Speaker 1: My name is Evel Longoria and I am MAE Gomez
Speaker 1: Rajon And welcome to.
Speaker 2: Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our past and
Speaker 2: present through food.
Speaker 1: On every episode, we'll talk about the history of some
Speaker 1: of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages from our culture.
Speaker 2: So make yourself at home, even broche This is crazy.
Speaker 2: I feel like maybe you and I talk about this
Speaker 2: all the time, but maybe we just haven't recorded it.
Speaker 2: I think so. But yeah, today we're talking spices and
Speaker 2: we're kicking things off with Molley.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Wouldn't you say Molley for us is the mother of
Speaker 2: all sauces. I mean, is it a sauce?
Speaker 3: It is a sauce. It is a sauce, And I
Speaker 3: would say that in Mexico.
Speaker 1: Yes, Molley is the most complex sauce and the most
Speaker 1: famous version of Mollet. The Moro has lots of different spaces.
Speaker 1: So we did an entire episode on salt, and this
Speaker 1: time we're doing an entire episode on spices.
Speaker 2: Spices. Now, you know you and I have talked about this.
Speaker 2: I am not a big fan of Molley. I didn't
Speaker 2: grow up with it. Did you grow up with Molley? Yes?
Speaker 3: I did. I did not I did always.
Speaker 1: I mean, my mom wouldn't make it from scratch, but
Speaker 1: we would go to the grocery store and Noveloredo and
Speaker 1: there were the mounds of different types of moles, so
Speaker 1: she would just buy it by the pound.
Speaker 3: So it's one of my favorite foods. Like I mean, I.
Speaker 1: Could probably even say final meal would be more. Oh yes,
Speaker 1: my lad, fried plantains and white rice.
Speaker 2: But mullet what on chicken or chi?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah on chicken, yes, yeah?
Speaker 2: And is there a certain Molley like because you know
Speaker 2: there's many mullets, there's many moles.
Speaker 1: I like the mule Neegro or the Coloraito mole. Those
Speaker 1: are my favorite moles. But I always go to how
Speaker 1: Can Market in La and I buy it. And when
Speaker 1: my mom comes to visit every single time, she's like,
Speaker 1: we have she has to go buy Molley always. So
Speaker 1: those are the show that I really like, and I
Speaker 1: always have the Moley paste if.
Speaker 2: You go buy Molley. Are all Mulley's created equal?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: No, This is probably why I don't like it, because
Speaker 2: I probably had bad Molley growing up and I was like, ew,
Speaker 2: that's horrible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes it probably, But you spent so much
Speaker 1: time in Wohaka. You know, when you were doing searching
Speaker 1: for Mexico, did you taste amazing Molissa?
Speaker 2: But let me, I want to be clear that mullet
Speaker 2: comes from Puebla, right, well yeah, well the the well,
Speaker 2: I mean, I mean they say Molley comes from Puebla,
Speaker 2: but that Wahawkan's perfected it. That was. That's the debate.
Speaker 2: That is, and I don't want to get in the middle.
Speaker 2: I don't want to get in the middle of the debate.
Speaker 2: But but I just don't want people listening to the
Speaker 2: podcast going, hey, hey, hey, hey, Molley is not from Wahaka.
Speaker 1: Well, the most well known molee is, for sure, and
Speaker 1: that was invented in colonial kitchens of Bueblah for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, okay, yeah, but I know I don't think
Speaker 2: Here's the thing reason why I don't think we had it.
Speaker 2: My mom's not that great of a cook. I'm the
Speaker 2: cook in the family. And Mona's hard to make. If
Speaker 2: you make it, oh, if you make it, it's so laborious,
Speaker 2: Oh god, so many different ingredients. I mean, what is
Speaker 2: a minimum twenty six or something like that, like the
Speaker 2: minimum minim amount of ingredients minimum twenty.
Speaker 1: Six, thirty like it's just so it's so intensive and
Speaker 1: add so many different steps.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, and they're shitting there that you don't think
Speaker 2: goes together, you know what I mean. It's like nuts, chocolate, spices, cayenne,
Speaker 2: you know, a bay leaf, and you're this should not
Speaker 2: go together, but it does.
