A few months ago, my father-in-law planted a couple of Serrano chilli seeds that a Mexican restaurant in London gives away for free in my terrace garden, and now, like an alpha-male warrior returning after a long war, it has taken the biblical instruction to go forth and multiply rather seriously.
We now get more chillies every two days than I know what to do with. The family (and its collective digestive linings) have not taken kindly to me sneaking in a few extra ones into the spinach dal or sambar on a daily basis, and my suggestion to turn it into chilli halwa has also been unanimously rejected for some reason.
But, as I gather the bountiful harvest of Capsicum annuum every other day with the cool (a Chennai weather phenomenon defined as any temperature below 32°C) breeze of the Bay of Bengal blowing into my face, I can’t help but think of this plant’s fascinating history.
In the 15th and 16th centuries, some enterprising (and mildly genocidal) folks from Spain encountered this rather hot-to-taste fruit in the Caribbean, and did what Europeans tended to do — give it a completely unrelated name just because they weren’t familiar with this species.
My personal theory is that they called it “Pepper” for two reasons. One — that’s the only other “hot” taste they had experienced before, and two — Columbus was sent to discover the fabled land of that very spice’s origin.
So, like a Burma Bazaar conman selling a “Sonee Discman” back in the day, he thought he could perhaps kill two mangoes (and a lot of native Americans) with one stone. He’d declare the Caribbean to be “India” (which is why they are still called West Indies today), and he’d term this colourful fruit “Pepper”, and call it a day.
Historians call this discovery and exchange of biological species between the old world (Asia and Europe), and the new world (the Americas) as the “Columbian exchange”.
I mean, it was a rather raw deal, if you ask me. We got potatoes, tomatoes, avocados, quinine (for Malaria) and chillies, while they got small pox, measles and yellow fever.
The Portuguese eventually brought this plant to India in the 16th century, and, clearly, this self-pollinating plant loved the local conditions (I mean, Europe isn’t exactly the most comfortable place for the plant equivalent of the lungi-clad chap, who likes to lounge topless in the tropical sea breeze).
Further, actual black pepper was the only major source of heat in Indian cooking at that point, and that’s a rather expensive and impractical spice.
For starters, you couldn’t exactly grow it in your backyard in Agra, while Capsicum annuum was happy to grow literally anywhere. And you got far more heat bang for the buck, thanks to the molecule Capsaicin, whose single biggest biochemical trick is to fool the nerve endings designed to detect high temperatures into action, causing the brain to think that one’s mouth is literally on fire, and take remedial action like sweating and extra blood flow to the face.
And oh, a parting food science trick for the next time you accidentally bite into a hot chilli. Yoghurt, milk or alcohol will kill the sensation of heat far quicker than water because capsaicin is fat and alcohol soluble, not water.
