I think it could be the trunk of the agave. I just looked at pictures of agaves and some have short palm like trunks that the leaves come off of at the top instead of being right on the ground like you usually see with the aloe and agave type succulents.
The trunk looks about the same size as the photos of the food object.
Yes, all of that was in the article that you apparently didn't read:
> In 2010, after a long anatomical study, they performed DNA barcoding on a slice of the snack and found it to match that of agave’s by 89 percent. There are several species of agave, but the lab test narrowed it down to Agave Sisalana, a plant sometimes used to make a tequila-like drink. They did a field visit soon after and plucked out a Sisalana only to find mesh-like, shallow roots. Next, they chopped off its leaves and there it was: the fat, white, watery trunk familiar to millions of Indians from food carts. They ate a slice from it, and it was tasteless and crunchy just like Ram Kand.
The trunk looks about the same size as the photos of the food object.
The agave sisalana wiki article shows it: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sisal