Speaker 3: It does.
Speaker 1: It's this harmonious blend of ingredients from all over the world.
Speaker 3: It's just I think it's it's magical. It's magical.
Speaker 2: Well, I want to dive in because where where did
Speaker 2: it originate? It doesn't feel Mexican. I know it's Mexican now,
Speaker 2: but it doesn't feel like it originated from indigenous Mexico.
Speaker 1: Well, the word itself, molet comes from the nawel muli,
Speaker 1: which means sauce, so in that sense, yes, and so
Speaker 1: in the pre colonial era there would make sauce it
Speaker 1: with chilis and seeds and tomatoes, you know, they made
Speaker 1: them into with them at that then formed it into
Speaker 1: a paste and they would add broth to it, just
Speaker 1: like we do with the molet pieste today, and add
Speaker 1: it to you know, turkey or sometimes the sauce they
Speaker 1: would put it on tortillas. But it was much simple.
Speaker 1: It was much simpler than what we think of mollet today.
Speaker 1: And so throughout the centuries, you know, post conquest, all
Speaker 1: of these different ingredients were introduced into Mexico, like spices,
Speaker 1: is and different types of nuts, and that evolved into
Speaker 1: the sauce that we're familiar with today. And this evolved
Speaker 1: in pre colonial you know, convents, but not almo Let's
Speaker 1: have chocolate, right not Almollyts have a million different ingredients
Speaker 1: and so it's and spices.
Speaker 3: So it's just the word morley comes from sauce.
Speaker 2: And then so when did it become so complicated?
Speaker 1: So in the seventeenth century, we see we talked about
Speaker 1: so Inez Elecros in one of our I think on
Speaker 1: our cookbook episodes, and so she wrote the first recipes
Speaker 1: in Mexico, and so in the seventeenth century, and she
Speaker 1: has a recipe for mole which is a mancha manteles,
Speaker 1: which is a type of molet. It's poat chicken and
Speaker 1: a sauce made with rehydrated chili, sesame seeds, tomato, onion
Speaker 1: rais and sweet potatoes, cinnamon, cloves, salt, pepper, and it's
Speaker 1: served with sliced plantains and pineapples and apples. So, like
Speaker 1: you say, things that you wouldn't think would go together,
Speaker 1: but they do. And so this is so interesting because
Speaker 1: these sauces, they represent this cultural exchange that was happening
Speaker 1: during this time, which is which I think is just
Speaker 1: really fascinating. It's kind of like when we did our
Speaker 1: Food in a Cup episode that when you buy a
Speaker 1: fruit from the fruit that all of the fruit is
Speaker 1: from a different part.
Speaker 3: Of the world.
Speaker 1: That's kind of like you know Molle the chef and
Speaker 1: food historian Madicate, but yes, she refers to the America
Speaker 1: as a lab of innercontinental fusion, right, So it's like
Speaker 1: all of these ingredients are mixing together.
Speaker 2: When I was shooting in New Mexico and Albuquerque, the
Speaker 2: first time I liked Mollet was in Santa Fe. There's
Speaker 2: a Mexican restaurant there called Sasson, and the chef is
Speaker 2: from Mexico. I think he's Chilango. I think he's from
Speaker 2: Mexico City. But he has twelve different moles that's the appetizer,
Speaker 2: and they come in tiny little bowls like this, and
Speaker 2: it's like six and six and tiny little tortillas like
Speaker 2: the size of a quarter, I mean literally or a
Speaker 2: silver dollar. I don't know if people know what that is,
Speaker 2: but it's like, you know, a tiny little torfilla, a
Speaker 2: little staff of tiny corn torpillas and twelve little mullas
Speaker 2: and the point is to try them. And there's sweet ones,
Speaker 2: there's green ones, there's dark ones, there's spicy ones there.
Speaker 2: And that's what really made me go, oh, there's different ones,
Speaker 2: like I didn't know. I didn't know there was sweet
Speaker 2: and then there was savory. So I personally liked the
Speaker 2: green favory one. But you have to go, like, it's
Speaker 2: worth going to Santa Fe to this restaurant for the
Speaker 2: twelve different mullets that this guy makes. And in the restaurant,
Speaker 2: the mural on the wall is all the ingredients. It's
Speaker 2: just all the ingredients of mullet and it's a big
Speaker 2: mural and it's beautiful. And he's like, that's molley. Like
Speaker 2: this restaurant is specializes in molley.
