Yesterday I divided up the jujube bushes. That is one very hardy plant. The variety I’ve got gets loaded with fruit about 1 inch across and about 1 1/2 inches long, and was given to me by a very dear old friend who is still powering along in his nineties. I love medicinal plants that aren’t recognisable to most people and then doubles as a fruit tree that has exceptional preserving qualities. The fruit from this one (I think it’s Ziziphus mauritiana judging by the shape of its seed) is good to eat green (tastes like a crisp, sweet apple) exceptionally sweet when ripe (tastes like apples and dates) and is at its peak in tastiness when dry.

The first dry one I had was when I had collected some fruit in my shirt and jumped in the front of the ute where some must have spilled out. A couple of weeks later I found dry brown/red fruit with the texture of dates flattened on the seat where my husband had sat on them. (What’s a little bottom-flattening between spouses, huh?) So I ate them! Oh they were soooo good!

Jujubes (Chinese dates) have been used in TCM for thousands of years.

http://foodfacts.mercola.com/jujubes.html

The Lang variety is supposed to be used in medicinal soups. Has anyone here used jujube for this purpose? I’ve never tried it.

I’m getting 4 different varieties for Christmas. There’s fourteen different varieties available here. Most grow into a tree but the one I have stays as a low-growing bush. For anyone who hasn’t already got one, you only need one and they are easy to propagate from root division. In a few years it’s possible to have dozens. Hack up one that a friend has. They are a bit spiny but no worse than Siberian ginseng.

They can handle extreme heat, cold, wet, and a good Australian drought, and just about anything nature throws at them. Because they send some of their roots deep, I believe they’d resprout also after fire.