North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Lucky Pittman <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu>]

At 09:54 PM 11/30/2004 -0500, Ginda wrote:

>  The other red fruit I
> wouldn't try is deadly nightshade.  (Some plants have black berries,
> but many have attractive red berries.)  I've read of people who
> cooked the ripe berries into pie and ate it without harm.  And I
> expect that like tomato (to which it is related) the toxins in the fruit
> break down as it ripens.  Still, personally, I would avoid
> it
Ginda,
We've discussed the 'edible' Solanum species here from time to time in
the past.  Several of the garden seed catalogs offer "Garden
Huckleberries" - usually S.melanocerasum, and/or 'Wonderberries',
which encompass a number of species, but if memory serves me correctly,
Lon has indicated that S.burbankii is the best of the bunch.
I've grown S.melanocerasum in the past, and the plants produce prodigious
amounts of beautiful big (1/2-3/4") blue-black berries - but even
after following preparation recommendations of boiling/leaching, and
treatment with baking soda - and addition of large amounts of sugar &
grape juice(these things have no taste to speak of on their own), the
resulting jams, pie filling, etc., still had an uncomfortable metallic
aftertaste that was quite disconcerting.
I've seen Lon write encouragingly about the flavor of S.burbankii, right
off the plant, but I've got some other acquaintances who've grown them
and thought they were awful - maybe their seeds were not true to
identity?

Along those same lines - of unusual edibles, sometime back I was drawn
into a discussion/search for a source for "Germanberries",
which turned out to be a species of Hibiscus, which produces an edible
pod.  Never have tried 'em, but here are a few links, if anyone is
interested:
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/BODY_MV126
> 
> http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/morton/roselle.html 
> 
> http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/duke_energy/Hibiscus_sabdariffa.html 
> 
> http://www.echonet.org/tropicalag/plantinfo/Hibiscussabdariffa.pdf 
>
if you want some, the seeds of that hibiscus may be ordered 
http://echonet.org/shopsite_sc/store/html/SeedtoSeed.html

Lucky