I think I've uncovered some kind of conspiracy, or at least a mystery.
Except for sweets and desserts, almost every food recipe I've ever followed calls for salt and pepper. And every savory recipe I've ever seen prepared on TV always includes salt and pepper. Along with salt, black pepper is a nearly ubiquitous spice. It's everywhere in what we cook and what we see cooked.
What's weird is that, for the life of me, I cannot remember seeing "black pepper" listed as an ingredient in any packaged food I've purchased from the store. I read a lot of food labels these days, and it just dawned on me that black pepper is never listed as an ingredient.
How can that be? How can black pepper be called for in almost every recipe known to man, yet not included in any foods that we buy?
Something fishy is going on.
1 comment:
Seasoned: past participle, past tense of sea·son (Verb)
1. Add salt, herbs, pepper, or other spices to (food).
2. Add an enlivening quality or feature to (something).
Black pepper is a spice or seasoning common in many cuisines. It is made from the unripe fruit, or peppercorns, of the Piper nigrum plant, a flowering vine native to South India. Black pepper is usually ground for use in foods.
The fruit of the Piper nigrum consists of small berries that start out green and become a deep red when fully ripe. Black pepper is only one of the products that can be made from peppercorns. White pepper, green pepper, and pink pepper are other varieties.
Black pepper is made from the unripe, green fruit of the pepper plant, which is cooked in hot water, then dried. The hot water serves to clean the peppercorns and to rupture their skin, which speeds the work of browning enzymes as the fruit is dried. The peppercorns are either left in the sun to dry or dried by machine. The skin becomes dark and wrinkled and the fruit hardens during the drying process.
Black peppercorns are hard and must typically be ground in order to be edible. However, ground pepper loses its flavor quickly. Most chefs recommend grinding black pepper as needed, immediately before adding it to food, in order to retain the most flavor.
Though black pepper is a staple on kitchen tables around the world today, it was once so valuable it was used as money. In the ancient world, the most important source of black pepper was India's Malabar Coast, the southwest coast of the country. The spice was traded with nearby countries, eventually making its way to China, Greece, Egypt, and the Roman Empire, though only the richest could afford it outside of South Asia.
Black pepper was a major catalyst of the European Age of Exploration beginning in the 15th century. Trade routes to India and other sources of coveted spices were extremely valuable, and the countries that controlled them controlled the European economy. During the Age of Exploration, pepper became more plentiful in Europe and people of average means became able to afford it.
Today, black pepper still accounts for one-fifth of the world's spice trade. However, India is no longer the world's primary producer of black pepper. Vietnam now leads the export market, followed by Indonesia, Brazil, Malaysia, and India, respectively. ->WiseGeek.com
When a store bought package says "spices, seasoning" black pepper is one of them. Also... be aware that everyone is eating diatoms in their pancake mix. Diatomaceous earth is used for grain storage... but this is not listed on any product label.
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