About Rhamnus prinoides L'Hér.
Rhamnus prinoides L'Hér. grows at medium to high altitudes across a range extending from Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Kenya down to South Africa. It typically grows near streams or along the edges of forests. It produces small, shiny red, berry-shaped edible fruits. This plant has many different uses among African communities. All parts of the plant can be harvested and used for nutrition, medicine, or religious purposes. In Ethiopia and Eritrea, the plant is called gesho or gešo, and it is used in a similar way to hops. Its stems are boiled, and the resulting extract is mixed with honey to ferment mead, which is called tej in Amharic and myes in Tigrinya. It is also a major ingredient in brewing tella, an Ethiopian and Eritrean beer known as siwa in Tigrinya. To make this drink, gesho leaves are first sundried and pounded into flour with a mortar and pestle. Barley malt is also prepared, sundried, and ground. The two ingredients are mixed in a proportion that varies by maker, and fermented for an average of 3 to 5 days. Regionally, baked finger millet, or alternatively sorghum or maize flour, is added to the fermented mixture. After an additional 1 to 2 days of fermentation, the final product is filtered to make the drink called guesh, or tsiray in Tigrinya. In Central Kenya, the plant is known as Mûkarakinga, and it is considered to have medicinal properties. Its bark is cut, boiled, and then added to soup.
