FOOD RESOURCE COLLEGE OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SCIENCES, OREGON STATE UNIVERSITY
ECHINOCACTUS CORACANA, ELEUSINE, NATCHNEE, RAGEE
Hedrick, U.P. editor. 1919. Sturtevant's Notes on Edible Plants. Report of the New York Agricultural Experiment Station for the Year 1919 II. Albany, J.B Lyon Company, State Printers. [References Available]
is a plant of South America, East Indies and Egypt. This grass is cultivated on a large scale in many tropical countries. It is the most productive of all the indian cereals, says Elliott, and is the staple grain of the Mysore country. In Sikkim, says Hooker, the seeds are fermented to make a drink called murwa. On the Coromandel coast, writes Ainslie, it is a useful and most valuable grain, which is eaten and prized by the natives. The grain is of the size of a mustard seed and is dark in color; it is either made into cakes, or is eaten as a porridge; it is pleasant to the taste and in its nature asperient. It is enumerated by Thunberg among the edible plants of Japan. Grant found this grass cultivated everywhere along his route through central Africa. Its flour, if soaked for a night in water, makes a very fair unleavened bread. A coarse beer, tasting pleasantly bitter, is also made from this grain mixed with that of durra. Schweinfurth says it is called telaboontocusso and is grown only in the poorest soils. It has a disagreeable taste and makes only a wretched sort of pop. It has been grown in small quantities at the Michigan Agricultural College.
