Sterculia monosperma

Sterculia monosperma
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Rosids
Order:	Malvales
Family:	Sterculiaceae
Genus:	Sterculia
Species:	S. monosperma
Binomial name
Sterculia monosperma Vent.
Synonyms
Sterculia nobilis (Salisb.) Sm.

Sterculia monosperma (Chinese: 蘋婆 (Ping Po^[1]); Thai: เกาลัดไทย), also known as Chinese chestnut, Thai chestnut and seven sisters' fruit,^[2] and phoenix eye fruit,^[3] is a deciduous tropical nut-bearing tree of genus Sterculia.

Its origin is Southern China (Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan and Taiwan), but it is now a common cultivated tree in Northern Thailand, Northern Vietnam, mountainous areas of Malaysia and Indonesia, as well as Northern Laos and Shan State in Burma.^[4]

Nuts

The ripe nuts are edible. They may eaten plain, roasted, boiled with water and salt or also may be used to prepare dishes, such as sauteed with chicken.^[5] The pods containing them have a striking red color when ripe and the nuts are much darker —their husk or pericarpus is almost black— and smaller than the common chestnuts of genus Castanea. The pellicle is brown and smooth and the fruit is yellowish in color.

In China these nuts are one of the traditional foods of the Qixi Festival, the 'night of the seven', also known as the 'anniversary of the seventh sister' (七姐誕). Qixi is celebrated on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month which falls on 20 Aug 2015 and on 9 Aug 2016 next year.

Steamed nuts

References

External links

• Media related to Sterculia monosperma at Wikimedia Commons
• Chinese Chestnut Sterculia monosperma
• Chinese chestnut and chicken leg
• Proximate analysis and physico-chemical properties of flour from the seeds of the China chestnut, Sterculia monosperma Ventenat