Picture Of

Chocolate Raspberry Cake

Rubus idaeus (Raspberry; occasionally as European Raspberry, Framboise, or Red Raspberry to distinguish it from related species) is a species of Rubus, native to Europe and northern Asia. A closely related plant in North America, formerly often regarded as a variety Rubus idaeus var. strigosus, is now usually treated as a distinct species Rubus strigosus (American Raspberry).

It is a perennial plant which bears biennial stems ("canes") from the perennial root system. In its first year, a new stem grows vigorously to its full height of 1.5-2.5 m, unbranched, and bearing large pinnate leaves with five or seven leaflets; normally it does not produce any flowers. In its second year, the stem does not grow taller, but produces several side shoots, which bear smaller leaves with three or five leaflets. The flowers are produced in late spring on short racemes on the tips of these side shoots, each flower about 1 cm diameter with five white petals. The fruit is red, edible, sweet but tart-flavoured, produced in summer or early autumn; in botanical terminology, it is not a berry at all, but an aggregate fruit of numerous drupelets around a central core. In raspberries, as in other species of the subgenus Idaeobatus, the drupelets separate from the core when picked, leaving a hollow fruit, whereas in blackberry the drupelets stay attached to the core.

It typically grows in forests, forming open stands under a tree canopy, and denser stands in clearings. In the south of its range (southern Europe, central Asia), it only occurs at high altitudes in mountains. The species name idaeus refers to its occurrence on Mount Ida near Troy in northwest Turkey, where the ancient Greeks were most familiar with it.

Cultivation and uses

The fruit is an important food crop, though most modern commercial raspberries cultivars derive from hybrids between R. idaeus and R. strigosus.
Main article: Red raspberry leaf

The leaves have been used for centuries as a folk medicine to treat canker sores, cold sores, and gingivitis in persons of all ages as well as to treat anemia, leg cramps, diarrhea, and morning sickness in pregnant women, and as a uterine relaxant.

Raspberry ~ Rubus idaeus

Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Division: Magnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Rosales
Family: Rosaceae
Genus: Rubus
Subgenus: Idaeobatus
Species: R. idaeus

Binomial name
Rubus idaeus

related : Raspberry ~ Raspberry