It was planted in the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty and is famous for its large flowers, bright colors, beautiful shape and fragrant fragrance. It has the reputation of "Heze peony is the best in the world, and the peony in the world is out of Heze". At present, the planting area has been15,000 mu, and there are more than 600 varieties, which are divided into nine color systems, such as white, pink, red, yellow, purple, black, green and multicolor. They are mainly distributed in villages such as Zhaolou, Liji, Helou and Hongmiao, and the famous products are bean green, pear flower snow, palm flower case, kudzu violet, Yao Huang and so on. Now, using the flower-forcing technology, peonies can be opened all the year round, especially some peonies can be in full bloom during the Spring Festival, which embellishes the festive atmosphere of the festival. Peony essence, a valuable perfume, can be extracted from peony flowers. The root can be processed into "Cortex Moutan", which is slightly cold in nature and bitter in taste. It enters the heart, liver and kidney meridians and has the functions of clearing heat, promoting blood circulation and removing blood stasis.
Caozhou Geng cake, named after the persimmon produced by Cao Zhou in Heze and Gengzhuang in Cao Zhou has the best flavor, has a production history of thousands of years, and was well-known throughout the country as early as the Ming Dynasty, and was listed as a tribute to the imperial court. Caozhou Geng cake is orange and transparent, with fine and soft meat, thick and seedless frost, pulpy at the entrance, mellow and sweet in taste, rich in nutrition, resistant to storage and long-lasting, and has always been the top grade persimmon. At present, our city has been designated to plant persimmon trees in a large area to increase people's demand and export foreign exchange.