.png)
SPICES
3 Spices Used in the Victorian Era
Exploring the origins, history and uses of
Pepper, Cinnamon and Ginger
Spices have been a part of humans diets for thousands of years. A spice can be a seed, fruit, root, bark or other plant substance. Spices can also be available in several forms: fresh, whole, or pre-ground dried.
The expansion of trade had a profound effect on the food supply in London and elsewhere in Britain in the Victorian era. In just one day in the early 1850s, 121 ships arrived on the Thames, bearing nearly 30,000 tons of imported, exotic goods. In 1854, nearly 15 million pounds (7 million kg) of spices were imported into Britain from the colonies and elsewhere, consisting of cassia bark, cinnamon, cloves, mace, nutmeg, pepper and pimento (allspice).
Pepper
What is it?
Black pepper (Piper nigrum) is a flowering plant in the Peperaceae family which is cultivated for its 'berries'. These peppercorns are then dried and used as an aromatic spice or seasoning.
The origins:
Since antiquity, pepper has been the most commonly used spice in the world.
Black pepper was first cultivated over 3,000 years ago in Southern India. It was soon introduced to the major islands of Indonesia by traders and began to be grown throughout the tropics. As pepper travelled, it became domesticated and different regions began growing different species of pepper. For example, long pepper cultivation began to dominate in the northeast of India, while black pepper dominated in the south west. These variations made pepper even more desirable and pepper soon became the main spice that European explorers wanted to find from the Indies.
The history:
Pepper has long been one of the most popular spices in not just Britain, but the world!
The Romans were huge fans of trading in spices. Peppercorns have even been found in ancient Egyptian tombs and stuffed into the nostrils of Ramses the Great (1303-1213 BC) when he was mummified! In Roman times, black pepper was an expensive commodity, often referred to as “black gold”. Although, despite its expense, black pepper was also well-known across the Roman Empire, and features prominently in Apicius’ De re coquinaria- a third-century cookery book that includes pepper in over 80% of its recipes.
Yet, not everybody in the Roman Empire was a fan of this spice, including Pliny the Elder (25-79 AD):
“There is no year in which India does not drain the Roman Empire of 50 million sesterces"
Pliny also comments:
“It is quite surprising that the use of pepper has come so much into fashion, seeing that in other substances which we use, it is sometimes their sweetness, and sometimes their appearance that has attracted our notice […] its only desirable quality being a certain pungency; and yet it is for this that we import it all the way from India!”
How was it used?
Currency:
During the Civil War (1139-53), black peppercorns were often used to pay rent as coins were scarce. Similarly, in the Middle Ages, black pepper was accepted as currency and was used to pay taxes and rent right through to the eighteenth century. By the nineteenth century, however, the price of pepper had fallen so dramatically that the term ‘peppercorn rent’ was born and came to mean 'low rent'.
Medicine:
Like many other eastern spices, black pepper was historically both a seasoning and a traditional medicine. Because of its chemical compound, piperine, pepper has long been believed to cure several illnesses, such as constipation, insomnia, sunburn and toothaches. While its benefits were also thought to extend to improving digestion and reducing stress levels.
Cooking:
The most popular use of pepper today is in cookery as a seasoning. This was very much the same during the Victorian period, especially with the advent of travel across the empire and the introduction of European cuisines and foods of colonial India. For the first time, London’s busy port allowed the spices that had once been limited to the banquets of the nobility into the middle-class home and used in several dishes.
A popular way of using pepper in Victorian Britain was through recreating Indian cuisine. In fact, curry recipes were a popular feature in cookbooks of the time.
Interestingly the recipes also resemble the same combination of ingredients we would use today. Take a look!
Recipe on how ‘to make a Currey the Indian Way’ from The Art of Cookery, Hannah Glasse (1747).
Queen Victoria also set the expectation of what to eat to the rest of the population, including the use of pepper. For example, because of her connections to India, later becoming Empress of India in 1877, she developed an interest in their culture and all things Indian became increasingly fashionable.
Queen Victoria even added an Indian wing to Osbourne House - her holiday home on the Isle of Wight - and hired Indian servants, including an Indian cook who used many exotic spices such as pepper and ginger, that today we take as standard, in their cooking.
