Introduction
Botanically, the pepper is a fruit and not a vegetable. However, as with many other "fruits", the use of the pepper is strictly as a vegetable. There are an estimated 1,600 hundred different varieties of peppers developed throughout the world. In Mexican markets alone, there are at least 140 different peppers sold with each variety, whether fresh, dried, or roasted, having its own unique flavour and pungency which are dependent upon the soil, rainfall, and temperature of the region. Not only do they vary in pungency from variety to variety, but can also differ among fruits from the same bush. That difference extends to size, shape, and colour as well. Today, peppers range from the pea-shaped chili piquin, the cherry-shaped cherry pepper, the lantern-shaped habanero, the stumpy-pointed jalapeno, the pattypan-shaped rocotillo, and the uncommonly long and thin Anaheim. The original "pepper country" extended from Mexico in the north, to Bolivia in the south. There is no written evidence to substantiate claims that the pepper originated in India or any other nation other than the Americas. No reference is made to the Capsicum in Sanskrit, Roman, Greek, Hebrew, or Arabic literature.
Both the hot and mild peppers come from one wild species native to Central and South America. It is thought that the hot types were the first to be cultivated as seeds have been found in Mexican settlements dating from 7000 BCE. One was a site in the Tehuacan Valley that showed deposits of squash, avocado, cotton, amaranth, corn, as well as peppers. In addition, the Aztecs were known to have grown them extensively. Another site in Tamaulipas, dating from about 6544 BCE, showed chiles being used as "tributes" or food used to pay taxes. During the rule of the Toltecs, thirteen of the thirty communities were required to pay their tributes only in chiles. One particular regime required a tribute of twenty baskets of anchos, twenty baskets of menudos, and ten baskets of chile pequeños every seventy days. This did not end with the coming of the Spanish, who forced the people to pay 400 crates of dried chiles to the first viceroy of New Spain.
Soon after finding the peppers in the new world, Spanish and Portuguese explorers were distributing them around the world. They arrived in Spain in 1493, in England by 1548, and Central Europe by 1585. From there, it spread to Asia. It was the Turks who brought it to European attention during the Turkish invasion of India. The pepper eventually made its way with the Ottoman soldiers to their conquered territories in Hungary, where it was "warmly" received and forever changed their cuisine, just as it had it every other place. By 1989, Hungary was able to produce only 62,000 tons of its infamous paprika. During the same year, India produced 800,000 tons of peppers, but consumed 95% of them. China, Pakistan, Mexico, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Thailand, and Japan produced about 4,000,000 tons of chile peppers, while only 200,000 tons of black pepper was produced in the same year. Today, India and Indonesia are the world's largest producers.
Peppers grow on bushy plants that are usually two or three feet high, but they can reach ten feet. One type of wild pepper in Bolivia grows to over sixty feet in height. In the broadest of generalities, peppers that grow in hot climates are hotter in taste than those that grow in cooler climates. In addition, when it comes to hot peppers, small ones tend to last longer than the large ones and green ones last longer than the red. All peppers turn red as they ripen. Unripe, colours range from green to bluish-green or brownish-green, to whitish yellow, yellow, purplish black, or dark green with a lavender hue. Size, shape, and pungency will vary even within the same growing plot and on the same plant. When peppers are cross-bred, no one can be sure what is going to come out. Sometimes, it takes many years to obtain the type of pepper for which one is aiming. Each variety of pepper has literally hundreds of thousands of genes that can be passed on, producing a new variety.
Just one raw green hot pepper can supply almost twice as much vitamin C as the RDA. Depending on the colour, they are also high in vitamin A. The redder the pepper, the more vitamin A. Mature peppers may have as much as ten times the amount of green peppers. Carrots contain only a fraction of the carotene found in peppers. They are also high in flavonoids and other phytochemicals, including phenolic acid and plant sterols, which have proven to inhibit the formation of cancer cells.
Peppers also contain another important constituent called vitamins P so named by a Hungarian scientist after finding large quantities of the substance in bell peppers. Vitamin P (bioflavonoids) funtions by maintaining the walls of blood vessels. Szent-Györgyi later wrote: "We have succeeded in curing certain diseases accompanied by hemophilia". Bell peppers are considered to be the absolute leader among vegetables and fruits of this nutrient. Depending on ripeness, they can contain from 150 mg (green bell peppers) to 300 mg (red bell peppers) per 100 grams. Hungarian wax peppers can even contain up to 400 mg. for the same amount.
When preparing the whole pepper for stuffing, the outer membrane has to be removed, otherwise, the end result is an unappealing shrivelled mass. To do this, immerse the pepper into hot water and then immediately plunge it into cold water. Roasting the pepper accomplishes the same thing. Hot peppers are best handled, literally with "kid gloves". The burning sensations left on the fingers will last for hours. If you forget and rub your eyes, the agony is compounded. Peppers can be frozen raw, blanched, or roasted and do not require defrosting before use. Just heat and serve or add to dishes as they are being prepared. Peppers can also be dried and then stored in glass containers away from heat and light. Water never squelches the heat of a pepper but a milk product will, to some extent; so it is better to have some yogurt on hand when eating a particularly hot meal of peppers.
Peppers around the world:
-- The Maya in the Yucatán will eat only the habanero pepper, maintained to be the world's hottest. Mashed, the habanero makes a sauce called xnipek, meaning "dog's nose", indicating that when the peppers are eaten, the nose becomes as moist as a dog's.
-- The favourite in Brazil is a small pepper called malagueta. This same pepper also grows on the Guinea coast of West Africa. However, another plant of the same name bears pungent seeds called "grains of paradise", which are known as allspice.
