Zeist Peach

The Zeist Peach is a plant stemming from the Riverlands on the planet of Zeist. Its fruits are a central ingredient in the cuisine of the Riverlands and the plant has found culinary use beyond its planet of origin.

Morphology
As seed plant developing a central wooden stem, the Zeist Peach is considered a tree by comparative biology. It grows up to four meters tall, making it one of the smaller trees originating from the planet Zeist, yet it developes a thick network of roots reaching almost twice as deep as the plant grows tall. Both the stunted size and the comparatively large roots are necessitated by its growth in muddy riverbanks and swamps of the Riverlands.

Zeist Peaches are flowering plants, their blossoms consisting of a single, circular petal around a single carpel or stamina. The plant is dioecious, meaning that its flowers contain either male-sex staminae or female-sex carpels and a single tree carries only flowers of either kind. If pollinated, female trees develope bright-red fruits containing a single pit, surrounded by a thick layer of pulp. These fruits, the eponymous Zeist Peaches, are very juicy and extremely sour, juice of Zeist Peach containing about 62 g/L of Adipic acid.

Habitation
The Zeist Peach originates from the Riverlands on Zeist, where it grows abundantly on muddy riverbanks and in swamps.

Cultural Importance
For the cuisine of the Riverlands, Zeist Peach juice is its single defining ingredient, being used to marinate meat instead of cooking it. Its cultivation has furthermore spread beyond Zeist, as the Droome have adopted Zeist Peach as spice, while lemonades made with Zeist Peach have become popular with humans and Krark in the Stellar Republic. Zeist Peach flowers furthermore have a great symbolic importance for the cultures of the Riverlands, symbolizing fertility and youth.