Indian Wing at Osbourne House, Isle of Wight
"Britain traded with the entire world, and that was reflected in the variety of goods regularly ordered for the[royal] kitchens’
- Annie Gray
Victorian food culture was shaped through appropriating the cuisines of its colonies, then creating something more suitable for the ‘refined’ British palette. So, even though what was labelled ‘Indian food’ in Britain often bore little resemblance to the true foods of India, it allowed the middle classes and other people of the era access to the taste of exotic cuisines.
Cinnamon
What is it?
Cinnamon is an aromatic spice obtained from the inner brown bark of several tree species from the genus Cinnamonum and is left to dry in the sun. Cinnamon is used in both sweet and savoury dishes.
Today cinnamon is available in the form of a ground powder or cinnamon stick in two main varieties:
Ceylon
This has a delicate and sweet taste.
Cassia
This is what is found in the supermarket and is seen as the lesser quality of the two products.
The origins:
It’s difficult to pinpoint Cinnamon’s origins because until the sixteenth century, its location was kept a secret by Arab traders who created mystical stories about its origins, in order to protect its high price.
“they are obtained from birds’ nests, and particularly from that of the phoenix, in the region where Father Liber was brought up, and that they are knocked down from inaccessible rocks and trees by the weight of the flesh brought there by the birds themselves, or by means of arrows loaded with lead; and similarly there is a tale of casia growing round marshes under the protection of a terrible kind of bats that guard it with their claws, and of winged serpents”!
The history:
Cinnamon is thought to have been brought over to Europe by Arab traders where its popularity and status as a luxury item grew.
Cinnamon was transported on Indonesian rafts to East Africa on the 'cinnamon route', then continued to the Roman markets. It was then brought over to Egypt by Arab traders, then from Egypt, Venetian traders from Italy purchased the spice and controlled the monopoly of Europe’s spice trade.
How was it used?
During Ancient Egypt, cinnamon was used for everything from medicine and ailments, to embalming bodies for burial.
However, cinnamon has also been used to flavour a variety of cuisines, and sweet and savoury dishes. In medieval Britain, cinnamon was used in recipes such as Cinnamon Brewet - a dish where cinnamon is sprinkled over a joint of beef before being roasted in red wine and stock, with almonds, ginger and cloves. This interest in using cinnamon in cooking and baking carried on through the nineteenth century when it was used widely across middle-class cookbooks.
Ginger
What is it?
Ginger is a flowering plant whose root is widely used as a spice due to its fragrant qualities.
The origins:
Ginger originated from Southeast Asia and was domesticated by the Austronesian people. During the spice trade, ginger was transported to India whose traders then carried it onto the Middle East and the Mediterranean around the first century BC.
The history:
The first written record of ginger comes from the Analects of Confucius, written in China during the Warring States period (475-221 BC).
Europeans saw ginger for the first time in the first century BC when the ancient Romans traded with India.
Did you know:
In the Middle Ages, the price of a half a kilogram of ginger was the same as one sheep!
By the time of Queen Elizabeth I's, ginger plants were being transported to the New World colonies of the Caribbean where they could be easily grown and cultivated for the domestic market at a cheaper price than in India. Soon, this made ginger widespread and more affordable for people to buy!
How was it used?
Today, ginger is a common spice used worldwide, although it has been used in different ways and for various reasons throughout its history.
Did you know:
The Austronesian people used ginger to bless their ships and used it in rituals for healing and asking for protection from spirits.
Did you know:
In the eleventh century, ginger was also recommended to King Henry VIII to treat the black plague and as an aid to digestion for Queen Elizabeth I!
Throughout its history, ginger was very much considered an exotic and expensive fragrance and flavour. Although the core ingredients of gingerbread became affordable to a wider proportion of society during the Victorian era, it was still considered a treat reserved for special occasions and so the middle classes used ginger to advertise and enforce their social position.
The Victorian Christmas became a chance to truly show off your money by making gingerbread men, not necessarily for eating, but to decorate the Christmas tree with, or building grand, sugar-decorated gingerbread houses.
It is safe to say the Victorians' use of spice reached new heights of extravagance, and owe their spice obsession largely to the Indian subcontinent who profoundly influenced British tastes of the time.
Try for yourself some of these spices that were imported and used by the Victorians in some of the bakes from this website!
You may notice the most featured spices include: coriander, caraway seeds, mace (allspice), cinnamon and nutmeg!