Bread nut
Brosimum alicastrum
Its seeds can be roasted to taste remarkably like coffee or chocolate, but without the caffeine.
- Scientific name
- Brosimum alicastrum
- Taxonomy
- Plantae › Tracheophyta › Magnoliopsida › Rosales › Moraceae › Brosimum
- IUCN Red List status
- Least Concern
- Population trend
- stable
- Biome
- forest
- Habitat
- Wet and dry tropical broadleaf forests, often thriving on limestone soils.
- Diet
- Autotrophic (Photosynthesis)
- Range
- Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica
- Size
- Up to 45 meters (148 feet) tall, with a trunk diameter up to 1 meter.
- Lifespan
- 100 to 150 years
- Active
- diurnal
- Threats
- Deforestation, land clearing for agriculture, and selective logging.
- Safe to approach?
- Harmless and welcoming. You can freely sit beneath its shade or touch its smooth, pale bark. Be mindful of falling seedpods during fruiting seasons. While the seeds are highly nutritious and edible when cooked, do not forage or consume wild plants unless guided by an expert.
Brosimum alicastrum , commonly known as the breadnut or Maya nut , is a tree species in the family Moraceae of flowering plants, whose other genera include figs and mulberries. The plant is known by a range of names in indigenous Mesoamerican and other languages, including: ramon, ojoche, ojite, ojushte, ujushte, ujuxte, capomo, mojo, ox, iximche, masica in Honduras, uje in the state of Michoacan Mexico, and mojote in Jalisco, or also chokogou in Haitian Creole.
Photo: Tereso Hernández Morales, CC-BY, via iNaturalist
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