Cucurbita andreana
Naudin
Wild giant squash
(c) Lucas, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Lucas
(c) Fernando E. Cuello, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)
(c) Andrea Talone Rìo, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)
What to Eat
Buttercup squash, a common cultivar, can be roasted, baked, and mashed into soups, among a variety of filler uses, much like pumpkin. It is extremely popular, especially as a soup, in Brazil, Colombia, and Africa. All giant pumpkins (over 300 pounds or 140 kilograms) are of this species, including the largest pumpkins ever documented, which have attained a size of 2,749.0 pounds (1,246.9 kg) as of 2023. The seed of C. maxima is used in treating parasites in animals.
Where to Find It
It is a tropical plant.
Argentina, Bolivia, South America, Uruguay,
How to Identify
A pumpkin family vine. The vine grows each year. The flowers are bright orange to yellow. The fruit are dark green and oval. They are not edible.
Notes
It can form hybrids with Cucurbita maxima. It has anticancer properties due to cucurbitacins.
Names & Synonyms
References (2)
- Jayaprakasam, B. et al, 2003, Anticancer and antiinflammatory activities of cucurbitacins from Cucurbita andreana. Cancer Letters 189 (2003) 11–16
- Nee, M., 1990, The Domestication of Cucurbita (Cucurbitaceae). Economic Botany, Vol. 44, No. 3, Supplement: New Perspectives on the Origin and Evolution of New World Domesticated Plants. pp. 56-68
