Smoked Plum / Mume Fruit

The unripe fruit of Prunus mume (the Japanese apricot, the “ume” of the famous Japanese umeboshi), picked green and smoked, then dried until it becomes that characteristic shrivelled brownish-black plum.

The traditional smoking concentrates the organic acids and gives the plum its uniquely intense sour-smoky savour.

A plant-food of thousand-year-old tradition in Chinese cookery (sauces, marinades) and orthodox in the pharmacopoeia.

To be distinguished from Mei Gui (rose), despite the shared root in the name.

The reference astringent herb for gathering in scattered Liquids (Jin Ye) (a descending movement that scatters over time, a surface that no longer holds for want of fullness).

Also traditionally used to engender the Liquids (Jin Ye) when deficient Yin no longer feeds them, and to quiet constitutions where the Qi of Metal scatters to excess. A powerful yet approachable astringent action.

• Decoction: 6 to 12 g, simmer for 25 minutes
• Carbonised form (Wu Mei Tan): a more astringent version, for markedly loose and long-standing stools
• Traditional cooking: Japanese umeboshi (salted fermented plum), Chinese sauces made with Wu Mei
• Wu Mei Tang: a classic blend of Zhang Zhongjing

To be avoided in cases of an acute attack on the surface not yet resolved or of fullness from inner accumulation (an astringent herb holds back what ought to be let go).

To be used with care by constitutions of settled heat.