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Cereals and bread from Northern Nigeria

Masa / waina (Nigerian fermented rice, millet, sorghum or maize cakes)masa

Rice, millet, sorghum or maize is soaked, wet-milled and left to sour, often with some batter kept from the last batch. Lactic acid bacteria and yeast drop the pH from about 6 to below 4 in a day, and the batter is fried in a cup-shaped pan, or rolled into balls, as puffy cakes.

Fully documentedCereals and bread28 h

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedMethod of the Sanni and Adesulu 2013 laboratory masa from maize, a slight modification of a traditional method; the paper gives no grain weights.
Grain (rice, millet, sorghum or maize)The study used white maize; the 2026 review lists rice, millet, maize and sorghum as the grains[sanni2013][olanbiwoninu2026]
Water, to a semi-solid slurry[sanni2013]
Some fermented batter from an earlier batch (back-slopping), in many households[olanbiwoninu2026]
Onions and salt, added after fermentation[sanni2013]
Vegetable oil, for frying[sanni2013]
Starterspontaneous or backslop

Total time across the recorded steps: 28 h

Start
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Close-up: water moving into a grain

What changes: Warm water soaks into the grain and softens it

Step 1 of 4
Steep the grain
Time
4 h
Reported
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactic acid bacteria
Yeasts
Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Rice, millet, sorghum or maize is soaked, wet-milled and left to sour, often with some batter kept from the last batch. Lactic acid bacteria and yeast drop the pH from about 6 to below 4 in a day, and the batter is fried in a cup-shaped pan, or rolled into balls, as puffy cakes. Made in 4 steps over 28 h. The longest step, cover and ferment, takes 24 h (Sanni A.I 2013) and runs at 26–30 °C (Sanni A.I 2013). Lactobacillus plantarum and Pediococcus acidilactici do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step24 hReported[sanni2013]Cover and ferment
Temperature26–30 °CReported[sanni2013]Cover and ferment
AciditypH 6 → 3.95Measured[sanni2013]Cover and ferment

What makes this one different

Masa is a fried cake, where the West African ogi and koko are sour grain porridges, and it can be made from maize, millet, sorghum or rice. Many makers keep back some batter to start the next one.

Related ferments

Safety

The batter reaches pH below 4 before frying. A 2026 review of street-vended masa says Shigella, Salmonella, Pseudomonas, E. coli and Staphylococcus have been detected in it, that the spontaneous fermentation makes safety and quality vary, and that it recommends HACCP and routine testing for contaminants and mycotoxins.

Hazards the sources name: Shigella, Salmonella, Pseudomonas, Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus, detected in street-vended masa.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Sanni and Adesulu (2013) write that masa is eaten with honey every Friday after Jumat prayers by Yoruba Muslims, and that it is also made the night before funerals, weddings or the 40th day after a child's birth.

  1. [sanni2013] Sanni A.I., Adesulu A.T. 2013, Microbiological and physico-chemical changes during fermentation of maize for masa production, African Journal of Microbiology Research 7(34):4355–4362, doi:10.5897/AJMR12.1362paper
  2. [olanbiwoninu2026] Olanbiwoninu A.A., Awotundun T.A., Afolabi J.F., Fashogbon R.O., Fagunwa O. 2026, Ethnogeographic distribution of Nigerian fermented foods and the prospects for bioeconomy improvements, Foods 15(17):3087, doi:10.3390/foods15173087 (review)paper
  3. [abdulkadir2026] Abdulkadir F., Anuonye J.C., Bala J.D., James S. 2026, Microbial, mycotoxin, and quality safety of Masa, a critical review of fermented fried puffed batter, Journal of Food Science and Technology 63(8):1403–1415, doi:10.1007/s13197-026-06717-5 (review, abstract)paper