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Trust the stroppiest group of pods of all to give the greatest headaches where its species’ name is concerned.
First dubbed Capsicum angulofum by Phillip Miller in 1768, it was then promptly misnamed Capsicum chinense by Dutch-born, Huguenot physician, Nicolaas Joseph Jacquain (subsequently ennobled by Hapsburg Emperor Franz II to Nikolaus, Baron von Jacquain), who encountered a West Indian pepper of wrinkled, pendulous appearance during a plant finding mission in the Caribbean for Hapsburg Emperor Franz I (a predecessor of the one who raised him to the peerage in 1806) between 1754 and 1759.
Why, of all things, name a fruit with no discernible connections to China as being Chinese? History does not relate and so far no taxonomist, past nor present, has had the temerity to correct the glaringly obvious. Thus, old Nicolaas Jacquain’s Homeric nodding session has gone into history and firmly holds on to its allotted place: Capsicum chinense it is and, so far, it still remains.
Some of the most spectacularly pungent chiles are members of the Capsicum chinense species whose pungency levels range from barely discernible (very rarely), through the mid 100,000 and 200,000s to no fewer than 580,000 or more Scoville units. Having gambolled its way through the South American continent up into Meso-America, and hop-scotched all the way across the Caribbean Archipelago, leaving a highly diverse gene pool with a multitude of different shapes, colours and tastes in its wake, it has become one of the most important cultivated crops in the extended region it has made its home.
Pod variation in the Capsicum chinense species is highly marked, from pea sized berries of about 1cm to gnarled and wrinkled elongated lantern pods of 12cm or more and, of course, just about anything in between. Members of the Habanero clan are of the familiar pendulous lantern shape, while the Caribbean Scotch Bonnet type are borne erect with the flattened crumpled tam-o’-shanter appearance: bonnet-like, hence the name. Like the majority of immature chile pods, green at first, Chinense varieties mature to red, orange and yellow with, as greater rarities, white to almost translucent ivory, purple and chocolate brown as the most exceptional appearances.
Flavour and aroma, however, are the hallmarks of the Capsicum chinense gang, and those qualities, in the Habaneros in particular, are the most highly prized of all. One could hardly call the pungency incidental in the appreciation of the finest Capsicum chinense varieties’ fruit, but their exceptional aromatics are their crowning glory in any cuisine they’re made to serve.
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