Speaker 1: Yes, I want to go, let's go, Let's go.
Speaker 2: And that made me go, that's what made me go, oh, Okay, okay,
Speaker 2: maybe maybe I might like this. I maybe just haven't
Speaker 2: had the right molet. Then I went to Wahaka with
Speaker 2: searching for Mexico and we went to the place of
Speaker 2: the specialty of Wahaka and he did it with turkey,
Speaker 2: it with wild.
Speaker 1: Our original protein. Yeah, that's so interesting. And like you
Speaker 1: say that that restaurant that has so many different times,
Speaker 1: I think that the common misconception is that almoleys.
Speaker 3: Have chocolate, or there's like the one morlet.
Speaker 1: But there's so many, right, And there's so many different
Speaker 1: textures and so many different flavors. And there's the one
Speaker 1: the moleli. Oh yeah, it is not even a sauce.
Speaker 1: It's like a soup, like a hearty soup. And you
Speaker 1: told me this because I always thought, oh, Wahaka's famous
Speaker 1: for seven morles, but it's there's not just seven molas.
Speaker 1: It's like a marketing thing, right, There's a million different
Speaker 1: more lis.
Speaker 2: A million different molives, million different mollets, different different different
Speaker 2: flavor profiles. So that's why I have always forgave myself
Speaker 2: for saying I don't really like mollet, because I feel
Speaker 2: like I had one, you know what I mean, I
Speaker 2: had one one type of mulley, and I'm like that
Speaker 2: I don't like it. Yeah, And then I went to
Speaker 2: Wahaka and I went to Susson, and I was like,
Speaker 2: oh my gosh, this I would I would drink I
Speaker 2: get I get it.
Speaker 1: You probably had the one that you buy and get
Speaker 1: that the grocery show, the Dona Maria or whatever.
Speaker 2: That's like, yes, that's what I'm saying. I don't think
Speaker 2: I agree with you. They're not all created equal. Yeah,
Speaker 2: because I want to say, here's the thing. Also, because
Speaker 2: malle has so many ingredients. There are some ingredients I
Speaker 2: don't like. I don't like anie, I don't like clovy,
Speaker 2: clovy mullet, and a lot of money's clovy. Talk about
Speaker 2: the ingredients because there's so many.
Speaker 1: There's so many ingredients, and some molts have up to
Speaker 1: thirty ingredients right from all the world.
Speaker 3: Cinnamon is from Sri Lanka and it's from.
Speaker 1: Asia, clothes from Indonesia, Peanuts from the andes, cilantro from
Speaker 1: the Eastern Mediterranean, bananas from India, s seeds from Africa.
Speaker 3: And that's only just a few of the ingredients.
Speaker 1: So all of these ingredients from the different continents, they
Speaker 1: meet native tomatoes and chilis and pumpkin seeds and the
Speaker 1: toasted you know, dorothiya, and so all of this is
Speaker 1: blended together and cooked and lard that arrived from European pigs, right,
Speaker 1: so so, but I think that the really good mole
Speaker 1: is all of these flavors are balanced. It's kind of
Speaker 1: like an Indian food, that the food flavors are balance
Speaker 1: because I don't love cuman, but I oh, I love
Speaker 1: you do, right, I don't love love. Yeah, molet has cuman,
Speaker 1: but you don't taste it. Right, So if it's yeah,
Speaker 1: I think a really good cook a really good molet,
Speaker 1: not one flavor stands out and everything just compliments each
Speaker 1: other really beautifully.
Speaker 2: When we come back. How long do spices last in
Speaker 2: our pantry? I've always wanted to know that because I
Speaker 2: feel like spices spire that's after the break.
Speaker 3: So, Eva, what are your favorite spices to cook one?
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, this is grab. I love this question.
Speaker 2: I feel like you are genuinely interested.
Speaker 3: I am totally I want to know, you know what.
