With the development of logistics management and cold chain transportation, the fruits on the shelves are not only getting fresher and better-looking, but there are also more and more things that have never been seen before. No, a strange fruit has suddenly become popular. It looks like a blueberry from a distance, but up close it has many longitudinal ribs like a pumpkin. What's even more terrifying is that it has a circle of "spider legs" with claws and teeth. People can't help but wonder if this fruit comes from a "different world"? Can it be eaten? Is it really delicious?
Source: Xiaohongshu
Of course you can eat it, the taste is...
First of all, fruits that can be put on regular supermarkets and e-commerce platforms are definitely edible.This purple-black fruit is called red ginseng. They have a light taste, sweet and sour, not bitter or astringent, and have a crunchy texture..
To be fair, among the novel fruits that have made their debut in recent years due to their appearance, its taste is pretty acceptable. The only drawback is that red ginseng has a relatively strong grassy smell, especially those "spider legs" that stick out. Some people find it unacceptable and unpalatable, but many people like this taste.
If you like to eat raw green leafy vegetables, then I suggest you muster up the courage to give it a try. You may not really like it, but at least you can satisfy your curiosity.
Is red ginseng really nutritious?
For such a fruit that doesn't taste amazing, businesses will inevitably promote its so-called "nutritional value", but most of them are untenable. For example, some platforms claim that it has "very high anthocyanin content, reaching 0.0820g/100g", but this content is less than a quarter of that of blueberries, and is only a medium level among common purple fruits.
As for the polysaccharides, flavonoids, vitamins, etc. mentioned in various promotional materials, they are all quite satisfactory, not bad, but there is nothing special about them. They can be obtained by consuming other fruits.
In other words, there is no need to eat it specifically for nutrition. If you like its taste, red ginseng, as a different "fruit", is also a good option to enrich our recipes. After all, the more diverse types of food, the better.
Why does red ginseng look so weird?
The most attractive thing about red ginseng is of course its weird appearance. In fact, the "spider legs" on the red ginseng fruit are just the remnants of the calyx. They are actually the same nature as the "navels" of the blueberries, apples, and pomegranates we often eat. The only difference is the location and shape of the calyx.
In botanical terms, blueberries are all "ovary inferior", that is, the ovary grows on the underside of the calyx, so after the fruit is formed, the calyx remains at the farthest end of the fruit.
In red ginseng, the ovary is half-down, so the remaining calyx remains in the middle of the fruit. This kind of half-lower ovary is rare among the fruits around us, so it inevitably looks strange.
I: upper ovary, II: semi-inferior (median) ovary, III: inferior ovary. a: male flower organ, g: female flower organ, p: petal, s: sepal, r: receptacle. Source: Wikipedia
Of course, you may ask why red ginseng also has a "navel". Unlike the "navel" of apples and pomegranates, this small circle is actually the remaining traces of the red ginseng corolla.
If we observe the blueberry carefully, we will find that there is actually a similar circle inside the protruding calyx of the blueberry, which is the remaining trace of the blueberry corolla. It's just that the two circles of the blueberry are very close to each other and are not easy to notice, while the lower ovary of the red fruit shortens the distance between the calyx and the corolla, making both circles very obvious.
Where does this strange fruit come from?
The plant that bears this fruit actually looks much more ordinary.
In the Flora of China, the official Chinese name of this plant is "Cyclocodonlancifolius", and its scientific name is Cyclocodonlancifolius. It is a member of the genus Cyclocodonlancifolius in the family Campanulaceae. Their flowers are very similar to those of Platycodon flowers. They are both bell-shaped tubular flowers, and the bases of all the petals are connected together. They just have one more enlarged ovary than Platycodon flowers, which looks like a big bump on the bell.
The bell flower has many aliases. Because it has the same enlarged fleshy roots as platycodon and the fruit is reddish-purple, it is called "red ginseng"; because it looks like a water chestnut and an abacus, it is also called "mountain water chestnut" or "earth abacus"; because of the "spider legs" on the fruit, it got a very appropriate nickname, "spider fruit".
Bellflower is a large herbaceous plant that can grow up to 3 meters tall. Depending on the climate and environment, it may be an annual or a perennial. This plant is native to the south of the Yangtze River Basin in my country, and is particularly common in the southwest. Abroad, it extends from the northeastern region of India in the west to Papua New Guinea in the east, and many Southeast Asian countries also have its footprints.
At first, red ginseng was just a wild fruit in the mountains and a snack for wild children. However, in recent years, it has begun to be commercially cultivated, and the scale is not small. The main production areas are also in the southwest.
Compared with ordinary fruits, the biggest advantage of red ginseng is that it takes a short time to bear fruit and returns funds quickly. Generally speaking, it is planted at the turn of spring and summer every year, and the fruit can be harvested in the second year, and there may even be a harvest in the same year.Moreover, red ginseng is also very resistant to transportation and storage. It can even be stored for three or four months under suitable conditions.
With such an excellent personality, it’s no wonder that both fruit farmers and supermarkets can’t wait to bring it to the market. So, dear friend, have you tried it? Describe what you tasted in the comment section!
Planning and production
This article is a work of Popular Science China-Starry Sky Project
Produced by Science Popularization Department of China Association for Science and Technology
Producer｜China Science and Technology Press Co., Ltd., Beijing Zhongke Galaxy Culture Media Co., Ltd.
Author丨Old Cat Science Writer
Review丨Gu Yourong, Associate Professor, School of Life Sciences, Capital Normal University, PhD in Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Planning丨Lin Lin
Editor丨He Tong