Paprika

Paprika is a spice made from dried and ground red peppers, Capsicum annuum. It can have varying levels of heat, but the peppers used for hot paprika tend to be milder and have thinner flesh than those used to produce chili powder. The milder, sweet paprika is mostly composed of the fruit of the pepper with most of the seeds removed; whereas some seeds and stalks are retained in the peppers used for hotter paprika.

Paprika, like all capsicum varieties and their derivatives, is descended from wild ancestors from the Amazon River, cultivated in ancient times in South, Central and North America, particularly in central Mexico. The peppers were introduced to Europe via Spain and Portugal in the 16th century. The trade in paprika expanded from the Iberian Peninsula to Africa and Asia and ultimately reached central Europe through the Balkans.

European cuisines in which paprika is a frequent and major ingredient include those of Hungary, Spain and Portugal; it is also found in many French and German dishes. It is widely used in North Africa and the Middle East.

History

Paprika is a spice made from dried and powdered red peppers. It is traditionally made from Capsicum annuum varietals in the Longum group, including chili peppers. Red peppers grow in the wild in Mexico, where they were being gathered and eaten c.7000 BC, and were cultivated there before 3500 BC. The food writer Alan Davidson comments that Christopher Columbus probably came across them on his first voyage in 1492, and may have brought plants back to Europe. The Spaniards and Portuguese also took them to India and south-east Asia and they were quickly taken up and grown in the Middle East, the Balkans and Europe – to Italy by 1526, Germany by 1543 and known in Hungary by 1569.