Speaker 2: During COVID, I did a video organizing my spice rack,
Speaker 2: and I thought it was the most exciting. Big Remember
Speaker 2: I think every bore like, yes, I do.
Speaker 3: I often organize my spice rack too.
Speaker 4: I love to see what I have SMA, and you know,
Speaker 4: I organize like the sweet like you know, baking, like
Speaker 4: you know, my vanilla and my cinnamon and my cardimen
Speaker 4: on one side and then the other on the other side,
Speaker 4: because oftentimes I confuse cumen and cinnamon, like I'll I'll
Speaker 4: reach for the cinnamon and I'm like, oh and I
Speaker 4: almost throw in cumin in my apple pot, you know,
Speaker 4: like oh my god, yeah, horrible.
Speaker 2: My go tos are I have to have garlic powder,
Speaker 2: onion powder, gominal and kosh your salt. Okay, like my
Speaker 2: my go to, my go to onion powder, garlic powder
Speaker 2: and and salts and gomino that goes in almost everything
Speaker 2: I cook.
Speaker 3: Really, and I use powder.
Speaker 2: I don't use s okay. Okay. Then if that doesn't,
Speaker 2: that's like white is not considered a color because that's
Speaker 2: my favorite color too, So right, yeah, so great. So
Speaker 2: then it's garlic powder, onion powder, and gomino cuman.
Speaker 1: But garlic powder and onion powder aren't spices either, What
Speaker 1: do you mean? Yeah, because they don't. A spice comes
Speaker 1: from the roots or the seeds, stems, barks of a plant.
Speaker 3: So human really is the spice that you cook?
Speaker 2: Okay?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, then it would be human? What about what about
Speaker 2: oh so then thyme and rosemary, none of that.
Speaker 3: Those are all herbs.
Speaker 2: Oh oh interesting, Yeah, well what other spices are there?
Speaker 1: So things like cinnamon, clothes, you know, cuman and it's
Speaker 1: carda mom what else, capper not meg vanilla that's native
Speaker 1: to van to Mexico.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so the way because the vanilla bean is
Speaker 2: the shruit, well, the seeds, the seeds.
Speaker 1: Exactly, the seeds, and herbs are the leaves of the plant.
Speaker 1: So dried herbs like the dried thyme, that is an herb.
Speaker 1: But when we go to the supermarket, all of the
Speaker 1: herbs and the spices, they're all the dried herbs and spices.
Speaker 1: It's all in the same place. The salt is all
Speaker 1: everything's in the same section of the of the grocery
Speaker 1: store because everything is used to add flavored to a.
Speaker 2: Dish, right right. And so here's the thing that I've
Speaker 2: always known that spices don't get better with age, Like
Speaker 2: I you really have to throw out old spices. The
Speaker 2: faster you use them, the better, the better little taste.
Speaker 2: I always like, if I'm like for Thanksgiving, I buy
Speaker 2: everything new, Like I'm like a new Union powdered new garlic.
Speaker 2: But yeah, because I just want it to have like
Speaker 2: the most potency. And you I can feel when a
Speaker 2: spice is gone back, especially like bay leaves, they just
Speaker 2: get dried. They don't they don't have the same flavor
Speaker 2: that they would if they were fresher. The vanilla bean
Speaker 2: I always have in my in my pantry that the
Speaker 2: actual vanilla beans, and they're very expensive, but they go
Speaker 2: bad they like you like you want a fresh vanilla bean.
Speaker 1: They last about three to four years from harvest time.
Speaker 1: And some spices has a manufacturing date printed on it,
Speaker 1: not they don't all. But that's when you can tell
Speaker 1: when you know when it was manufactured, because sometimes this
Speaker 1: stuff in the grocery store has been on the shelf
Speaker 1: or has been not necessarily on the shelf but harvested
Speaker 1: for years and years and years and gone from you know,
Speaker 1: hand to hand.
Speaker 2: Yes, so check check that date. But also I will say,
Speaker 2: which I've noticed is whole spices last longer than ground spice.
Speaker 2: And so I usually buy a whole human seeds, whole
Speaker 2: black peppercorns, whole cinnamon, right like, and then I I
Speaker 2: grind it, do you really, I'll grind it. Yeah, So
Speaker 2: I have like you know, like a coffee grinder. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'll use a coffee grinder that's just for spices, my
Speaker 2: spice grinder or in the Malta, yeah, you.
