FACTOID # 172: The number of tourists in San Marino is almost 19 times the resident population.
 
 Home   Encyclopedia   Statistics   Countries A-Z   Flags   Maps   Education   Forum   FAQ   About 
 
WHAT'S NEW
RECENT ARTICLES
More Recent Articles »
 

SEARCH ALL

FACTS & STATISTICS    Advanced view

Search encyclopedia, statistics and forums:

 

 

(* = Graphable)

 

 


Encyclopedia > Yuka
?
Cassava

Manihot esculenta
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Division: Magnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Malpighiales
Family: Euphorbiaceae
Subfamily: Crotonoideae
Tribe: Manihoteae
Genus: Manihot
Species: M. esculenta
Binomial name
Manihot esculenta
Crantz

The cassava or manioc (Manihot esculenta; also yuca in Spanish, mandioca, aipim, or macaxeira in Portuguese, and mandio in Guaraní) is a woody perennial shrub of the spurge family, that is extensively cultivated as an annual crop for its edible starchy tuberous root. It was originally observed in what are now called Brazil and Paraguay, and today is widely diffused in tropical and subtropical regions, and may be called the "potato of the tropics". All known species and varieties are cultigens. Scientific classification or biological classification is how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms. ... Divisions Green algae land plants (embryophytes) non-vascular embryophytes Hepatophyta - liverworts Anthocerophyta - hornworts Bryophyta - mosses vascular plants (tracheophytes) seedless vascular plants Lycopodiophyta - clubmosses Equisetophyta - horsetails Pteridophyta - true ferns Psilotophyta - whisk ferns Ophioglossophyta - adderstongue ferns seed plants (spermatophytes) †Pteridospermatophyta - seed ferns Pinophyta - conifers Cycadophyta - cycads Ginkgophyta - ginkgo Gnetophyta - gnetae Magnoliophyta - flowering... Classes Magnoliopsida - Dicots Liliopsida - Monocots The flowering plants (also angiosperms or Magnoliophyta) are one of the major groups of modern plants, comprising those that produce seeds in specialized reproductive organs called flowers, where the ovulary or carpel is enclosed. ... Orders see text Dicotyledons or dicots are flowering plants whose seed contains two embryonic leaves or cotyledons. ... Families Family Achariaceae Family Balanopaceae Family Bonnetiaceae Family Caryocaraceae Family Chrysobalanaceae Family Clusiaceae Family Ctenolophonaceae Family Dichapetalaceae Family Elatinaceae Family Erythryloxaceae (coca family) Family Euphorbiaceae (spurge family) Family Euphroniaceae Family Goupiaceae Family Humiriaceae Family Hypericaceae (St Johns wort family) Family Irvingiaceae Family Ixonanthaceae Family Lacistemaceae Family Linaceae (flax family... Genera See text Ref: Euphorbiaceae in The Families of Flowering Plants, as of 2002-07-13 The Spurge family (Euphorbiaceae) is a large family of flowering plants with 280 genera and around 6000 species. ... Genera See Subtaxa section The Crotonoideae is a subfamily of the family Euphorbiaceae. ... Genera Cnidoscolus - spurge nettle Manihot Manihoteae is a tribe of the subfamily Crotonoideae, under the family Euphorbiaceae. ... Species Manihot brasiliensis Manihot esculenta - cassava, manioc Manihot glaziovi Manihot grahamii et al. ... In biology, binomial nomenclature is a standard convention used for naming species. ... Guaraní (local name: avañeẽ ) is the language of the Guaranies indigenous people still spoken in Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay and southwestern Brazil. ... A willow shrub A shrub or bush is a horticultural rather than strictly botanical category of woody plant, distinguished from a tree by its multiple stems and lower height, usually less than 6 m tall. ... This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Starch is a complex carbohydrate which is insoluble in water. ... A tuberous root is a modified lateral root, enlarged for storage. ... The tropics are the geographic region of the Earth centered on the equator and limited in latitude by the two tropics: the Tropic of Cancer in the north and the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere. ... Subtropical (or semitropical) areas are those adjacent to the tropics, usually roughly defined as the ranges 23. ... Binomial name Solanum tuberosum L. The potato (Solanum tuberosum) is a perennial plant of the Solanaceae, or nightshade, family, grown for its starchy tuber. ... Cultigen is the name for organisms, especially cultivated plants like the edible banana, not known to have a wild or uncultivated counterpart in nature. ...


