Akebia quinata
species of plant
Akebia quinata –commonly known as akebi (木通), chocolate vine, five-leaf chocolate vine, or five-leaf akebia– is a vine that is native to Japan, China and Korea, commonly used as an ornamental or edible plant in the United States and Europe. In its native habitat, it is often found on hills, in hedges, on trees, along forest edges and streams, and on mountainous slopes.
Etymology
Akebi, its Japanese vernacular name, was originally written as 開(あ)け実(び); it derives from akeru (開ける, "to open") and mi (実, "fruit"), due to its fruit splitting open when ripe.
The epithet quinata means 'divided into five' and is presumably a reference to its lobed leaves.
Description
Akebia quinata is a climbing evergreen vine that grows to 10 m (30 ft) or more in height and has palmately compound leaves with five elliptic or obovate leaflets that are notched at the tip. The woody stems are greyish-brown with lenticels.
The flowers are clustered in racemes and are chocolate-scented, with three or four sepals. The fruits are sausage-shaped pods which contain edible pulp. The gelatinous placentation contains seeds surrounded with white pulp that has a sweet flavor.
Uses
Culinary
The fruit contains a sweet soft pulp, eaten primarily in Japan as a seasonal delicacy.
The public source identifies “Akebia quinata” as species of plant. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Akebia, quinata and species.
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The date and method of observation matter as much as the stated conclusion, especially where classification or consensus has changed. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1482093. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Akebia quinata” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.