Spice tour

Working on ag in Tanzania, I knew that it would be very useful to go on a spice tour and learn a bit about this critical part of the agriculture sector, especially on Zanzibar.

It's amazing how much I learned in one morning - that vanilla is actually sort of an invasive vine, that cardomom grows at the roots of trees, that leaves from the arbaini tree can be boiled for a natural way to treat a bout of malaria, that mace is vibrant red and feels like plastic and is wrapped around the nutmeg seed, and that there's a pod that has bright orange natural dye that's used in tandoori chicken (pictured left).

I realized I actually knew so little about the origins of many of the items in my spice cabinet. Those dark brown cloves actually start out a vibrant red and yellow. And there's rambutan, a relative of the lychee that is a comical spikey red, yellow, and green fruit with a squishy, clear, delicious inside.

And all along, the tour guide helpers filled up our little palm leaf containers with samples from the trees, and fashioned all kinds of tree leaf ornamentation for us - I ended up with a frog necklace, two bracelets, a ring, and these stylin' profilin' glasses to complement my bride's maid basket of spice samples.

It's only appropriate that the SWAHILI WORD OF THE DAY is viungo, which means spices.