Africa it is a standard hot-weather drink sold alongside zobo and other cold infusions. Sweetening is essential rather than optional. Unsweetened tamarind is bracingly sour.