Why egusi is more than just a great soup

By Yewande Komolafe, The New York Times

Every cook has at least one hard-to-get ingredient that they know they can find almost anywhere they are, as long as they’re persistent.

For me, it’s the egusi seed. Even after moving from Nigeria to the United States, I’ve always been able to find these off-white seeds, dried and peeled, harvested from the gourd-like fruit of a climbing vine native to West Africa. Just a few handfuls are all I need for a divine pot of soup.

The availability of an ingredient that grows on the other side of the Atlantic feels like a luxury, and I felt that even more acutely after speaking with Bethany Oyefeso, who owns Adùn, a Nigerian food delivery company, with her husband, Tobi Smith.

When she left Nigeria in 2004, egusi seeds — also called agushi, egunsi or egwusi — and most other West African ingredients were harder to come by outside the continent. As she moved from Sierra Leone to China, the United Ar...