Tasmannia lanceolata   Mountain Pepper
----  Botanical information  ----

Tasmanian pepper berries are more versatile than conventional peppercorn, able to be used in sweet and savoury dishes.   The leaves, stems and berries have an aromatic peppery taste producing approx. 3 times the anti-oxidants of blueberries.  Native birds, such as the Black Currawong, eat the berries.   It is widespread, growing from sea level up to subalpine altitudes.

Tasmannia lanceolata is usually a compact 2 metre bushy shrub but can grow to 10 metres tall.   Leaf stalks and young stems are red; its leaves are hairless, green, thick, and elliptical in shape.

Plants are either male or female, with sexually-distinct flowers found in umbels at the base of the new season's growth.   Both sexes have tiny cream-coloured flowers with narrow oblanceolate petals.   The male flower has many stamens; the female flower has 2-lobed ovary.   Flowering occurs in mid-Spring in the southern hemisphere (October-November).   The ripened fruit (March-June) is a pea-sized 2-lobed lustrous deep-purple, almost black, berry with many small angular seeds.

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