Mountain-pepper

Litsea cubeba (Lour.) Pers. (Lauraceae), mountain pepper or May Chang, is a small deciduous aromatic tree or large shrub 3-10 m tall, native to southern China, the Himalayas, Indochina and parts of Indonesia, where it grows in secondary forest, forest margins and disturbed slopes from 500 to 2500 m. The smooth grey bark, leaves and fruit all emit a strong lemony scent when bruised. Leaves are alternate, lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 5-11 cm long and 1.5-3 cm wide, pinnately veined, glabrous and slightly glaucous beneath. The species is dioecious; small pale yellow flowers appear before or with the leaves in axillary clusters of 4-6 enclosed in deciduous involucral bracts, each flower with six tepals and either nine fertile stamens (male) or a single pistil (female). Fruits are subglobose berries 4-6 mm in diameter, ripening from green through red to glossy black, seated on a small persistent cupule and yielding the commercial May Chang essential oil.