World production of cassava root was estimated to be 184 million tonnes in 2002, the majority of production is in Africa where 99.1 million tonnes were grown, 51.5 million tonnes were grown in Asia and 33.2 million tonnes in Latin America and the Caribbean. A tonne (also called metric ton) is a non-SI unit of mass, accepted for use with SI, defined as: 1 tonne = 1000 kg (= 106 g). ... 2002 is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Africa is the worlds second-largest continent and second most populous after Asia. ... World map showing location of Asia Asia is the central and eastern part of Eurasia, defined by subtracting Europe from Eurasia. ... Latin America consists of the countries of South America and some of North America (including Central America and some the islands of the Caribbean) whose inhabitants mostly speak Romance languages, although Native American languages are also spoken. ... ...

Contents


Description

Unprocessed cassava root
Enlarge
Unprocessed cassava root

The root is long and tapered, with a firm homogeneous flesh encased in a detachable rind, about 1 mm thick, rough and brown on the outside. Commercial varieties can be 5 to 10 cm in diameter at the top, and 50 to 80 cm long. A woody cordon runs along the root's axis. The flesh can be chalk-white or yellowish; it breaks like a carrot's, and darkens quickly upon exposure to the air. (For this reason, the skinned root must be kept under water until it is ready to be cooked.) Even under refrigeration, the root's flavor spoils in a day or so, and therefore it is not very popular with supermarkets. A cordon is the descriptive term for a particular style of pruning woody plants. ...


The root contains free and bound cyanogenic glucosides which are converted to HCN in the presence of linamarase, a naturally occurring enzyme in cassava. In the past, cassava was categorized as either sweet or bitter, signifying the absence or presence of toxic levels of cyanogenic glucosides. The so-called "sweet" (actually "not bitter") cultivars can produce as little as 20 mg of HCN per kg of fresh roots, while "bitter" ones may produce more than 50 times as much (1 g/kg). Bitter varieties must be processed so as to remove the cyanogenic glucosides. A cyanide is any chemical compound that contains the group C≡N, with the carbon atom triple bonded to the nitrogen atom. ... A glucoside is a glycoside that is derived from glucose. ... Hydrogen cyanide is a chemical compound with chemical formula H-C≡N. A solution of hydrogen cyanide in water is called hydrocyanic acid or prussic acid. ... Ribbon diagram of the catalytically perfect enzyme TIM. Factor D enzyme crystal prevents the immune system from inappropriately running out of control. ...


Uses

The root is usually cooked into a great variety of dishes. If eaten raw, the root is poisonous and can be fatal, because the digestive process produces cyanide within the body. The soft-boiled root has a delicate flavor and can replace boiled potatoes in many uses: as an accompaniment for meat dishes, or deep-fried, made into purées, dumplings and gnocchi, soups, stews, gravies, etc. Cassava flour can also replace wheat flour, and is so-used by some people with allergies to other grain crops. Tapioca and foufou are made from the starchy flour from cassava root. Dumplings may be any of a wide variety of dishes, both sweet and savoury, in several different cuisines. ... Gnocchi (pronounced NYOKI; [] or []) is the Italian word for dumpling, literally meaning lumps. ... Soup is a savoury liquid food that is made by boiling ingredients, such as meat, vegetables and beans in stock or hot water, until the flavor is extracted, forming a broth. ... Species T. boeoticum T. durum T. monococcum T. spelta References:   ITIS 42236 2002-09-22 Wheat (Triticum spp. ... An allergy or Type I hypersensitivity is an immune malfunction whereby a persons body is hypersensitised to react immunologically to typically nonimmunogenic substances. ... Tapioca is an essentially flavourless starchy ingredient, or fecula, produced from treated and dried cassava (manioc) root and used in cooking. ... Fufu, also spelled foo-foo, foufou, or fu fu, is a staple food of West Africa and Central Africa. ...

Dried cassava for sale in a Cameroonian market
Dried cassava for sale in a Cameroonian market

In West Africa, particularly in Nigeria, cassava is commonly prepared as Eba or Gari. The cassava is grated and fried then mixed with boiling water to form a thick paste. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1000x850, 1008 KB) Dried manioc for sale in the market of Abong-Mbang, East Province, Cameroon. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (1000x850, 1008 KB) Dried manioc for sale in the market of Abong-Mbang, East Province, Cameroon. ... West Africa is the region of western Africa that, most strictly speaking, includes the countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte dIvoire, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo. ...



