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Plantain
Definitions
- 1 Any plant of the genus Plantago, with a rosette of sessile leaves about 10 cm (4") long with a narrow part instead of a petiole, and with a spike inflorescence with the flower spacing varying widely among the species. See also psyllium.
"The roots of Plantain and Pellitory of Spain beaten to powder and put into hollow teeth, takes away the pains of them."
- 2 A plant in the genus Musa, the genus that includes banana, but with lower sugar content than banana.
- 3 starchy banana-like fruit; eaten (always cooked) as a staple vegetable throughout the tropics wordnet
- 4 The fruit of the plant, usually cooked before eating and used like potatoes.
"We were sitting at the tables in the port, eating an unhurried breakfast of delicious mojarra fish from the swamp and slices of fried green plantain, when my mother resumed the offensive in her personal war."
- 5 a banana tree bearing hanging clusters of edible angular greenish starchy fruits; tropics and subtropics wordnet
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- 6 any of numerous plants of the genus Plantago; mostly small roadside or dooryard weeds with elliptic leaves and small spikes of very small flowers; seeds of some used medicinally wordnet
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English planteyne, planteyn, from Anglo-Norman plainteine et al., Old French plaintain, from Latin plantāgō, from planta (“sole of the foot”), a nasalized form of Proto-Indo-European *pleth₂- (“flat; to spread”), because of the broad, flat shape of the plantain leaves.
From Spanish plantano (obsolete variant of plátano), from Latin platanus, from Ancient Greek πλάτανος (plátanos).
See also for "plantain"
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Unscramble this word: plantain