File:Palm oil - hand producing from African Oil Palm - Elaeis guineensis.jpg

English: Hand extraction of oil from the pulp of the fruit of the African oil palm requires first boiling the fruits to soften the outside pulp, then mashing them in a mortar and pestle to separate the fatty vegetable pulp from the fibers and hard center nut of the fruit. The fibers are scooped out and wrung to squeeze out the reddish oil to be used in a wide range of traditional west and central African recipes. The fibers are returned to the mortar to be pounded again with hot water to extract another product, an opaque yellow liquid used in other popular recipes such as moambe. Mechanical methods are becoming more available to more households to do this chore. Congo