"pepper" news and stories

Happy National Pepper Month!

Whether or not you're in the habit of automatically reaching for pepper as soon as you're served a meal, National Pepper Month is the time to start. Originating in India, pepper clippings were next brought to Asia, where they have been exported from for the last 4000 years. Although once a star of the spice trade, pepper is hardly deemed exotic anymore, but its sharp, peppery taste still enhances food as much as any other spice.

Pepper fanatic or not, these punchy pepper recipes will allow you to savor the black powder condiment -- and save you the trouble of reaching across the table for an extra dose.

• Parmesan Black Pepper Biscotti
• Five-Spice Salt and Pepper Shrimp
• Sauteed Tilapia with Lemon-Peppercorn Pan Sauce
• Maple Black Pepper Pork Chops
• Gingered Salmon Tartar with Green Apple, Radish and Pink Peppercorns
• Pink Peppercorn Ice Cream
• Blackberry and Black Pepper Pie
• Black Pepper Vanilla Ice Cream

Become a member of the Slashfood Flickr pool to get a shot at having your photos featured on the site.

Hate chasing loose peppercorns all over the counter when trying to fill your pepper mill? Eliminate spillage with this easy tip.

Seeding hot peppers can be time consuming. Make the process less complicated by using a small melon baller scoop. And alleviate the stinging pain of particularly hot chilies by wearing gloves.

I have been hooked on Maras pepper ever since my first encounter with it a few years ago in lamb meatballs. It's a unique mildly hot red pepper from the Kahramanmara? region of Turkey, just north of Syria. After a lengthy process of drying the peppers and then grinding them, the pepper is sent to markets all over Turkey.

Maras is delicious with vegetables, seafood, and steak. Unlike many peppers, this one has a subtlety; a heat that seems to creep up on one's palate in the most gentle and delicate way. I find that many hot peppers offer a heat that overwhelms the flavor of the pepper. Maras pepper is unique in its well balanced complex taste and level of heat.

Below are 8 recipes that call for Maras pepper:

1. Turkish lamb kebabs
2. Pistachio-crusted halibut with spicy yogurt
3. Valerie's lamb kofte with garlic yogurt sauce
4. Vinaigrette - add a dash of Maras pepper to transform your common salad dressing.
   
5. Spiced lamb with eggplant yogurt sauce - substitute their suggested pepper for Maras. This is an excellent recipe from Develï restaurant in Istanbul
   
6. Poached sea bass with almond sauce (Badem Taratorlu Levrek) - drop the black peppercorns, and add maras pepper.
7. Mercimek Çorbas? (Red lentil soup) - Use Maras pepper where it calls for red pepper.
8. Grilled eggplant with lebneh - simple, yet probably one of my favorites on this list. Add Maras pepper at the end.

What would a dinner table be without its salt and pepper? They've become so ubiquitous in everyone's kitchen. However, we rarely wonder why. Both were heavily used in cuisine for hundreds of years, but so were several other spices. What made people focus on salt and pepper?

The story begins with salt. In Ancient Rome, it gained popularity as a condiment. Italians during the Renaissance served salted dishes at the same time as sugared dishes. It was not until the 17th century that the French created a salt-sweet divide. Salted foods were eaten throughout the meal because they stimulate the appetite. Sweet plates were served at the end; they satiate the appetite and shutdown our desire to eat.

It was in France that salt met its inevitable spicy partner, pepper. 17th-century Classic French cuisine, which developed at the court of Louis XIV, considered pepper and parsley as superior to the various spices imported from the Middle East. In fact, it viewed all spices as vulgar ingredients masking the true flavor of a dish. Pepper was the only spice acceptable. And, it eventually attained the same status as fine herbs which were thought to be more wholesome and exquisite. The French heightened the importance of pepper giving it the status it has today.