Long Pepper: The Spice that We Forgot

Long Pepper

A Spice from History

Popping out of the green and rich foliage of the creepers that cover the entire trunk of a mango tree or tamarind tree, the black and pleasingly pungent little spikes of long pepper spread a feeble yet distinct aroma around it during the hot and humid days of the South Indian summer time. This is a spice that grows mostly in the wild. Cultivation is limited to the farmers and companies who produce or process medicinal plants. This curious spice once delighted the taste buds of Asia, Europe, Arabia, and the Middle East.

In Europe, long pepper is known to have competed with pepper for an important place in the culinary kingdom. This spice, no less interesting or tastier than pepper, was cast away in the flood of changes happening in the history of food choices. Originally the Arabs used to buy long pepper from the Indian sub-continent and it was only later that pepper replaced long pepper as the favourite spice. The father of modern medicine, Hippocrates discussed this herb as a medicine widely used. Greece had this spice as a popular culinary flavouring agent since the 6th century BCE. The catkins of the plant were dried and used as a spice. Only in the 4th century CE did black pepper reach Greece and ended the reign of long pepper. The difficulty of cultivating long pepper (which is greatly partial to its natural habitat) and the lower productivity of this vine compared to the black pepper vine might have been why this spice was lost from the palatal memories of the world. By the 16th century CE, long pepper fell out of use in Europe.

The Distinct Taste of Long Pepper

The book, Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventurer’s Guide, described the long pepper as the ‘lost superior pepper’ and its taste as “blunt and earthy”. Just like pepper, long pepper also has piperine, a substance that activates the heat-sensing neurones of the human body. The taste of long pepper is also compared to that of Sichuan peppercorns.

Nowadays, while the rest of the world has forgotten long pepper as a spice, it adds flavour to some rare and unique dishes in India and Pakistan. For example, long pepper is pickled in India and sometimes added to other pickles to improve their shelf life. Long pepper can be bought in some of the North Indian spice markets. In some African countries also, this spice is used for cooking.

Powder Fort: The Spice Mix of the Medieval Times

Powder fort, Poudre fort, and Strong powder are the names for a medieval-era spice mixture with long pepper as an ingredient. It is supposed to be a mix of cloves, pepper, long pepper, and nutmeg ground together. To grind the long pepper, usually, a coffee grinder is used. Long pepper was also a common ingredient of medieval spiced wines and drinks such as ale.

Nihari, The Long Pepper Mutton Stew

Nihari is the mutton stew popular in Pakistan and it is made using the spice, the long pepper. This dish originated in Lucknow, now the capital city of Uttar Pradesh state in India, and earlier the capital of Awadh, a legendary kingdom ruled by the Shia Muslim rulers. Slow-cooked mutton is the main ingredient.

For the Mutton Stew:

• 1 kilogram mutton, pieces

• 2 onion, finely chopped

• 4 tablespoons ghee or clarified butter

• 1 tablespoon ginger paste

• 1 tablespoon garlic paste

• 1/2 tablespoon turmeric powder

• 3 tablespoons wheat flour

• 3 tablespoons nihari spice mix

• 2 tablespoons coriander powder

• to taste salt

• 1 tablespoon lime juice

• for garnishing fresh coriander leaves and ginger cut into strips

For the Nihari spice mix:

• 1 tablespoon cumin seed

• 1 tablespoon fennel seed

• 1 tablespoon dry ginger powder

• 1/4 tablespoon grated nutmeg

• 4 green cardamom

• 4 cloves

• 1 bay leaf

• 8-10 long pepper

• 1 inch cinnamon stick

Instructions

1. To make Nihari spice mix, dry roast all the spices listed, cool them and grind them into a fine powder.

2. Heat ghee in a deep bottom pot and fry onions till they turn brown. Add mutton pieces, coriander powder, turmeric powder, ginger paste, garlic paste, and salt to taste. Saute for 5 minutes and stir well. Add 8 cups of water and the Nihari Spice Mix. Cook on low flame for about 4 hours. Add the wheat flour mixed well in half a cup of water when the meat is tender. Simmer and cook for another 10-15 minutes. Add lemon juice and garnish with coriander leaves when the gravy is thick. Serve hot. The distinctive and lingering flavour sets this mutton stew apart from other dishes.

Long Pepper: Medicinal Uses

Long pepper in ancient times was thought of as a sexual enhancer and stimulant that increases semen count when used as a concoction along with milk, sesame oil and ghee. This mixture also had the reputation of being an effective sleep aid.

In Ayurveda, long pepper is used in medicinal preparations for digestive and respiratory disorders. The roots of long pepper are also used in Ayurvedic preparations. Some popular medicinal preparations in which long pepper is an active ingredient are,

Pippalyasava

Triphala Choorna

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Lavana Bhaskara Choorna

Pippalyasava is helpful for digestion. Triphala Choorna is considered anti-ageing and rejuvenation medicine and is prescribed by Ayurveda practitioners as suitable for daily intake for all once they enter their middle age.

Sir George King, the British botanist who was also the superintendent of the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta during the late 1800s, and Udoy Chandra Dutt, in their exhaustive work, ‘The Material Medica of the Hindus: Compiled from Sanskrit Medical Works’, have listed many Ayurvedic medicinal preparations in which long pepper is an ingredient. Medicinal preparations described in this text to treat spleen disease, dyspepsia, diarrhoea, fever and asthma have long pepper as their important ingredient. One preparation is given below-

“Vidyddhara rasa? Take of mercury, sulphur, prepared copper, iron pyrites, realgar afpd orpiment equal parts, rub them together and soak the mixture iu a decoction of long pepper and in the milky juice of Euphorbia nerdfolia (vajri). Make into pills about six grains each. These pills are given with honey in enlarged spleen and other enlargements of the abdominal viscera.”

The most significant of Ayurveda texts, the Caraka Samhita records many ancient medicinal cures using long pepper and a simple example is this preparation,

“The gruel prepared with long pepper, piper root, piper chaba, white flowered leadwort and dry ginger is a digestive-stimulant and pain-killer”.

Caraka Samhitha also describes long pepper as an aphrodisiac.

Long Pepper: Gone and Forgotten

When chilli pepper from South America was introduced during the voyages of Christopher Columbus to Europe, the culinary practice of using long pepper was pushed into oblivion. Unlike long pepper, chilli was a very flexible crop, one that could adapt to different climates and geography. Thus ended the era of long pepper, and this plant was returned to a wild existence in forests and wastelands of the Indian subcontinent, and in less-known indigenous food cultures.

References

Lionel D. Barnett, Antiquities of India: An Account of the History and Culture of Ancient Hindustan, 1914.

Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventurer’s Guide, Cecily Wong, Dylan Thuras, Atlas Obscura, 2021.

The Caraka Saṃhitā Expounded by the Worshipful Ātreya Punarvasu, Compiled by the Great Sage Agniveśa and Redacted by Caraka & Dṛḍhabala, Vol. 5 by Shree Gulabkunverba Ayurvedic Society.

Sir George King and Udoy Chandra Dutt, ‘The Material Medica of the Hindus: Compiled from Sanskrit Medical Works’, https://archive.org/details/dli.csl.5808/page/n57/mode/2up?q=long+pepper