Speaker 3: Do that, I usually have, I have my I have
Speaker 3: both for certain things. I'll use the the the certain things. Certain.
Speaker 2: Where did the word spice come from?
Speaker 1: So spice comes from the Latin species or special wares,
Speaker 1: and it refers to an item of special value as
Speaker 1: opposed to something that's just ordinary, like ordinary art of trade.
Speaker 1: So now we don't think that there are really anything
Speaker 1: that special, like pepper or cinnamon their staples in our pantries. Right,
Speaker 1: I probably use cinnamon more than I use anything else.
Speaker 1: But they really love cinnamon, cinnamon and pepper.
Speaker 2: Didn't Christopher Columbus have a big hand and how spices
Speaker 2: came over.
Speaker 3: During the Middle Ages.
Speaker 1: Europeans they really wanted spices, and they were getting the
Speaker 1: spices from Asia, and it was one of the motivating
Speaker 1: factors of the European.
Speaker 3: Age of Exploration.
Speaker 1: They wanted a more direct access to the East to
Speaker 1: get spices, and so they had been exported along the
Speaker 1: Silk Roads, and so there were these different land and
Speaker 1: sea routes. But the Europeans just wanted these direct routes
Speaker 1: because they were so expensive by the time they got
Speaker 1: to Europe, because they went from so many different hands.
Speaker 1: So Europeans wanted to cut these middlemen and then.
Speaker 3: Just go straight to the source.
Speaker 1: And so Christopher Columbus were sent to find a direct
Speaker 1: route from Europe to Asia. And so in this search
Speaker 1: for the direct route, Christopher Columbus came across a land
Speaker 1: mass that he thought was India and when it wasn't.
Speaker 1: This is why the natives in the Americas are called Indias,
Speaker 1: because he called them Indians. But this is how he landed,
Speaker 1: not discovered, landed in Americas in search of spices.
Speaker 2: Now, also, like I remember, I mean for me, you know,
Speaker 2: growing up Catholic, I associate going to church so much
Speaker 2: with the smell of that incense. Oh yeah, wasn't that
Speaker 2: technically a spice? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, And because a lot of spices are used for that,
Speaker 1: you know, for churches.
Speaker 2: In religious ceremonies. Yeah. You and I have talked about
Speaker 2: also the cost of spice. Like you know, when I
Speaker 2: was doing Mexico searching for Mexico, they were saying vanilla
Speaker 2: is the second most expensive spice after saffron, because it's
Speaker 2: so labor intend Saffron so labor intensive because it's they're
Speaker 2: actual little.
Speaker 1: Petals or little the little stamens of the crocus one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but what was the cost back then in Europe
Speaker 2: to you know, if they were in so demand, these
Speaker 2: spices were like so in demand and being exported along
Speaker 2: all of these routes, Like, was were they expensive? Was
Speaker 2: it considered like, you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1: A luxury, absolute luxury. They're so expensive. So there's a
Speaker 1: historian m and Pearson. He writes about the cost requard
Speaker 1: to get spices to Europe via the traditional Middle Eastern routes, says,
Speaker 1: the price of a kilo of pepper as it changed
Speaker 1: hands was enormous. So it costs one or two grams
Speaker 1: of silver at the production point, and then once it
Speaker 1: reached Alexandria in Egypt, it was ten to fourteen, fourteen
Speaker 1: to eighteen in Venice, and then in the consumer countries
Speaker 1: of Europe twenty to thirty. So it went from costing
Speaker 1: like one gram of silver to thirty grams of silver.
Speaker 1: So this is why, because it was so luxurious, everybody
Speaker 1: wanted their hands on it, which I find so interesting
Speaker 1: because now we open up our pantries and.
Speaker 2: We all have it her everywhere.
Speaker 3: They're not expensive.
Speaker 2: Well, vanilla still it real Mexican vanilla is the most expensive.