Cassava is heavily featured in the cuisine of Brazil. The dish vaca atolada ("mud-stranded cow") is a meat and cassava stew, cooked until the root has turned into a paste; and pirão is a thick gravy-like gruel prepared by cooking fish bits (such as heads and bones) with cassava flour. In the guise of farofa (lightly roasted flour), cassava combines with rice and beans to make the basic meal of lower class Brazilians. Farofa is also a standard side dish for feijoada, the famous meat-and-beans stew. Boiled cassava is also made into a popular sweet pudding. Deep-fried mandioca is a popular snack. Brazils population is a racial mix of native Amerindians, Portugueses, Africans, Italians, Spaniards, Germans, Syrians, Lebanese and Asians. ... Farofa is a widely varying flavoring dish conumend in South America. ... An ingredient used in many foods, flour is a fine powder made from cereals or other starchy food sources. ... Feijoada, a traditional Angolan, Brazilian, Portuguese dish among other former Portuguese colonies, is a stew of black beans (in Brazil), white or red beans in Portugal, with a variety of pork and beef products such as salted pork trimmings (ears, tail, feet), pork sausage and bacon, and salted beef (loin... Pudding is either of two general types of food, the second deriving from the first. ...

Deep-fried 'Mandioca' snack
Deep-fried 'Mandioca' snack

Cassava was, and still is, a major staple food for many native tribes of tropical South America, since pre-Colombian times. It was grated into flour and made into pancakes; bitter varieties were detoxified by washing the flour. Fermentation of cassava gruel produced cauim, a mild alcoholic beverage consumed in vast quantities by natives at parties and ceremonies. Image File history File links Fried Cassava, tipical from Brazil File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ... Image File history File links Fried Cassava, tipical from Brazil File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ... Cauim is a traditional alcoholic beverage of the Native American populations of Brazil, since pre-Columbian times. ... Bottles of cachaça, a Brazilian alcoholic beverage. ...


Cassava is used as animal feed in Latin America and the Caribbean, China, Nigeria and the EU.


Cassava pests

In Africa the cassava mealybug (Phenacocus manihoti) and cassava green mite (Monoychellus tanajoa) can cause up to 80% crop loss, which is extremely detrimental to the production of subsistence farmers. These pests were rampant in the 1970s and 1980s but were brought under control following the establishment of the Biological Control Centre for Africa. The Centre investigated biological control for cassava pests and two South American insects Epidinicarsis lopezi and Typhlodromalus aripo were found to effectively control the cassava mealybug and the cassava green mite respectively. Image:Http://www. ... The following is a list of subsistence techniques: Hunting and Gathering, also known as Foraging freeganism involves gathering of discarded food in the context of an urban environment gleaning involves the gathering of food that traditional farmers have left behind in their fields Cultivation Horticulture - plant cultivation, based on the... Biological control of pests and diseases Overview A key belief of the organic gardener is that diversity furthers health. ... South America South America is a continent crossed by the equator, with most of its area in the Southern Hemisphere. ...


See also

Binomial name Arracacia xanthorrhiza Bancroft The arracacha (Arracacia xanthorrhiza) is a garden root vegetable originally from the Andes, somewhat intermediate between the carrot and celery. ... Binomial name Solanum tuberosum L. The potato (Solanum tuberosum) is a perennial plant of the Solanaceae, or nightshade, family, grown for its starchy tuber. ...

Reference

  • FAO, June 2003 cassava market assessment, 2003

External links

Commons
Wikimedia Commons has more media related to:

  Results from FactBites:
 
YouTube - Yuka Kosaka 小阪由佳 - If (338 words)
YouTube - Yuka Kosaka 小阪由佳 - If The CNN/YouTube Republican Debate: Live on Wednesday at 8 PM ET
Yuka Kosaka 小阪由佳 - If Hello, you either have JavaScript turned off or an old version of Adobe's Flash Player.
This video has been added to your favorites.
Yuka Honda - Cibo Matto (634 words)
Yuka is searching for something new, and she is always open minded to experimenting with different musical styles.
Yuka is responsible for most of the musical composition of the songs that Cibo Matto writes and/or arranges.
Yuka blends the ideas of a melody that she performs on keyboards and tinkers with various changes and passages.
  More results at FactBites »


 

COMMENTARY     


Share your thoughts, questions and commentary here
Your name
Your comments
Please enter the 5-letter protection code

Want to know more?
Search encyclopedia, statistics and forums:

 


Lesson Plans | Student Area | Student FAQ | Reviews | Press Releases |  Feeds | Contact
The Wikipedia article included on this page is licensed under the GFDL.
Images may be subject to relevant owners' copyright.
All other elements are (c) copyright NationMaster.com 2003-5. All Rights Reserved.
Usage implies agreement with terms.