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Food - Its fruits are excellent sources of vitamin A, vitamin B6, vitamin C and vitamin E. It also has a significant amount of minerals like iron, potassium and magnesium. Medicine - Fruit is believed to combat anaemia and respiratory diseases. Its shoots are sometimes added to children’s baths to prevent illness.
Latin America
Open forests at medium to high elevations.
Also called the tree tomato, is related to the tomato and eggplant. Its fruits can be yellow, orange, red or purple.
Evergreen shrub that grows usually up to 3 m tall.
Trunk is single upright with lateral branches and a grey bark.
Leaves simple, the blades 7-40 x 6-35 cm, ca. 1-1.5 times as long as wide, chartaceous, ovate, moderately puberulent adaxially with unbranched hairs, more densely so on veins, densely puberulent abaxially; base cordate to auriculate with basal lobes 1.5-6 cm; margin entire; apex acuminate; petioles 3-25 cm, densely puberulent.
Flowers with the calyx radius 3-5 mm, the lobes 1-2 x 2-3 mm, deltate, obtuse to truncate, apiculate at tips, fleshy, sparsely to densely puberulent. Corollas 2-2.5 cm in diameter, the radius 10-15 mm, stellate, subcoriaceous to fleshy, pinkish white, the tube 2-3 mm, the lobes 7-12 x 2.5-4 mm at base, narrowly triangular, acute at apices, glabrous abaxially and adaxially, the margin tomentose. Anther thecae 5-6 x 2-2.5 mm, lanceolate, connivent, pale yellow, the pores directed adaxially and distally; connective 4.5-5 x 1-2 mm, narrowly triangular, abaxially slightly shorter than thecae at apex, equal to or slightly shorter than them at base, absent adaxially, bright lemon-yellow. Ovary glabrous; style 5-6 x 0.5-1 mm., exserted 1-2.5 mm beyond stamens, cylindrical, glabrous; stigma truncate.
Fruits 4-10 x 3-5 cm, ellipsoidal or ovoid, obtuse or acute at apex, yellow to orange, red, or purple, often with darker longitudinal stripes, glabrous; stone cell aggregates present.
Flowering: July – September
Fruiting: Winter