stink bean

English

stink beans, Parkia speciosa seeds

a stink bean tree

Noun

stink bean (plural stink beans)

1. A tree (Parkia speciosa) that produces edible beans.

   Synonyms: bitter bean, stinky bean, twisted cluster bean

   • 2008, Eric Frérot, Alain Velluz, Alain Bagnoud, Estelle Delort, “Analysis of the volatile constituents of cooked petai beans (Parkia speciosa) using high‐resolution GC/ToF–MS”, in Flavour and Fragrance Journal, volume 23, number 6, page 434:

     Parkia speciosa (common name: petai in Malay; twisted cluster bean or stink bean) is a tropical leguminous tree of the family of the Fabaceae, subfamily of the Mimosoideae. It is found in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and northern India, and the cooked beans are used in cooking, mainly in seafood recipes.

   • 2014, Suchanuch Wonghirundecha, Soottawat Benjakul, Punnanee Sumpavapo, “Total phenolic content, antioxidant and antimicrobial activities of stink bean (Parkia speciosa Hassk.) pod extracts”, in Songklanakarin Journal of Science and Technology, volume 36, number 2, page 301:

     Stink bean pod is regarded as waste material during the processing of commercial preserved stink bean seed.

2. The bean seed of the plant, used as food.
   • 2020, Yoong-Kong How, Lee-Fong Siow, “Effects of convection-, vacuum- and freeze-drying on antioxidant, physicochemical properties, functional properties and storage stability of stink bean (Parkia speciosa) powder”, in Journal of Food Science and Technology, volume 57, number 12, page 4637:

     As the name suggested, stink beans are rather unique because they have strong and distinctive bitter taste and pungent odour contributed by the presence of cyclic polysulfide compounds such as hexathionine, tetrathiane, triothiolane, pentathiopane, pentathiocane and tetrathiepane. Nevertheless, stink beans remain popular as a form of delicacy among Southeast Asians whether they are eaten cooked or raw.

Further reading

• Parkia speciosa on Wikipedia.Wikipedia