The Pepper Trail

Winner of the 2001 IACP's Jane Grigson Award. Veteran aficionados and newcomers on the pepper trail will enjoy this stunning addition to Jean Andrew's classic work on peppers. Andrews, who has been called the first lady of chili peppers, the godmother of the chili world, as well as her own registered trademark The Pepper Lady, follows the spice trade and early movements of capsicums along the spice roads, through much of Turkey and the Middle East, Africa and Monsoon Asia (India, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Indonesia) plus the Szechuan and Hunan provinces in China and the Silk Route. This latest offering of Andrews' research includes previous undiscovered facts, such as the etymology of the word cayenne. The first spice to be used by man, peppers are currently hot in Mexico, Guatemala, much of the Caribbean, most of Africa, parts of South America, India, Bhutan, Malaysia, the United States-Louisiana, Texas, and the Southwest-plus Korea. A chapter on what makes a pepper a pepper includes detailed descriptions and illustrations of twenty-seven separate varieties of the Capsicum, as well as miscellaneous cultivars and detailed directions on working with fresh and dried peppers, including how to choose and use them and how to care for them.