The spice of life

The Bangkok Post February 26 1989

For at least 5,000 years the word ‘spice’ has been linked with the East, from where most of the household spices we associate with flavoursome cooking at one time originated. The word itself derives from species, kinds of goods, and refers to all parts of plants which at the outset of the spice trade grew mostly in the tropical East.

These were transported to Europe along caravan routes which stretched from China, Indonesia, Ceylon and India right across the landmass of Asia, over the Khyber Pass, through Afghanistan and Iran, down to Babylon on the Euphrates. The names alone conjure up a lost world of exoticism and mystery which today’s little glass jars on the supermarket shelf have difficulty living up to.

By the time they arrived in Europe, in the trading countries around the Mediterranean basin, they were usually in the form of dried aromatics rather than fresh leaves, barks or roots. People weren’t quite sure where they came from so that for a long time spices were thought to originate from Arabia and Persia, since traders and merchants were from that part of the world. Taxes on spices were high, consequently they were of great commercial value. The towns of Italy – Venice, Amalfi, Genoa – grew rich from the trade. It is partly for this reason that the cooking of the Mediterranean is much spicier and more aromatic than that of the blander nations to the north.

Not all spices came from the East however. Columbus brought back allspice, a native of Central and South America and now mostly cultivated in Jamaica. Paprica, chilli and sweet peppers also came from the new World, as did the flavourings vanilla and chocolate.

Historical accident, exploration and war all go hand in hand with the expansion and development of a nation’s native cuisine. In this respect the cooking an eating habits of those arch explorers and colonisers, the British, are remarkably resilient: blandness is the order of the day. The roman invasion was responsible for the introduction of many of the common spices to Britain. With the arrival of large numbers of immigrants from Pakistan, the East and West Indies, however, spices, herbs and all kinds of exotic fruits and vegetables are now available in even the smallest of towns in Britain. Refugees, too, are playing a part in this culinary melting pot. In my hometown of 5,000 people tucked away in the North-west of Europe there are three Vietnamese-Chinese restaurants serving polystyrene boxes filled with monosodium glutamated awfulness. Trade is booming, though, particularly on Saturday night.

Influences also work the other way. In Sri Lanka, the original Spice Island, famous for its cinnamon, there is much evidence of long years of colonialism on the food shelves, perhaps as an antidote to the island’s fiery, rich cuisine. Today in Thailand one occasionally gets served a rice dish or a sweet and sour concoction which has been adulterated with ketchup – yet another legacy from Vietnam War days.

Bread, milk and potatoes (mahn farang), not the healthiest of choices, are now consumed by the middle-classes in Thailand. I recently had occasion to watch the consumption of a large wedge of Christmas cake with a plate of som tam – and that was for breakfast! Though these examples may not belong to the realm of haute cuisine, it is usually through a process of trial and error that new blends, hybrids and wonders appear as part of a country’s diet.

Milk chocolate, invented in Switzerland by M. peter in 1876, might never have seen the light of day were it not for the Dutchman van Houten’s development of cocoa in 1828. Van Houten’s Cocoa in turn depended on the importation of chocolate beans by Cortes in 1520. Columbus found the original beans in the hold of an Indian trading boat in the Gulf of Honduras. Chocolate was an important drink among the Aztecs; the Emperor Montezuma required 50 jars of the stuff a day. The word itself comes from the Aztec chocolatl meaning ‘food for the gods’. In Europe, chocolate was for a long time considered a luxury drink for the rich and to some extent this reputation still clings to it today. However, we could very well have missed out on this food for the gods were it not for such a long chain of accidents.

Herbs, as distinct from spices and flavourings (chocolate as used in cooking is more properly a flavouring), are the original grasses, fruit, roots and berries before they have been dried. Consequently, they are usually found closer to home. The distinction is academic in that one man’s herb is another man’s spice and vice versa. Herbs go back as far as cooking goes back, to a time when primitive man must have first smelled wood smoke and could distinguish one smell from another. In the cuisine of most countries it is the peasant or rural traditions of cooking which make the most use of spices and flavourings. Urban dwellers and the upper crust usually go for ornamentation and refinement since they have leisure time and servants galore to do all the peeling and cutting. This is true of Thailand’s cuisine and of Southeast Asia in general. Esarn food and Northern food is much spicier and less refined (not to be confused with delicious) than central Thai or Court cuisine.

Herbs and medicines have long been associated. This is probably because loss of appetite is one of the chief symptoms of any illness. Ginger, originally from the tropical jungles of Southeast Asia, was used against bubonic plague during the Black Death. Though not a foolproof prescription, it is nonetheless well-meaning and in the right direction since ginger stimulates sweating. It is one of the oldest spices to reach Europe from Asia.

Garlic, probably the most widely used of all spices, also has a well-deserved link with health and medicine. It contains substances with an antiseptic effect, which are beneficial to the digestive system. It is also useful in lowering blood pressure and clearing bronchitis. In olden times it was used as an antidote for poison, stings and bites. Roman soldiers ate garlic before embarking on battle because it was believed to have stimulating properties. Perhaps this has something to do with its sparing use in British food. Cocks were also given garlic with the same objective before a cockfight. As a flavouring substance it is usually ranked at the top of the list and all celebrated cuisines make wide usage of it.

Coriander, that ubiquitous and multi-purpose herb in Southeast Asian cooking (and in Chinese medicine), is also one of the oldest. The manna of the Bible was compared to the whiteness of coriander seed (‘the name thereof manna and it was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey. Exodus XVI, 31). The word has an interesting etymology, coming from the Greek koris, meaning ‘bug’, because the Greeks had the rather inaccurate notion that the smell of coriander leaves resembled that of bedbugs.

Cumin seed had a curious medicinal or cosmetic use. It was thought to be good for blanching the skin, since in Roman times, as in present-day Thailand, a pale skin denoted one’s adherence to the leisure class. The Roman writer Pliny records that scholars would rub their skins with cumin oil to fool their teachers that they were studying industriously.

Basil has a strange relationship with sanctity. A type of basil, the holy tulsi, is much revered by Hindus and was used in place of a Bible by Hindus taking the oath in British courts. In the West, basil symbolised fertility.

Those little jars on the supermarket shelf have come a long way since they were transported on the backs of horses, camels and porters. Though anyone who takes his cookery at all seriously finds it much cheaper to buy herbs and spices fresh from the market. Perhaps in centuries to come food historians, as they’re called, will recognise our century as one of decadence in the art of food flavouring, with its widespread use of ketchup, monosodium glutamate, colourings and artificial flavourings.