-- In Guatemala, it is common for hot green chiles to be fried and eaten on their own.
-- Peruvians eat the rocoto, a fiery pepper that looks like a cherry and grows high up in the Andes. Too hot for many, it is usually opened up and stirred into soup and then pulled out and discarded. The Maya do the opposite. They dip their stuffed hot pepper into a steaming bowl of soup and then eat it. The hot soup serves to heat the chile as well as flavour the pepper, just as the pepper flavours the soup for the Peruvians.
-- Bees at markets in Bolivia fly into sacks of powdered red pepper where they pack their legs with it as they do with pollen and then fly off. It is very bizarre and one cannot help but wonder about the honey they produce.
-- In India, cooks are pepper alchemists. They begin by tossing some dried pods into some oil; and, as the dish progresses, spoonfuls of the same pepper in powdered form are added. This is finished off with a purée of fresh pods. As a result, a dish often contains the same pepper in three different forms, each adding its own distinctive flavour. Guntur, in southeast India is considered to be "one" of the pepper capitals of the world. Pepper crops are shipped there from all over India, brokered, and then distributed worldwide.
-- It is estimated that Thais eat more hot peppers than any other people in the world, consuming an average of five grams per person per day, which is twice that of India. Their clear soups are transformed in a literal "fire water" with the use of the extremely pungent green pickeenu pepper.
-- The Koreans come close to the Thais in hot pepper consumption, with the use of the highly pugnacious dried red pepper in the country's staple dish called kimchi.
-- The people of Szechwan, in China, begin each day with a breakfast of hot pepper oil or sauce over noodles.
-- The Japanese use a mild green horseradish or wasabi that accompanies sushi. The country produces small quantities of two very hot peppers -- santaka and hontaka. Because land is scarce, the Japanese have people in China grow them to meet the rising domestic demand. These are then returned to Japan as tentaka.
-- Of all the pepper centers around the world, Hatch, New Mexico, must also be considered. Its plant breeders and botanists create taylor-made peppers which are introduced to the locals like new car models. One such pepper is called Big Jim or Number Six. This pepper is so big that, at a distance, it can be mistaken for a green banana except that it is flat and pointed like a chisel. The Guinness Book of Records states the biggest pod was picked in 1988, measuring 13½ inches. Like the proverbial fisherman's tale, the grower responsible for the world record also stated that she grew some that were seventeen inches long, but never entered them again into the record. One year, a Big Jim plant became so stressed that it ended up intensifying its heat, and loyal customers began to complain. These plants had grown in a corner of a field that was too sandy and suffered from a lack of water, which stressed the plants and thus produced a hotter variety than normal.
-- The Santa Fe School of Cooking had, at one time, enlisted a pepper botanist to give students a education on pepper botany, especially the varieties, their flavours, and their pungency. This idea of introducing botany to a cooking class shows just how serious this spice is pursued for adoption into American cuisine. Judging from the varieties of tomatoes and their flavours, bringing in a tomato botanist could be a unique approach to the art of Italian cooking.
-- George Washington was one of the earliest Americans to grow extremely hot peppers. In 1785, grew two rows of bird peppers and one row of cayenne peppers in his garden in Virginia. It is not known what became of them as they never were mentioned in any of Martha's recipes.
Names:
Chile is a general term derived from the Nahuatl language for a wide range of Capsicum fruits, but not including the mild-tasting pimiento or sweet pepper. Chilli was first used in print by Francisco Hernandez (1514-1578), and is the form adopted by most English-speaking peoples. The British added the double "l", and the Americans adopted that along with changing the "e" to an "i". Therefore, the spelling varies from the English-speaking world to the Hispanic form of chile. Chilli can refer to a pungent type of peppers. Chili refers to the spicy meat dish or a blend of slices. Chile in italics refers to the native Mexican cultivar of peppers, and not in italics refers to the South American country. However, there is no right or wrong way to use the word, according to "chili" lovers, but for the sake of continuity, we will use the Hispanic form of the word which is chile.
Incas called the pepper ajf. Aztecs called it chile. When Columbus discovered the pepper growing in the new-found world, he thought he had discovered the source of the black pepper which, at the time, was very expensive. Capsicum peppers are not related to the black pepper, but acquired the pepper name because the South Americans flavoured their food with ground bell pepper. To distinguish the pepper pod from the peppercorn, Greek spice merchants in the 16th century, called it a chile pepper. Hungarians changed the name to paprika. Italians called it peperone. In England, it was the red pepper. In Germany, Indianifcher pfeffer. In France, it is poivre de l'Inde -- still erroneously link it to India. But, in India, it is called mircha. In the 17th century, A Frenchman gave it the Latin name of Capsicum, which some believe came from the Greek root word kapto meaning "I bite", which aptly describes the fruit.
With the overwhelming number of pepper cultivars and local names for each, The United Nation's agricultural committee in 1976 had to intervene to devise a nomenclature so that botanists and farmers alike could identify the same pepper. According to the latest classifications, the list was narrowed to 1,600 varieties. Only about 200 are grown commercially, with the bulk of them belonging to just one species, Capsicum annum. This grouping is based on the fact that these varieties must be replanted every year in order to bear fruit. There are five species of Capsicum cultivated, but most modern cultivars are bred from either C. annuum or C. frutescens. A third, C. chinense is well behind in third place with two more obscure species, C. baccatum, native to the west coast of South America and usually called "ajf", and C. pubescens, native to the Andes and known as "rocoto", from the Incan Quechua language.
