a. pepper primer
Pepper comes from the drupes, or berry-like fruits, of a
climbing vine botanically known as Piper Nigrum and commonly
called — what else? — pepper vine.
Depending on the region and the type of finished product desired, the hand-picked fruits
are subjected to varying degrees of moist heat to promote
fermentation and are then dried by forced air via machines or by
basking for several days in the sun. Once dried, a peppercorn is born. From here, a peppercorn may be destined to become a
component of bottled pickling brine or to be packaged and sold
whole "as-is" or as pre-cracked or ground pepper.
(The green drupes of the Piper Nigrum will ripen to red while on the vine, but these
red peppercorn are not the same as the more widely available
pink peppercorn —
SPOILER: pink peppercorn
is harvested from a different plant.)
b. price of spice
For most people, the purchase of ground black pepper from the
supermarket isn’t much of a financial setback. At one time,
however, the price of pepper was nothing to sneeze at. In fact,
peppercorns have been used as currency or collateral at
different times in history.
For example, when the Goths seized
Rome in the 5th century, the king’s ransom demand included 3,000
pounds of peppercorns. During the middle ages, it was often
permissible to pay rent or taxes in peppercorns, a practice that
gave us the expression “peppercorn rent.”
To this day,
peppercorn payments legally refer to a nominal monetary
consideration in the creation of an agreement to make a purchase
of, for example, real estate or a car. These minimal payments
are commonly expressed in deeds and title transfers as, “in
consideration of one dollar,” to reflect the transfer of
ownership without divulging the actual purchase price.