Elaeocarpus dentatus, commonly known as hinau (Māori: hīnau), is a native lowland forest tree of New Zealand.

[20] It was renamed Elaeocarpus dentatus by the Danish-Norwegian botanist Martin Vahl in the third edition of his Symbolæ Botanicæ, published in 1794.

[21] The British botanist Allan Cunningham renamed it superfluously to Elaeocarpus hinau in 1840, in an article in the Annals of Natural History,[22] as did the French Botanist Étienne Raoul in his 1846 Choix de Plantes de la Nouvelle-Zélande ("Selected plants of New Zealand"), this time to Elaeocarpus cunninghamii.

[25][12] The fruit are eaten (off the ground) by North Island brown kiwi (Apteryx mantelli) who use the seeds as grinding agents to help break down food in their gizzards.

Kākā also rely heavily on hinau and tawa trees to feed their young, both because of their prevalence on the island and their abundant crop of fruit.

[36] Weka (Gallirallus australis) eat the fruit which falls onto the ground and are thought to be very important dispersers after the extinction of many of New Zealand's other flightless birds.

Hinau seeds may also germinate better after the coat has been torn open and the weka's gizzard might have a similar effect, though more research is needed.

[38] The extremely hard endocarp is thought to be for protection inside the digestive systems of large flightless birds who acted as another disperser by eating fallen fruit.

It missed and landed first in the Rata (all species under NZ), Hīnau, Kahikatea, Rimu, Mataī, and Miro trees who rejected the fire.

It then went on, landing in the kaikōmako, tōtara, patete, pukatea, and māhoe trees who received the fire, considering it a great gift.

[43][44][45][46] The ethnographer Elsdon Best recorded that, though the drupes are edible raw, to make the cake they would first dry the fruit for a couple of days and then pound them with a pestle made of maire or stone.

This process, deemed "Tuki," was done in a trough called a "kumete," and was necessary in order to remove the unwanted nuts, stalks and bits of broken skin.

Because some meal was still left on the stones, water was used to rub it off and the combination was drunk as a sort of gruel, as it would be called in a western context, and known to Māori as "wai haro."

[48] Another 19th century ethnographer, Richard Taylor, described a similar process, though he recorded that the drupes were steeped in running water for a year to remove their "bitterness" and cooked wrapped inside a rangiora leaf.

"[46] Mākereti Papakura, another ethnographer from the time period also described the fruit being soaked, though she didn't record it being a year long process.

[45] Although some Europeans didn't particularly enjoy the cakes, Elsdon Best writing that: "I prefer my bread and beefsteak,"[44] Mākereti Papakura claimed that Māori considered it a great luxury[45] as demonstrated in their saying: "Kia whakaara koe i taku moe, ko te whatu turei a Rua" meaning "When you awaken me from my sleep let it be for the purpose of eating the whatu turei a Rua (Hīnau meal).

[44] Elaeocarpus dentatus's fruit are in fact a good thing to eat as they contain some fatty acids which may be protective against Cardiovascular disease.

[49] The bark produces a brown dye which, when dipped in a ferrugineous swamp (one containing Iron), turns it into a bright and durable black colour.