Tepin
| Tepin | ||||||||||||
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Tepin |
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| Capsicum annuum var. Glabriusculum | ||||||||||||
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Tepin ( Capsicum annuum var. Glabriusculum ), also Chiltepin or Chiltecpin , is a wild-growing chilli , which can be used e.g. B. found in the Sonoran Desert . It is considered to be the "original form" of the chilli known today, even if only a part of the cultivated Capsicum belongs to the Capsicum annuum species .
Origin and history
Its use as a spice, medicine and wonder drug goes back 9000 years. In many Indian tribes, the tepin is considered sacred. In addition to the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern United States and neighboring Mexico, the US state of Texas is an important occurrence area.
Almost all chilli peppers known today and also all non-hot sweet peppers are cultivations and breeds from tepins.
The plant with hardly pea-sized fruits cannot be cultivated well, even commercial cultivation attempts are usually of little success, so tepins are harvested directly from the wild bushes, which are usually in the shade of larger trees. There the bushes can get up to 30 years old.
Spread
Since birds are not sensitive to capsaicin , which is responsible for the pungent sensation in mammals , they eat the berries from the bushes and later, usually also sitting on larger trees, excrete the undigested seeds together with the excrement, which also acts as fertilizer. Due to this type of spread ( ornithochory - bird spread), Chiltepin plants are preferred to be found under trees, which also serve as shade providers.
Use as a spice
Chiltepin is mostly used dry and is used as a seasoning for soups, meat dishes and the like. a. In addition to the sharpness, the fruits are used for their unique taste. Due to the laborious harvest, tepin fruits are very expensive and are among the most expensive spices in the world.
etymology
The name is derived from the Nahuatl language and roughly means "flea chili".