Mysterious superfruit #2

More on the peculiar phenomenon of marketing dubious health products with images that have nothing to do with the product.

The mysterious superfruit turned out to be a malformed hen's egg. Now it's this thing, that comes with the promise "Eat THIS, Never Diet Again ... Dr OZ:"The Holy Grail of weight loss".

The site links to an advert for extract of "Garcinia gambogia" - a fruit native to Indonesia that goes under various names such as Malabar tamarind. Its scientific name is Garcinia gummi-gutta, but slimming product vendors have latched on to the former scientific name Garcinia gambogia. There's little or no evidence of its claimed weight loss properties, and one trial had to be abandoned because of liver toxicity.
Garcinia gummi-gutta, however, looks like a small pumpkin (above left).

A Google Images search finds that the fruit in the advert link picture comes from an entirely different plant, the Finger Lime (Citrus australasica - depicted right). A thorny shrub native to Australia, it has lately acquired a reputation as a gourmet "lime caviar".

- Ray