RIFFING ON CHILI PEPPERS

The time is ripe, so to speak, to prepare piperade, the signature dish of Basque cuisine in southwest France. It's featured ingredient is a green chili pepper mixed with tomatoes and eggs.  It is seasoned with the Basque proprietary Espelette chili powder.  Less well known, but characteristic of Basque fidelity to their past, these chilis are believed to be the direct descendants of the peppers Columbus brought to Spain at the end of the 15^th century.

Chilis, unlike their cousins, the sweet bell peppers, contain capsaicin, an alkaloid oil, a failed defense mechanism. that activates pain receptors in the mouth.  Capsaicin develops fully in the world's tropical zones. Chilis grown in the southern corner of France and coast Northern Spain get just enough heat and sun to produce a warm, comforting umami high.

Basque Chef Gerald Hirigoyen uses Anaheim chilis to prepare a slow-simmered piperade in his two San Francisco restaurants. He feels this green chili’s mild, grassy flavor comes closest to the one used in Basque cuisine. He seasons the dish with Espelette and white rather than black pepper to allow the chili aromas to dominate.

The introduction of chili peppers in Europe inspired other cultures to create their own chili powder. The Ottoman Turks brought chilis to Hungary in the mid-16^th century from ports in India where Portuguese explorers had introduced them. The lecsó stew our Hungary tour group prepared in Budapest last fall was very similar to a Basque piperade.  We used sweet bell peppers and let the oil in Hungarian paprika spiced sausage slices enhance the lecsó's delicious, warm mouthfeel.

Fiery North African harissa is another chili that took root in the 16^th century thanks to Spanish traders who introduced it to Ottoman ports in Tunisia. Harissa has become the national seasoning in all the African countries bordering the Mediterranean. A bowl of Tunisian chakchouka is much like piperade and lecsó despite its appearance. Green chilis are left whole; the eggs are poached and nested rather than stirred into the stew.

The origin story of the Anaheim pepper shows how quickly and easily chilis can spread and be customized.   This chili bears the name of the California city where it was hybridized for canning purposes at the end of the 19th century.  A businessman farmer had brought the seeds from New Mexico, but the ancestor of these seeds had arrived from Spain in the late 16^th century with Don Pedro de Peralta, the Spanish colonist who founded Santa Fe. Since Santa Fe is the oldest European settlement west of the Mississippi, the Anaheim chili, also known as the New Mexico and Hatch chilis, just may have bragging rights as our nation’s oldest chili pepper.