This spice commonly known as Grains of paradise, Melegueta pepper, alligator pepper, Guinea grains or Guinea pepper is obtained from the plant's ground seeds; it gives a pungent, peppery flavour.
Although it is native to West Africa, it is an important cash crop in the Basketo special woreda of southern Ethiopia.
Grains of paradise are commonly employed in the cuisines of West Africa and of North Africa, where they have been traditionally imported via caravan routes in a series of transshipments through the Sahara desert and whence they were distributed to Sicily and Italy.
They are also used by people on certain diets, such as a raw-food diet, because they are less irritating to digestion than black pepper.
In West African folk medicine, grains of paradise are valued for their warming and digestive properties, and among the Efik people in Nigeria have been used for divination and ordeals determining guilt.