Tasmanian pepperberry ✦

Baies de Tasmanie

What it is

The bite is polygodial, a sesquiterpene dialdehyde with nothing in common with piperine or capsaicin, and it arrives late — two seconds of sweet berry, then a heat that keeps climbing for half a minute. Colonial cooks used the leaf as a pepper substitute; the berry only reached restaurant kitchens with the native-food revival of the 1980s.

In the kitchen

Dose it at the very end and at about a third of what you would use of black pepper, tasting after a full thirty seconds — judged too early, you will double it. It stains: a pinch turns a cream sauce grey-purple.

Goes with

Venison Beef Wattleseed Macadamia Dark chocolate Lamb

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