Plant · P-528

Chinese Lantern

Physalis alkekengi

Chinese lantern spreads by underground runners to produce the bright orange papery husk that wraps each berry through late summer and autumn, grown as much for drying as for eating. Only the ripe berry inside is safe to eat - the husk, unripe fruit and foliage are all poisonous - though the berry and leaves both have a history of herbal use for skin and urinary complaints. Left alone it runs hard and turns a bed into a colony within a few years, so most growers keep it in a container or behind a buried barrier.