🍢 SNACK
Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks)
Roasted peanuts ground to a paste, kneaded with salted water to press out their oil, spiced with ginger and chili, shaped into sticks and rings and fried until hard and crunchy.
Beninese · medium · serves 6
prep 45 min · cook 30 min
~579 cal · 22g protein · 13g carbs · 53g fat · 7g fiber · 3g sugars · 8g sat fat (estimated, per serving)
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Klui-klui means galette in Fon, the main language of southern Benin, and it is the country's favourite crunchy snack, sold at markets and roadsides in twisted rings, tapered sticks, balls and spirals. The same snack is known as kuli-kuli in Nigeria and across the region, and it is made the same way everywhere, almost entirely from peanuts.
Making it is hard work and has traditionally been women's work. The peanuts are roasted, skinned and ground to a paste, which is then kneaded with a little salted water and squeezed again and again until the peanut oil runs out. What remains is a firm, dry dough, seasoned with ginger, chili or pepper, shaped by hand and fried in the very oil that was pressed from it.
Klui-klui is eaten at any time of day, most often with , granules, sprinkled with cane sugar, and also with bread or porridge. Ground to a powder, it also goes into the spice rub for suya.
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Make it yours
✓ Naturally vegetarian, vegan and gluten-, dairy-, egg- and pork-free. No swaps needed.
Toggle a diet and the ingredients rewrite themselves with regional substitutes.
🥕 Vegetarian
🌱 Vegan
🌾 Gluten-Free
🥛 Dairy-Free
🥜 Nut-Free
🥚 Egg-Free
🐖 Pork-Free
Dietary labels are a cooking guide, not allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we count coconut as a tree nut, following FDA labeling), fish, and shellfish; we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, read the label on every product you use, and note that a kitchen can cross-contaminate in ways a recipe cannot control.
Ingredients
US
Metric
Serves 6
- 500 g (about 3 1/2 cups) roasted, skinned unsalted peanuts
- about 1/2 cup warm water
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1/2 to 1 tsp chili powder or cayenne
- about 2 cups peanut oil, for frying, including the oil pressed from the paste
Instructions
- 1Grind the peanuts in a food processor, scraping down the sides, until they form a thick, smooth paste. This can take 5 to 8 minutes.
- 2Dissolve the salt in the warm water. Tip the paste into a bowl and knead it, adding the salted water a spoonful at a time, squeezing and pressing the paste against the side of the bowl so the oil runs out. Pour the oil off into a pan as it collects.✎ Chef’s noteThis is the heart of the recipe and it takes time, 20 minutes or more. Keep squeezing until the paste is firm, pale and barely oily; the more oil you remove, the crunchier the klui-klui.
- 3Knead the ginger and chili into the pressed dough. Pinch off small pieces and roll them into thin sticks about 10 cm (4 inches) long, tapered at both ends, or join them into small rings.
- 4Top up the pressed-out oil with enough peanut oil to come about 3 cm (1 1/4 inches) up a pan and heat it to about 160C (320F). Fry the pieces in batches for 5 to 8 minutes, turning, until deep golden brown.✎ Chef’s noteKeep the heat moderate so they colour slowly and dry out right through.
- 5Lift out onto paper towels and leave to cool completely, when they turn hard and crunchy. Store in an airtight jar.
Fon tradition, southern Benin.
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🌏 While it simmers, know your destination
📍
Cotonou. Akassa is fermented corn dough wrapped in leaves and eaten cool beside a sauce, and it is the everyday counterpart to amiwo's occasion. The city sits between the sea and a lagoon, so fish is either grilled whole on the sand or smoked and dropped into the sauces.
🗺️
Benin. Vodun's centre is here, in the Fon kingdom of Dahomey in what is now southern Benin, but it spans Togo, Ghana and Nigeria and absorbed a great deal of Yoruba practice, so it is a regional religion with a Beninese heartland. The slave port at Ouidah carried it across the Atlantic to Haiti, Cuba and Brazil, where its descendants are still practised.
🌍
Africa. The structure repeats across most of the continent: one starch and one sauce. A grain or root is cooked stiff, torn or rolled by hand, and used to carry a stew of leaves, groundnut, okra or fish, usually from a shared bowl and with the right hand. UNESCO listings have followed that logic, inscribing couscous in 2020 as a shared Maghreb tradition and Ivorian attieke in 2024.
The story behind this dish is up top, worth a read while the pot works.
More from Benin
AmiwoCornmeal cooked directly in a spiced red tomato-and-pepper sauce, served with braised chicken.
AbloSoft, slightly sweet steamed rice-and-corn cakes eaten plain or with a spicy sauce for breakfast.
Wassa-WassaSteamed yam-flour couscous tossed with a spiced tomato and onion sauce, a northern Beninese lunch staple.
Browse all Benin recipes →
Good to know
You’ll need: Blender, Food processor.
Storing it: Fried food is best eaten fresh while crisp. Re-crisp leftovers in a hot oven or air fryer; the microwave makes them soft.
Make it a Benin meal
TchoukoutouDrink
Yovo Doko (Sweet Fritters)Dessert
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Frequently asked questions
What is Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks)?
Roasted peanuts ground to a paste, kneaded with salted water to press out their oil, spiced with ginger and chili, shaped into sticks and rings and fried until hard and crunchy.
Where does Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) come from?
Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) is a Beninese dish from Cotonou, Benin.
Can Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) be made vegan, gluten-free, or dairy-free?
This Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) recipe includes substitution suggestions for vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, nut-free, egg-free, and pork-free versions. Treat the substitutions as a starting guide rather than a guarantee, and see the allergen note below.
Is Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) safe for people with food allergies?
Our dietary labels and substitutions are a cooking guide, not medical or allergen-safety advice. We track dairy, egg, gluten, tree nuts and peanuts (we still count coconut as a tree nut to be cautious, although the FDA stopped listing it as one in 2025), fish, and shellfish, but we do not screen for sesame, soy, mustard, celery, or sulphites. If you have a food allergy, always read the label on every product you use, and remember a home or commercial kitchen can cross-contaminate ingredients in ways a recipe cannot control.
How long does Klui-Klui (Beninese Peanut Sticks) take to make?
About 75 minutes total (45 minutes prep, 30 minutes cooking), serving 6.
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