Speaker 2: If you're if you're in a store and you see
Speaker 2: a vanilla for ninety nine cents and one another bottle
Speaker 2: right next to it for twenty dollars, that's because the
Speaker 2: ninety nine cent one is not vanilla. It's the Nain
Speaker 2: which is a synthetic vanilla, and the twenty dollars bottle
Speaker 2: is real vanilla. So you look, look, look at the
Speaker 2: labels exactly exactly.
Speaker 1: And also saffron is still really expensive, and cardamom is
Speaker 1: also pretty expensive because those are really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love card I think I like cardam and
Speaker 2: more than cinnamon.
Speaker 1: Oh really, I love them both, yea love. I love
Speaker 1: the smell of cardim It's amazing.
Speaker 2: So so how were spices? You know, I don't associate
Speaker 2: Europe with spices, So when you talk about like Europe
Speaker 2: loved and wanted all these spices, I'm like, what did
Speaker 2: they use it for? Because for me it's like in
Speaker 2: Europe it's such clean cooking. And I find like India, China, Mexico,
Speaker 2: they really we really use a lot of spices, Like,
Speaker 2: how were spices used in Europe?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's so interesting that you say that, because you're right,
Speaker 1: spices at one point, like during the Middle Ages, they
Speaker 1: were they wanted their hands on it, right on ginger
Speaker 1: and clothes and cinnamon, all of this, and even the
Speaker 1: lower classes when they could afford it, they would get pepper,
Speaker 1: so they would use them so much in cooking. They
Speaker 1: believe they had medicinal value, like black pepper was considered
Speaker 1: a treatment for coffs and asthma and could wounds, and
Speaker 1: cinnamon helped cure fevers. It was burned like incense and
Speaker 1: so in churches and brothels everywhere to improve the odors
Speaker 1: of the day. But it changed, like right now, we
Speaker 1: don't really associate Europe with a lot of spices because
Speaker 1: when they became more readily available, they weren't seen as
Speaker 1: a source of wealth and status.
Speaker 3: So then they start cooking.
Speaker 1: With herbs, with butter, and it was more about the
Speaker 1: mouth feel and this, and it just became something different.
Speaker 3: It just kind of lost their their I don't know,
Speaker 3: they're they're.
Speaker 1: Oomph But even gemstones and semi precious stones were often
Speaker 1: categorized as spices. Stones like topas were thought to ease hemorrhoids.
Speaker 1: Lapislazo was good for malaria. And I hope people don't
Speaker 1: start doing this today because there's so much crazy stuff
Speaker 1: going on. Empowdered pearls mixed with was taking to prevent
Speaker 1: old age.
Speaker 3: Powdered pearls mixed with spices.
Speaker 2: We've got lots more after the break, stay with us.
Speaker 1: So Eva, let's talk about some of the most popular spices.
Speaker 3: Can you guess some of them?
Speaker 2: I mean, cinnamon has to be. Cinnamon has to be.
Speaker 2: Why haven't even seen this list? Cinnamon and pet I mean, oh,
Speaker 2: is pepper a spice?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Okay, pepper, Yeah, cinnamon and pepper are up there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, cinnamon, pepper, clave. Yeah.
Speaker 1: All of the ones that we're mentioning, except for clothes.
Speaker 1: We didn't really talk about clothes. But I love this
Speaker 1: story about cinnamon. Merchants would tell stories that to harvest cinnamon,
Speaker 1: they would have to set out large chunks of raw
Speaker 1: meat near the nests of a cinemologous bird a mythical bird,
Speaker 1: and the birds would swoop down and carry off the
Speaker 1: limbs of these beasts to their nests, and the nests
Speaker 1: would break and fall down and then Arabians would approach
Speaker 1: and collect what they wanted. So this is nonsense. Cinnamon
Speaker 1: comes from the bark of a tree.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, well, miss, now I'm confused. What
Speaker 2: is cinnamon? Isn't it? I was like, is it a stem?
Speaker 2: Is it? Is it a root? It's the bark of
Speaker 2: a tree.
Speaker 3: Cinnamon is the bark of a tree.
Speaker 1: But there the merchants would create these crazy stories just
Speaker 1: to hike up the price of the cinnamon. And during
Speaker 1: the Middle Ages it was one of the favored spices.
Speaker 1: It was regarded as an aphrodisiac.
