Chili, the World Traveler

I recently went on a holiday to Mexico with my daughter Nina and her family. We had a wonderful time there. We experienced their lifestyle, their beautiful nature (beaches and forests), their history, their wildlife (such sweet agoutis for example, which are like a large squirrel without the bushy tail) and their food from near. We also saw many fascinating Mayan ruins there. Of course you cannot know everything in two weeks but whatever I saw was very interesting.

Nina cooked most of our meals at home, but every few days we ate out in the local restaurants to taste the authentic local food. Their staple food is rice, beans, tortillas, cheese, certain vegetables, meat and fruits. There were many local fruits that we tried and enjoyed. We stayed an hour away from the big city of Cancun which is why perhaps we encountered many street sellers with local fruits and vegetables, some of which I had never seen before. Tomatoes are used very generously in all of their savoury dishes. They have beautiful breads. What struck me most of all though, was how much and how many different types of salsas they eat. Their salsas are relishes made mostly with fresh fruits (tomatoes, mangoes, chilies). My most favourite salsas were the Picante Pimiento (spicy bell pepper), the Pico de Gallo (finely chopped tomatoes and white onion, chilli and lime juice) and their very famous Guacamole (avocado pear flesh with chopped onion, a little chopped tomato, salt and lime juice). Mexicans also eat lots of salsas made with very hot fresh green and red chillies. The salsas are very hot but fresh and delicious. Yum!

I was very surprised because I used to think that only Indians eat such spicy food; Mexicans eat very chilli hot food too.

History

At the end of the 15th century, two famous Iberian expeditions set sail to explore a sea route that would take them straight to India, known then as “the land of spices”. During the Middle Ages, spices had been a luxury food in Europe, imported via intermediaries in the Middle East from India and Southeast Asia.

Expedition 1: Christopher Columbus to the Americas

One of the expeditions was led by a Spaniard Christopher Columbus, who was seeking out India to bring spices such as black pepper back to his country. Instead of reaching India, he landed up in the Americas, and he mistook chilies as black pepper (that’s why the chili started being called ‘chile pepper.’ He recorded the discovery in his ship’s log: “There is also plenty of agi” (what they called pepper) “which is more valuable than black pepper, and all the people eat nothing else”.

He brought chilies back to Spain, and the Spaniards cultivated them. Very soon, the seeds produced fruiting plants. However, the nobility considered chilli as having too strong a taste. The fact that the plant was undemanding and grew well in the Mediterranean climate, served to increase this rejection, as chilli could not lay claim to the aura of prestige that surrounded the spices arriving from India. Many even believed that the latter had magical powers. Cinnamon, pepper and nutmeg came from faraway lands swathed in legend and mystery. These spices travelled great distances before reaching European grocers’ stalls, a long journey which included desert crossings on camel. The modest chilli pepper however, thrived in any garden, so failed to capture people’s imaginations, let alone become a source of lucrative trade. Those hoping to become wealthy from this new spice were disappointed. Chilli was relegated to the rank of the ‘poor man’s pepper’, and it was indeed the most impoverished who adopted it to enhance the flavour of their simple, mostly vegetarian food

Expedition 2: Vasco de Gama to India

In 1497, another expedition team left the Iberian Peninsula, looking for the sea route to India. Headed by the Portuguese Vasco da Gama, it sailed under the Portuguese flag and reached Calicut (Kozhikode). In the years to come, the Portuguese would establish themselves in India, and by the 1530s they were ruling over Goa. With them, the Portuguese brought some of the plants that they had themselves just acquired from the Americas via the Spanish and their own colony in contemporary Brazil. The Mughal emperor Akbar, a connoisseur of fruits, showed great interest in some of the new delicacies and made pineapples and guavas mainstays of the imperial kitchens. So much did he enjoy the pineapple that the sweet fruit was procured for ten times the price of a mango at the market. By the time of Jahangir, the emperor’s gardens in Agra already grew thousands of pineapples.

Not all of the new plants became popular immediately, though. One late starter was the chilli. Black pepper remained an important source for heat in Indian food. After the Portuguese arrival in India, chillies were first introduced to Goa, from where they spread to South India. When the army of the Maratha king Shivaji moved north to challenge the Mughal Empire during the 17th century, the chilli was also introduced to north India. According to legend, the Mughal army could only be defeated because the Marathas’ consumption of chillies turned them into particularly fiery adversaries. At first, chillies were used to prepare pickles and chutneys, adding another layer of flavour to the pungent relishes that were immensely popular in the 16th century. Soon chilies began being incorporated into various other preparations. Today, India is the largest producer of dried chillies in the world.

I was very surprised when I learnt that the Chilli actually originated in Mexico. Today, it is unimaginable to think of Indian cuisine without the hot spice, chili. In fact India has become the world’s largest producer and exporter of chilies, exporting to USA, Canada, UK, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Malaysia, Germany and many other countries across the globe. The majority of chilies grown in India are cultivated in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Orissa. It contributes 25% of the world’s total production of chilies. Some of the hottest chilies are grown in India. Indian chilies have been dominating the international chili market. And to think that this spice was originally imported from Mexico. Wow! A real world traveler, this little chili fellow!

For the last several centuries Indians, Mexicans and many other countries have developed many new varieties of chillies, as it is now one of the most favourite spices used in many different cuisines around the world.

Chilies and Cooking

There are more than 400 different varieties of chilies found all over the world today. The world’s hottest chili “Naga Jolokia” is cultivated in Assam, India.

Chilies have spread to all the warm regions of the globe, superseding black pepper and revolutionising culinary traditions. Today, it is a common spice and one of the most widely grown in the world. Chillies are used fresh or dried, whole or powdered, and sometimes smoked (like the renowned chipotle, obtained from drying and smoking jalapeño peppers). They are used to prepare spicy sauces commonly used as seasoning. They are consumed in many different ways around the world. In Vietnam people crunch on a whole chilli pepper over the course of a meal, while in Martinique, a Habanero pepper (a very hot variety also known as bondamanjak) is cut in half and rubbed over food before eating it.. Spaghetti with garlic, olive oil and chilli pepper is a popular Italian pasta dish. Goulash in Hungary. Gong Bǎo chicken in China. All this diversity of food that uses chilies bears witness to the incredible journey our amigo the chilli has taken, not to mention the countless varieties of curries to which Indian and Thai cuisines are now linked.

Chilies are known by many different names around the world, not always meaning the same fruit. This creates a lot of confusion. Some of the names that are used for chillies are; pepper, chili, chile, paprika and capsicum. In Indian cuisine, capsicum generally means green pepper/sweet pepper/bell pepper, not a hot chilli. In some countries, paprika may mean hot chilli, but in an Indian recipe, it generally means sweet chilli/capsicum powder, used for colour only. The word ‘pepper’ used on its own usually means black pepper and not chilli pepper in Indian recipes.

Western chefs often ask you to remove seeds when using fresh chilli. To my mind, seeds and the membranes are the best part of a chilli that give it its heat and flavour. Why eat chilli, if you can't stand the heat?

In India, chillies are rarely known or sold with the name of the type of chili. Instead people guess their heat and taste by their size, look and feel. Generally speaking, smaller, thinner and firmer (more tightly packed with seeds) the chilli is, the hotter it is. The larger, more hollow, milder ones are often used for making various ‘stuffed’ chilli dishes like pickles and pakoras.

Okay enough chili talk now… all this talk of spice is making my mouth water. I’m off to have the most exquisite meal of all: a cheese sandwich with a cobra chili handpicked off my grandson’s chili plant in our garden.

Until next time: Chill!