Maca

Lepidium meyenii

Brassicaceae

An Andean mustard whose swollen root is a staple above 4,000 meters — stamina folklore in a radish.

Culinary hypocotyl of the high Andes. Gelatinized powder is a food product, not a hormone drug.

Parts used: Dried hypocotyl
Traditional notes: Andean staple food · Traditional stamina and fertility folklore
Grow · USDA 6b: High-altitude biennial. Wants cold nights and a short season. Seed in a climate that mimics the Andes, or buy the dried root. In work: Sep · Oct · Nov
Harvest: Hypocotyls after a long cool season, dried for storage.

A packet of powder is the honest harvest at low elevation.
Heat and humidity make a sad mustard.

Safety

Hormone-sensitive conditions without advice at extract dose

Lore

Quechua and Aymara kitchens dried it in the sun until it was a shelf-stable malt. Spanish chroniclers noted it as a camelid fodder and a human staple. The 1990s export boom made it a gym powder. In Junín it is still a root in a stew.

The Herbarium — a teaching catalog, not a clinic. Traditional use is history, not a prescription. USDA 6b dates are a week either way, not a promise. Do not eat, drink, or harvest a plant you cannot name.