Premna puberula Pamp.

The two Chinese varieties are rather poorly differentiated; however, there does appear to be a good correlation within the material available between flower color and flower size. Plants with white corollas have tubes less than 3 mm, whereas those with yellow corollas or yellow marked with brown have tubes 2.4–4 mm. This distinction merits further investigation.

Shrubs or small trees, erect to slightly climbing. Branchlets green when young, becoming brown. Petiole (0.5-)1-2(-3.5) cm; leaf blade brown when dry, oblong-elliptic, ovate-elliptic, or ovate, 2.5-11 X 1.5-5.5 cm, papery, base cuneate, rounded, or slightly cordate, margin entire, apex caudate to acute, reticulate veins abaxially distinct. Panicles 4-14 X 2-9 cm, subglabrous to puberulent; bracts linear to lanceolate. Calyx cup-shaped, 1.5-2.5 mm, outside pubescent and yellow glandular; teeth 5, minute, triangular, ciliate. Corolla white, yellowish, orange, purple, or brown striate, 5-7 mm, tube 2.5-4 mm, slightly 2-lipped, villous in throat, lower lip 3-lobed; upper lip rounded to emarginate, outside densely glandular. Stamens slightly exserted; filaments glabrous. Ovary glabrous, apically glandular. Style shorter than stamens. Fruit purple-black, obovate. Fl. and fr. May-Sep.

Fujian, Gansu, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, S Shanxi, Sichuan, Yunnan.

* 700-1800 m.

Premna puberula is a species of plant in the family Lamiaceae that is endemic to Central and South China. Known colloquially in South China as "fairy tofu tree"(神仙豆腐樹) or more simply as "tofu tree" (豆腐樹), the extract from the leaves of this plant, with its high pectin content, is used to make a jelly dish served in a similar manner as Chinese Liangfen.