1. Flower and fruit are seen here, but the business end is missing. Bleat a little bit for the answer.

ANSWERCapers, Caper blossoms and Caper Berries. Capers, the buds seen below, are used in cooking and were named after the fact their aroma was sort of goat-y.

2. The same term is used in an European language for these three different spices, and so this name is also the name for a liqueur where any one may be used as a flavouring agent. What?

ANSWER

Kummel, the generic name for Fennel, Caraway and Cumin in German.

3.This familiar word comes from an alteration of the Middle English for odour or taste, and is derived in turn from a Middle French term meaning something left behind, or released. What noun, more familiar to us as verb?

ANSWERRelish.

4. Anethum graveolens is not really the thing pickled, and yet it gives its name to such an item. What misnomer are we talking about?

ANSWERDill Pickle, normally a whole cucumber in brine with dill stems.

5.

“The fruit is dark green and round, with a distinct nipple on the stem end. It has a thick rind, knobby and wrinkled, and one of its common names is 'porcupine orange'. As the fruit becomes older, the color fades to a lighter, yellowish green. Though the juice is infrequently use in cooking, the zest of the rind is often used for making curry pastes.”

This quote is an encyclopaedia entry on the fruit. We are not so familiar with the fruit as with something else from the plant, but both are usually referred to by the same name. What name?

ANSWERKaffir Lime

6. It was a flavouring for the old wine ‘Hippocras” and is also known as ‘Grains of Paradise’.

Originally transported across the Sahara by caravan, the spices were popular in Europe from the time of Elizabeth 1, until the time of George III who proscribed them. Trade in this item dwindled after that and only the Scandinavians, who had a West African foothold, continued to use them. What?

ANSWERMelegueta Pepper

7This combination—1 tablespoon cinnamon, 1 teaspoon ground cloves, 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg, 1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom—takes its name from the fact that it is normally associated with one specific culinary item suggesting Americanness and order.

The combination may be used elsewhere, but the name has stuck. What name?

ANSWERApple Pie Spice

8. Purge me with _ _ _ _ _ _, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

Quote from the Bible which turned something into proverb for palate assault? (6 letters)

ANSWERHyssop. Some scholars believe that the repeated use of the European species name hyssop in the Bible was a translation goof-up. The reference was most probably to Syrian Oregano, a species more commonly found in that part of the world

9He wrote The Art of Compounding, which was first published in 1895 and has seen several editions after. The book was used as a pharmacological reference up until the 1960s. He also wrote another volume titled Extract and Perfumes. Most famous for something he came up with while an employee at Parke-Davis. Who?

ANSWERWilbur Scoville, who devised the Scoville Scale used to measure the ‘hotness’ of chillies.

10.“All freshly picked X, no matter how ripe, have a vile, intensely bitter taste. In order to make them palatable, they must be pickled. Since Y are sweet and indigenous to the Mediterranean, it's easy to imagine an innovative farmer or chef way back when thinking they would make the perfect neutralizer to the X’s natural acidity.”

What association does this quote explain?

ANSWERX= Olives

Y=Pimentos/Pimientos

11.Valencia oranges did really badly when transported to the New World due to terrible conditions there. This was nevertheless turned to advantage, and the use of whole cloves, cinnamon sticks, and coriander-seed is said to have been crucial in creating something distinctive. What?

ANSWER

The liqueur Curaçao is made from steeping the not-so hot descendants of the original Valencia oranges in alcohol with this combination of spices.

12.What Hindi/Urdu term is now defined as “a thick sauce of Indian origin that contains fruits, vinegar, sugar, and spices and is used as a condiment”?

ANSWERChutney

13. For most Indians, this is the familiar trade name for a paracetamol formulation used as analgesic and antipyretic. The name is derived from a flowering plant, and is properly used for two chemicals which give th e plant's best-known product its characteristic colour and hay-like taste. What?

ANSWERCrocin/Picrocrocin in Saffron.

14.“The mangoes have to be pickled as soon as they are picked, preferably the same day. The other thing is that only mangoes which have their stalk/ stem or “_____” (hence the name of the pickle) are used to make these pickles. The stem ensures that the “sap” (liquid which appears when the stem is separated from the mango) is retained and the mangoes are fresh.”

Gyaan from a cookery-blog about what Iyer/Kerala specialty?

ANSWERKannimanga pickle, an Iyer/Kerala pickle where the whole mango is pickled.

15In the US, this spice is normally sold with the names of two Asian countries prefixed to it as a way of distinguishing between what others would see as two different spices altogether. Which spice? What names?

ANSWERChinese and Ceylon, for Cinnamon. Chinese Cinnamon is actually Cassia.

16The tensions caused by the spices may be gauged from this 1623 event called, melodramatically, the ___ Massacre, after the island where one set of colonisers put another set of spice-merchants to death for spying on them.

This snowballed into a diplomatic confrontation and caused three wars between the European countries and continued to figure in history text-books all the way down to the 20th century. Which two powers? What event?

ANSWERThe Amboyna Massacre, after the island of Ambon where the Dutch slew ten British soldiers

17The two names we use are both derived from the Greek for bug. One name travelled to Latin and thence into English, the other went to Spanish from mediaeval Latin before arriving in English. What two names?

ANSWERCoriander and Cilantro

18

Columbus discovered some on San Salvador. In the 1660s, the genus was named by French botanist Joseph Pitton de Tournefort who connected its fruit with the Latin word for "box“. What?

ANSWERCapsicum

19Halmahera, Seram, Buru, Ambon, What's missing?

ANSWERTernate and Tidore, the Spice Islands.

20X is harvested by Indian tribes such as the Panares and the Piaoras or by local villagers, especially in the region around the Caura River, a tributary of the Orinoco. Harvesting takes place in the forests, and the tree is not cultivated.

Y is the parent organic compound of a class of naturally occurring phytochemicals found in many plant species. Its fragrance is described as a vanilla-like odor or the aroma of hay. Identified in the 1820s, Y has been synthesized in the laboratory since 1868 and used to make perfumes and flavorings. It is also used to prepare other chemicals -- in particular anticoagulants and rodent poison.

Y is found in a variety of plants, of which X is chief. It is thought to work by serving as a pesticide for the plants that produce it .ID X and Y

ANSWER

Tonka Beans and Coumarin