Speaker 2: So it's endemic to Sri Lanka, India. Yeah, and marra mar.
Speaker 1: And then there are some really interesting videos and you'll
Speaker 1: see people taking a tool and like imagine like a
Speaker 1: thick flad heead screwdriver, and they're just just you know
Speaker 1: how it comes in little.
Speaker 2: Like shaving it off, shaving it off. Yeah, exactly where
Speaker 2: does cumin come from? Greeks?
Speaker 1: Cuman is also native to the eastern Mediterranean and also
Speaker 1: South Asia and oldest reference to Cuman dates back about
Speaker 1: five thousand years. They're both as a mummification ingredient for
Speaker 1: Egyptian pharaohs.
Speaker 3: Yeah, lots of stories.
Speaker 2: I know, there's so many cool stories. I remember. I
Speaker 2: know the story about black pepper being called black gold
Speaker 2: and it was like the King of spices because it
Speaker 2: was so widely consumed. Which is so interesting, because I
Speaker 2: find black pepper to be boring. Really, I find it
Speaker 2: very I don't use a lot of it. I find
Speaker 2: it very one note. I'd rather if I want spice
Speaker 2: like heat in something, I would rather use cayenne, chipotlet,
Speaker 2: ancho Chile. I mean, black pepper is not my go to,
Speaker 2: which is interesting.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do use a lot of black pepper for
Speaker 3: me when I do.
Speaker 1: If I do cayenne or something like that, it brings
Speaker 1: a different flavor profile.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I like the mixed pepper corns, the red,
Speaker 2: the white, the black. Like I like like the mix.
Speaker 2: I'm not a fan of like black pepper. I feel
Speaker 2: like it's so one note.
Speaker 3: So you don't use like salt pepper, you just use
Speaker 3: salt and.
Speaker 2: Anything else, salt, garlic, cumi, other stuff. Yeah, I rarely
Speaker 2: use pepper, rarely use pepper. I covered this a lot
Speaker 2: in searching for Mexico, but there's so many spices that
Speaker 2: are that are native to the America is obviously vanilla.
Speaker 2: We've talked about vanilla chile, which is technically a fruit,
Speaker 2: but we now use it as as spice. We have
Speaker 2: a vanilla and a chili episode if you guys want
Speaker 2: to want to try those out. What I've never used achiote?
Speaker 2: What do you use that one?
Speaker 3: I don't. I don't use it.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's a fruit, isn't it.
Speaker 3: It's a spice. It's a it's a spice.
Speaker 2: That's Oh, that's right, that's the one from your terrier.
Speaker 2: That's the almost Yeah, the paste.
Speaker 3: So I do when I make that, I do use it.
Speaker 1: I buy the riccatto, but I don't typically have the you.
Speaker 2: Know whole Well you should because it's an aphrodisiac.
Speaker 3: Oh, that's true. Right now.
Speaker 2: It's associated with the fertility gods. It is, That's what
Speaker 2: it was. And then what's all spice? All spice? All
Speaker 2: spice is native to the America.
Speaker 1: It is, it is, and it's like a giant it
Speaker 1: looks like a giant pepper corn. And it's called allspice
Speaker 1: because it smells like all of the spices. It smells
Speaker 1: like a combination of pepper and nutmeg and cinnamon and
Speaker 1: all of it, but it was used in seasoning and
Speaker 1: also in perfumery. And it grows. Yeah, it grows along
Speaker 1: the Gulf coast from Veracruz to Yucatan.
Speaker 3: I love all spice. Well.
Speaker 2: I hope this episode inspires people to clean out your spices,
Speaker 2: organize yours zes. I hope this episode inspires people to
Speaker 2: actually open your palate to new spices. Yeah, you know, like,
Speaker 2: let's try some try cardiman instead of cinnamon, try the
Speaker 2: red pepper flake as opposed to black party, Like, try
Speaker 2: try tomn spices because the history of them is really fascinating. Well,
Speaker 2: thanks for listening, you guys. I hope this was a
Speaker 2: fascinating for you as it was for me in my day.
Speaker 3: Thank you for listening everyone.
Speaker 2: Thanks, goodbye bye, Hungary for History is a hyphen media
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