Pilea peperomioidesThis plant - sometimes called the Chinese money plant - is an evergreen, rhizomatous perennial with shiny, dark green, round leaves, held on long stalks attached near the centre, rather like a nasturtium! The leaves grow around a central 'trunk'. The plant grows about 30 cm tall. The flowers are inconspicuous. It is frost sensitive, so in cool climates it is grown as a house plant, but in Sydney it can be grown outdoors in well-drained soil in part or dappled shade. Sometimes it seems to form a miniature tree but mine has just multiplied sideways and remained low. It is easily propagated from a rhizomatous 'pup' that appears at the base of the plant or via cuttings.
In the wild, it grows on shady, damp rocks in forests. It was collected by a Norwegian missionary Agnar Espegren in the Yunnnan Province in South China in 1945. He took it back to Norway, where it was spread by cuttings amongst home gardeners, without becoming well known in the botanical world in the west until the 1980s. it is now widely available.