Good bait for carp as the other fish tend to leave them alone.
I used to buy them from the health food shop as tiger nuts before they were more widely available for bait. Nice to eat and very sweet tasting. I soaked some for bait once and just before I boiled them I stuck two in a pot on the windowsill where they did quite well and ended up with a handful of tubers.
The Spanish make a drink from them called horchata de chufa, that's apparently really nice
Yes, horchata de chufas is a very nice 'milk' drink with a slight coconut type flavour - much nicer than soya milk and much cheaper than almond or hazelnut (chufas grow as a weed in the Valencia rice fields - very cheap to grow). It is also better for nut allergy people since it isn't a nut at all - it is a tuber.
Unfortunately the standard version of the drink (available throughout Spain and the Canaries) is far too sweet (unless you like childrens' drinks) and the nuts have been squeezed so hard there is a slight underlying chalky taste. The closer you get to Valencia the more you will find the "extra chufas" version in the shops - it is much nicer.
If you make it yourself in a blender and sieve then it will be even nicer still - and the lighter processing means there is quite a lot of flavour left in the solids you sieve out - this is a big bonus if you make bread - it adds a delicious subtle 'moreish' flavour to the loaf that I really miss.
PS. I don't recommend eating chufas raw - the flavour is good but you end up with a mouthful of dry dust - and some of it always seems to end up in my lungs - I think this horrible coughing fit is why 'tiger nuts' have disappeared from UK shops.
Cheers.
