Yùtou shì yì zhǒng chángjiàn de gēn jīng lèi shūcài.
Taro is a common root vegetable.
Tips
usage
芋 alone is the botanical term; in everyday speech, taro is usually called 芋头 (yùtou). 山芋 can refer to sweet potato in some dialects. In Taiwanese and Cantonese cuisine, taro features heavily in both savory and sweet dishes.
Top grass radical (Kangxi #140 in its 3-stroke compressed form), marking 芋 as a plant. Taro is a tuberous edible plant cultivated since antiquity, so the botanical tag is literal. Same family: 花 flower, 草 grass, 茶 tea, 苹 apple.
Bottom 于 supplies the sound, yú to yù with tone shift. The 'at, in' preposition meaning is not transferred; 于 is purely a sound tag here. Same phonetic family includes 宇 cosmos, 盂 bowl, 迂 roundabout.
