Thanks Karen! I think the ones I have been seeing are bisexual, since they have what looks like a very long pistil in the center of the flower. Unless looks are deceiving...
Cheers,
Carolyn
Yep, mine has flowers that look exactly like your picture, and it sets fruit abundantly without me doing a thing. The green part of the pistil is what grows to be the “berry”. The flowers attract bees, wasps, flies, etc. It’s a pretty busy location in my garden!
Sorry, but I’ve no suggestions for coaxing your plant into setting fruit.
I usually preserve (brine) some of both the buds & the berries. Until you begin getting fruit, are you interested in cooking with other parts of the plant. Brining the buds is the most common practice that I’m aware of. But there are also other things you can try. I recently boiled some caper leaves and laid them on cooked chicken breast (which was otherwise pretty plain; more tomato would’ve helped also). They’re bitter, even after boiling and rinsing, so I wouldn’t over-do it, but they add a complexity of flavor that at least *some* adults can appreciate.
I haven’t yet found a good source of info on how to cook with the leaves & stems, but I came across one reference to young, tender stems that compared them favorably to asparagus spears.
The main thing to overcome in preparing caper tissues for eating seems to be their abundance of tannins. That’s why all the boiling, brining, etc. is called for.