Achiote or annato is a small tree that produces a spiny fruit with waxy reddish-orange seeds that are used as natural colorants in foods and cosmetics around the world. The Machiguenga and other native peoples of the Amazon first used achiote as a bright red paint for adorning the face and hair. Achiote is cooked with sap from the rubber tree to make a durable latex paint that sticks to the skin for several days. Passion fruit grows wild as a flimsy vine with a colorful flower and an egg-shaped fruit. The Machiguenga eat several species of passion fruit, which is full of crunchy seeds with sweet, slightly tart pulp.
Machiguenga children love to play with the beautiful flowers, plucking off the petals one by one.
The Machiguenga, for example, drink the water from the thick vine to treat coughs and colds. Until recently, educated urban Peruvians rejected the medicinal values of the plant as superstition. In the past few years, the plant has been subjected to pharmacological tests and shown to have activity both as an anti-inflammatory and as a booster for the immune system. An Austrian company has patented the standardized extract. This plant is now being exported on a massive scale from Peru to the world herbal market in the form of medicinal teas.