Shea butter is a natural fat produced from the fruit of the shea tree, Vitellaria paradoxa. Shea butter has an ivory appearance and is referred to as ‘Nkuto’ in Twi. Ghana’s dry savannah region is home to the shea tree, an indigenous African species. The tree begins to bear fruit between the 10th and 15th year after planting and achieves its peak production between the 30th and 50th year after planting. Shea nut kernels contain between 47 and 50 percent fat or oil when they are mature, making it a rich source of shea nut oil. To extract the shea butter, the kernels are pounded, grinded into a golden-brown paste. The paste is then boiled and the oil is skimmed off after the residue and impurities are removed.
Shea butter is used extensively for cosmetic and therapeutic purposes. It helps in the removal of blemishes, stretch marks and protects the skin against harmful sun rays and harsh weather condition.
There are uses for almost every component of the shea butter tree. The termite-resistant wood is employed in construction. The walls of middle buildings are waterproofed using the shell. The leaves, bark, roots, and pulp are utilized in traditional medicine.
Vitamins A, E, and F are abundant in shea butter. It is used as cooking oil, as an ingredient in pharmaceutical businesses, and in the cosmetics, sector to manufacture skin moisturizers and hair care products. In the food industry, shea butter is also used to replace cocoa butter and margarine. Additionally, it’s utilized to make candles and soap.
We walk you from the shea kernels process to the soft, creamy, and pure butter we are familiar with so you can appreciate the quality, effort, and skill that went into making shea butter. Shea butter production is using done by women in the Northern region using traditional methods and almost the whole shea butter production process is made solely with hands.
The ripe (fallen) shea fruits are manually gathered from the ground beneath the shea tree every year between April and August. After gathering the fruits, the fruit skin must be removed, and the nuts must be well dried before being used in the production process. Depending on the size of the tree and the season, one shea tree can provide up to 40 kilos of fresh fruits.
In the past, shea kernels are washed, to remove the shell, women used to grind nuts with their hands, using mortar and pestle. Nowadays, they mostly take them to the grinding machine which facilitates and speed up the process.
After being crushed, nuts are roasted over an open flame. Because of this, the finished product has a wonderful roasting aroma. Then, after being returned to the grinding machine, the roasted fragments are put through a specific procedure to create a thick paste. The hardest part comes after this process phase.
Women stir the paste in big basins, by hand while gradually adding cold water while they knead. The fat separates from the cake after an hour as a result of the mixing breaking the emulsion. After that, women remove the oil that floats to the top of the bowl as the butter melts at the high temperature. The liquid is then strained to remove any undesired impurities before being placed in large basins. To ensure that the oil is thick and ready for use and sale, these basins must be kept in a cold, dark location for at least half a day.
When shea butter is not filtered in any way, but sold directly from the point when women finish the process, it is called raw or unrefined shea butter. It has nutty and roasted smell and ivory or deep yellow colour. Also, with the further purification, like cleaning and bleaching, its smell, composition and colour are abolished. This kind of butter is called refined shea butter and has no smell and typical white snowy colour.
If your skin needs moisturization and hydration, the best option is to use shea butter. The process makes it worth every glow.