How to eat a name?

December 14, 2010 11:06 AM

Whats a "name"????

So I'm often up in Harlem and there is a vegetable stand where they sell what looks like a large root. It's labeled "name" and when I asked what it was the lady just said "a na-me" and it's from Costa Rica. What is it? How do you cook it? Googling name and root has been rather fruitless.

posted by melissam to Food & Drink (6 answers total)

Best answer: Apparently, it's a type of yam!
posted by sugarbomb at 11:09 AM on December 14, 2010

Best answer: Ñame is Spanish for Yam. The real, huge yam, not the tiny sweet potato which is sometimes called a Yam in english.
posted by zsazsa at 11:10 AM on December 14, 2010

Best answer: Here. I searched for "na me root" and this was the first result.
posted by Night_owl at 11:10 AM on December 14, 2010

Response by poster: Ah, so it's a true yam! Thanks everyone!
posted by melissam at 11:12 AM on December 14, 2010

Wonderful! I just picked up one of these from Meijer and was wondering the same thing.

Love the blog, melissam!
posted by Earl the Polliwog at 10:59 PM on December 14, 2010

Hey, look at this from the Wikipedia article zsazsa linked:

Although it is unclear which came first, the word yam is related to Portuguese inhame or Spanish ñame, which both ultimately derive from the Wolof word nyam, meaning "to sample" or "taste"; in other African languages it can also mean "to eat", e.g. yamyam and doya in Hausa or "to chew" in Dholuo language of the Luo of Kenya and Northern Tanzania.

Nyam! Etymology for yum and nom nom nom!
posted by tangerine at 11:16 PM on December 14, 2010